BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING

October 11, 2003, Red Rock, Nevada

President C. Mike Tomlinson called the meeting to order at 11:15 a.m.

President Tomlinson addressed the Board, advising the purpose of holding the meeting at the site of the championship ride was to garner membership input during a face-to-face meeting. He further advised that those motions presented by the board that impact the riders will not be voted upon, they will be published in the Endurance News to bring forth the opinions of the membership.

Also present for the meeting: Directors: Mike Maul, Jan Jeffers, Terry Woolley Howe, Vonita Bowers, Margie Burton, Connie Caudill, Dean Jackson, Jan Stevens, Stan Eichelberger, Patti Pizzo, Stephanie Teeter, Gail Williams, John H. Parke, Susan Kasemeyer, Duane Barnett, Randy Eiland, Roger W. Taylor, Maryben Stover, Jim Baldwin, Barney Fleming, Stagg Newman, Robert Ribley, and Executive Director Kathleen Henkel. Absent: Maggy Price, Louise Riedel, and Dane Frazier.

Dane Frazier asked to be excused from this board meeting due to family illness. Maggy Price asked to be excused from the meeting due to illness and Louise Riedel asked to be excused from the meeting due to a caregiver issue. It was moved and seconded to excuse all three. Motion passed.

Moved by Susan Kasemeyer, resolved, that the Board of Directors excuse those Directors who missed the September 16, 2003 Board of Directors meeting due to their having attended the Pan Am Endurance event and were still en route back home. Seconded by Stan Eichelberger. Motion passed with Barney Fleming abstaining.

Moved by Stagg Newman and seconded by Susan Kasemeyer that the Board of Directors excuse Director Louise Riedel from the September 16, 2003 conference call due to a caregiver issue and Robert Ribley due to work on the National Championship ride. Motion passed.

Roger Taylor moved to approve the minutes of the September 16, 2003 conference call. Motion passed, with Vonita Bowers and Jim Baldwin abstaining.

Kathleen advised all is going well in the office. Media kits were presented for the board’s perusal. Judy Hall was introduced and it was advised she will be handling vendor booth assignments regarding the convention and Liz Bryson was introduced as the finance director. Troy was unable to attend this meeting.

Terry Woolley Howe advised she has written an article relative to the unpaid rider fee list for publication in the December issue of the Endurance News.

John Parke, Legal Committee Chair, advised he has reviewed the Canadian ride insurance policy. President Tomlinson suggested a meeting between John Parke and Roger Taylor to further discuss the ride insurance issue.

John Parke advised Debi Sanger did provide some documentation to the office showing she filed a petition for discharge, however, because this is a bankruptcy law issue, the matter is under review by a bankruptcy attorney and John will report the outcome at a future meeting.

Kathleen advised the office is in continual contact with NATRC. At present working together regarding the sharing of some expenses regarding speakers. John Parke advised the 2005 convention contract from the Nugget looks fine, however he does have a couple of unanswered questions regarding the cost for meeting rooms.

Sites regarding the 2006 convention was discussed. Information for hosting the convention in the city of San Antonio was presented – room rates at $99 per night to $119 per night, and food and beverage charges of $15,000 must be met by the group. Negotiations continuing.

Connie Caudill, Co-Chair, NC Committee, thanked Carol Hoeft for the job she is doing on the current NC ride. The committee recommends moving the championship ride from region to region each year. Recommended sites: June 2005, Fort Howes, and August 2006, the Wolverine ride. The committee is currently looking at six rides for the future and is developing a 5-year plan for the ride. Motion from committee: Move the ride every year after the Red Rock ride next year - Fort Howes in the Mountain Region is the site for 2005 and the Wolverine Ride in the Midwest Region is the choice for 2006. Motion passed. 1 abstention – Jan Stevens. Firm dates for each ride will be available for the board meeting to be held in conjunction with the convention in Reno in February 2004.

Barney Fleming, Past Presidents Committee Chair, advised the Committee has met twice via conference call. The long-range plan for AERC is a work in progress. The mission statement will be proposed during the convention board meeting.

Connie Caudill, Ride Managers Committee Chair, reported the video is being worked on and it will be a success. Editing is the next step with the Ride Managers committee as the spearhead, with input from the Veterinary and Education Committees. Completion is anticipated for the convention.

Jim Baldwin, Veterinary Committee Chair, reported the audiotape is a work in progress. When the script is complete, Jim will seek approval of the Board. Motion from committee: Effective for the 2004 ride season, AERC riders must use an AERC rider card or equivalent thereof and the information contained thereon is the joint property of the rider, ride manager, veterinarians involved, AERC Board of Directors and the AERC Veterinary Committee.

John Parke, Legal Committee Chair, moved to defer the above motion until the convention to afford time for publication of the issue in the magazine.

Stephanie Teeter seconded the motion to defer. Motion passed.

Stagg Newman, Co-Chair, Education Committee, thanked those that worked on the re-write of the Riders Handbook. The handbook is complete and the office can proceed with the reprint.

Patti Pizzo, Rules Committee Chair, advised the edited rules have been forwarded to the board and no changes received from members of the board. Motion before the board from committee to accept the recommended versions of the statement to be placed in the rules preamble, along with the recommended versions for Rule 9.4.2.1, and L9.4.1.2 as submitted in the Rules Committee report of September 12, 2003, in conjunction with the Board conference call held Tuesday, September 16, 2003.

After discussion, it was decided to use the original motion as passed in Salt Lake City regarding the rules preamble.

Voting took place on the recommended version of Rule 9.4.2.1 and the recommended version of Rule L9.4.1.2, and the motion passed to accept the recommended versions for printing in the next rulebook.

Regarding Rule 14, Stephanie Teeter moved to defer voting on Rule 14, with Gail Williams seconding the motion. Motion to defer failed.

Roger Taylor moved to remove Rule 14 from the rulebook. Motion seconded by Robert Ribley. Motion passed with one abstention: Jim Baldwin.

The office will proceed with the rules reprint.

John Parke, Welfare of the Horse Committee Chair, presented initial policy recommendations from the Committee, summarized as follows:

1) The Rules should be amended to allow 30 minutes rather than the present one hour for a horse to pass its post-finish-line vet check.

2) The Veterinarian's Handbook should be amended to recommend the use of the CRI, at a minimum, at each vet check of 45 minutes or longer and also at any vet check if the veterinarian has doubts about a horse's fitness to continue.  The Handbook should also state that the CRI is considered a tool to evaluate the horse along with other factors and not a stand alone test.  The AERC should make training available on the use of the CRI to all ride veterinarians and riders by demonstrations at the convention, instructional videos, handouts, articles in Endurance News or whatever other means the Board or other appropriate committees consider to be effective.

3) The Rules should be amended to require beginning riders to finish their first four rides in a minimum time no less than 2/3 of the maximum time currently permitted for a given ride length, i.e. 4 hours for a 25 mile ride or 8 hours for a 50 mile ride.  The Tomcat record keeping program should be modified so that the AERC national office can monitor compliance with this requirement in order to minimize the burden on ride managers.

The Committee will prepare an article for Endurance News on these policy recommendations in order to promote discussion of the recommendations by the AERC membership.  The Committee will ask the Board to vote on these recommendations at the board meeting at the convention.  Aside from these initial recommendations, the Committee will review and/or develop other policy recommendations to present to the Board in future reports.

Gail Williams, Limited Distance Committee Chair, reported the committee has held two conference calls since the board meeting on September 16, 2003, and the minutes from both meetings are available in the office. A new Limited Distance award will be proposed at a future meeting similar to the Bill Stuckey award currently available for the endurance rider over age 65 completing the most miles in a season. Jene Moseley has offered to sponsor this award in an amount up to $150.

The committee continues work on a Limited Distance Best Condition proposal. Currently, Rule L9 states, “An award may be available for the horse judged to be in the Best Condition.” A motion from committee will be presented during a future meeting to change the rule to read that an award will be available; changing the word may to will.

Maryben Stover, Junior Committee Chair, advised the committee will rework the 100 mile award proposal motion as presented in the Junior Committee report to the Board for the September 16, 2003 meeting, for presentation at a future meeting. Second motion from committee is as follows: Current Policy: A junior applies to the AERC for an unsponsored rider letter. When the letter is sent, the junior is automatically put in the senior rider weight division. All junior points earned in their region for that year just disappear. This effectively nullifies their junior standing.

However, by rule, juniors are sometimes required to compete in two divisions at once. If a ride manager does not allow unsponsored juniors, they must go back to the sponsored junior division. However, they do not earn junior points. Since they can’t earn senior points they seem to be in some type of limbo.

Proposal: When a junior requests an unsponsored junior status, the AERC would assign that rider a new AERC number, in addition to the original number. The junior would then be responsible for entering rides under the proper number. Once the junior reached 16 years and became a senior rider, the new AERC number would be retired and the mileage transferred to the original number and the status changed to the proper weight division.

This would be a fair way for juniors to retain their regional points and standings by having their points and mileage posted to the correct division.

Costs: This has been discussed with the AERC office and would be a simple procedure. Cost, if any, would be minimal.

Effective Date: Immediately, upon approval.

The second motion from committee as stated above, failed with Jim Baldwin abstaining.

President Tomlinson moved “Resolved that the Board of Directors authorize the President of AERC to have AERC affiliate with USEF, as the new NGB, pending review and acceptance by the Legal Committee”, seconded by Susan Kasemeyer. Motion passed.

Mike Maul, Technical Committee Chair, reported that the new website is up and running. There were a few technical problems associated with the site but those have been smoothed out. Technical problems associated with the email list are also being worked out.

Mike Maul advised the Doublejoy site containing AERC ride results and standings, rider and horse history, etc., receives approximately a million and a half hits a year. The software was developed and is currently owned by AERC member Russ Humphrey. Russ presently volunteers his time and money to run the site as he has been doing over the past 8 years. It is the recommendation of the Technical Committee to purchase the software, as it exists today from Mr. Humphrey. $15,000 for the coming year has been added to the Technical Committee budget for this project, and $10,000 will be added to the budget for the next couple of years to cover the cost of purchase. Motion from committee to approve the $15,000 budget request for this year’s budget to potentially be used toward the purchase of the Doublejoy software. Contract pertaining to the purchase will be presented to the Board at a future date for approval. Motion passed with Jim Baldwin, Connie Caudill and Randy Eiland abstaining.

Barney Fleming, Research Grants Committee Chair, presented a motion from committee as follows: “It is moved that the Board of Directors approve a budget amount of $45,000 to be available for funding veterinary research proposals. No specific grants will be awarded until the Board has voted on the individual proposal.

Vonita Bowers moved for a roll call vote and Terry Woolley Howe seconded. Motion for roll call vote passed.

Roll call vote taken as follows: Mike Maul, Jan Jeffers, Connie Caudill, Jan Stevens, Stephanie Teeter, Susan Kasemeyer, and Maryben Stover voted Against, Terry Woolley Howe, Vonita Bowers, Margie Burton, Dean Jackson, Stan Eichelberger, Patti Pizzo, John Parke, Duane Barnett, Randy Eiland, Roger Taylor, Jim Baldwin, Barney Fleming, Stagg Newman and Robert Ribley voted For, and Gail Williams abstained. Motion passed.

Motion from committee presented by Barney Fleming: Penn State/Dr. Durando grant request: Ranked #1 in the proposals received and graded A. Good value and very possibly could identify horses that maybe should not be involved in our sport. The committee recommends funding this study now. AERC member Meg Sleeper is part of the study. Grant request: $6050. Motion passed with one abstention: Jim Baldwin.

The 3 additional grant motions before the board from committee have been rescinded until the Board meeting to be held in conjunction with the convention to allow the Board further time for review. President Tomlinson requested the members of the Board to forward any questions regarding the remaining 3 projects to Barney for answers before the convention Board meeting.

Roger Taylor, Trails Grants Committee Chair, reported the War Eagle Trail Association project is off and running. Equipment is being purchased and the work has started.

Motion from committee presented by Roger Taylor: “The Harrison-Crawford and Clark State Forest project to be funded out of next years funds for a maximum of $5,000. Funds to cover rental of machinery to work on trails in the above areas. The project coordinator be informed by the Executive Director when funds are available for disbursement upon proper receipt of rental agreement paperwork. This funding should be from trails set aside funds.” Motion withdrawn until the next meeting to afford the committee more time for review.

Motion from committee presented by Roger Taylor: “The Wolf Creek Trailhead project be funded for the first part of the project out of next years funds for a maximum of $15,000. Funds to cover the road construction to the trailhead. The project coordinator be informed by the Executive Director when funds are available for disbursement. This is anticipated to be a contracted construction with funds dispersed upon appropriate approvals and paperwork to the AERC Office. This funding should be from a regular budgeted line item. Motion withdrawn until the next meeting, with a request to print an article regarding this project in the Endurance News.

Jerry Fruth, Trails Advocacy Chair, reviewed a written report from the Trail Committee including information regarding the trails symposiums attended by Jerry, and he also presented the budget request for the coming year from the Trails Committee. Jerry reported that horse identification will be required in the next two years. The USDA has requested the American Horse Council to work up a program that will work throughout all industries involving horses. Jerry advised the Technical Committee will be contacted regarding the set-up of this program. Any horse that ships inter or intra state will need to be identified. Jerry was thanked by the Board for his work on trails.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) sponsorship contract was reviewed by John Parke, Legal Committee Chair, and John advised the office to sign and return the contract to the BLM.

Jim Baldwin, Veterinary Committee Chair, requested a total of $3500 in the upcoming budget for the possible use on postmortems with respect to equines that die in connection with a ride. A protocol will be written for the postmortems before any fees are disbursed.

Jim discussed his plan for revamping the current drug testing procedure, stating he would prefer a drug testing kit be available in all regions at all times, to travel to rides with veterinarians. Dr. Baldwin and Dr. Fleming have agreed to discuss the pros and cons of the current drug testing procedures and Dr. Baldwin’s new plan, and will report at a future meeting.

Terry Woolley Howe, Treasurer, advised it is anticipated AERC will have approximately a $100,000 profit for the 2003 fiscal year. Some salary increases were requested for the staff, along with a bonus for yearend in the upcoming fiscal year. The Finance Committee recommendation is that the budget be accepted as presented. Budget passed as amended – Technical Committee budget went up by $5,000 from what was printed and the Trails Committee budget went down by $10,000.

Vonita Bowers, Sanction Committee Chair, presented from committee the new sanction form, including special sanction request info and insurance information and requested a vote on the acceptance of the new form. Passed – the new form will be printed by the office.

Randy Eiland, Chair, Sponsorship Committee, advised there is need for a new demographic study of AERC’s membership. It was recommended by President Tomlinson that Randy work with the Education Committee, the Veterinary Committee, and any other committee that may be interested in having some questions added to the survey. Stan Eichelberger will chair a new ad hoc committee regarding the production of a survey pertinent to demographics. An attempt will be made to locate a school to handle the survey project.

Special Sanction request regarding Fort Stanton requires Board approval: The ride is currently slated for 2 three day rides: June 13, 14, 15, and then a day off, and the second 3-day ride on June 17, 18, 19, 2004, is the ride that requires Board approval. Board approves the ride.

Jim Baldwin, Veterinary Committee Chair, advised he will forward some changes to the Board for review in time for the next meeting regarding the procedures for reporting equine deaths.

Stephanie Teeter brought forth a motion from a previous meeting as follows: “The Sanctioning Committee shall initially receive all requests for Special Event and Special Qualification rides and render a committee decision on the request for sanctioning. If there is not a unanimous decision by the Sanctioning Committee, the sanction request shall then go before the AERC Board for final review and decision. Further, the Board directs the Executive Director to publish in the May and June issues of Endurance News, the original motion to modify the process of Special Event and Special Qualification sanctioning as well as the recommendations from the referenced committees. A final motion (original or revised) will then be brought to the AERC Board for final consideration at the Midyear AERC Board Meeting. If approved it will be effective for the 2004 ride season.” Sanction Committee approves the motion, Ride Managers Committee does not approve. Roll call vote: Mike Maul, Jan Jeffers, Vonita Bowers, Stan Eichelberger, Stephanie Teeter, Gail Williams, John Parke, Maryben Stover, Jim Baldwin, and Robert Ribley voted For; Terry Woolley Howe, Connie Caudill, Dean Jackson, Jan Stevens, Susan Kasemeyer, Duane Barnett, Patti Pizzo, Randy Eiland, Roger Taylor, Barney Fleming, and Stagg Newman voted Against. One abstention: Margie Burton. Motion failed.

Action in lieu of Executive Committee regarding the date change for the Doncaster Ride due to the impending hurricane, passed.

John Parke advised he has looked into blanket liability releases from riders, however the matter requires further review and will be discussed at a future meeting.

Meeting adjourned at 5:50 p.m.

Respectfully submitted,

Jan Jeffers, Secretary