Minutes of Ottawa Orienteering Club 2009 Annual General Meeting

Held January 17, 2010 at Tanglewood Community Centre – 4pm

Present: Richard Aranoff, David Agar, Jeffrey Teutsch, Linda Connell, Andrea Blindenbacher, Isabelle Robert, Bill Anderson, Steve Buchko, Bill Meldrum, Stefan Bergström, Bert Waslander, Michael Haynes, Mary Anne Fairburn, Adrian Turcanu, Rorry Harding, Andreas Buss, Randy Kemp, Andrew Cornett, Karen Tippett, Richard and Lorna Guttormson, Barbara and Allan Gravelle.

1. Minutes of the 2008 AGM were approved with the correction of one typo.  Moved by Lorna, seconded by Rorry

2. President’s Report – full report attached

3. Director’s Reports

a)      Treasurers Report – attached is the report updated for the changes approved here.

Bill A. reported that the inventory will be reduced by ~$1000 as he will be selling sets of  flags purchased as school sets to Eric T. for sale in his new business.  He also has 4-6 club jackets available for sale.

Bill A. moved the software budget be increased to $900 in order to purchase 2 OCAD licenses to accommodate our increased numbers of mappers.  Bill M. seconded. Carried

Randy moved we included a $250 expense COF fundraiser item.  They will be selling buffs that can be used for prizes.  Stefan seconded.  Carried

Karen mentioned James Connell did the budget review.  He did find some addition errors in the meet reports.  Karen encouraged all meet directors to review their reports carefully for such errors in the future.

Karen moved approval of the revised budget.  Andrew seconded.  Carried.

b)      Membership – report attached

Steve moved that membership fees remain the same as last year $20 for first adult, $10 for additional adults, $6 additional junior and $10 for individual junior.  Karen seconded. Carried

c)      Local Meets – report

Andrew mentioned that a number of meet directors this year were first time meet directors and thanked Stefan for the course given last winter.

It was suggested OOC should do 4 of the 5 Summer Solstice meets as participants are getting tired of the continual reuse of the LGOC Rockcliffe and Green’s Creek maps.

Michael Haynes mentioned it would be good to track the number of youth participating as the government is concerned about youth obesity and would be more open to support if numbers could show youth participation.

d)      Promotion – report attached

Many suggestions were contributed by members present.  Orienteering is now part of the Cadets program, so we might get more involved there.  Articles submitted to Trail running and other athletic magazines would reach the athletic folks. Inviting politicians to the Welcome meet would then draw reporters.  Unique stories of athletes, human interest stories are more acceptable to the papers.  Outdoor education programs are getting keen on orienteering.  It was also suggested that brochures for the COC’s might be added to the Ottawa Marathon and the Triathalon kits.

e)      Junior Program

Our junior program supported 8 juniors financially in attending some 58 out of town meets.  Rorry suggested he may be able to obtain a sport psychologist to speak to the group.  Adrian asked if adults could be encouraged to train with their youngsters and perhaps other adults also learn from the training sessions.  It was suggested there be a seminar for parents to fully understand the program and that the program needs to be better publicized.

4.      Other Reports

a)      Orienteering Quebec – there was no OQ AGM as there were no participants beyond the Board.  They are flush with money ($30,000), but are low on volunteers.  Bill A. mentioned there is some interest in the Sherbrooke area.

b)      SportIdent – the club will be looking to upgrade the SI system and also add 2 modules for the COC’s

c)      2010 COC planning – report attached

d)      Mapping – report attached

Bill further reported that we were very fortunate to have had the best Canadian mapper, Bryan Chubb, and a top International mapper, Ales Hejna, working on the maps for the 2010 COCs.  It has been helpful to have meet directors update their maps where they feel confident doing so. Stefan presented the ski-o map used earlier in the day – the first map for 2010.

e)      Pat de St. Croix event

Moved by the Board of Directors of the OOC:

“The Ottawa Orienteering Club wishes to honour the memory of Pat de St. Croix who, through her positive outlook, boundless energy, and expert organizational skills, had contributed to the development and growth of orienteering at the club, provincial, and national level for over 40 years.”

“We propose that we name one club event every year the ‘Pat de St. Croix Memorial Event’ and that she be honoured at that event’s awards ceremony by a public announcement.  We also propose that 10% of gross revenue from that event will be donted to the Canadian Cancer Society in Pat’s honour.  For 2010 we propose that the Memorial Event be the middle distance race at the Canadian Championships in August.  The venue for that event will be in a beautiful setting n the Carp Ride.  The OOC Boad of Directors will, each spring, choose one meet when the season’s schedule is finalized and publicize that meet as the Memorial Event.”

f)        40^th Anniversary – Richard present Alan Gravelle with a copy of the story he contributed in honour of the clubs 40^th anniversary, which was illustrated by Liran Raz and expressed our thanks to those early orienteers who built our club.

5.      Election of Officers – Bill Meldrum presented a slate of officers but also invited nominations from the floor.  The new Board, approved at the meeting, will be:

President:         Randy Kemp

Treasurer          Karen Tippett

Secretary          Lynda Scrivens

Events Coordinator       Andrew Cornett

Directors at Large

Membership     Steve Buchko

Publicity           Jeff Teutsch

                        Rorry Harding

                        Linda Connell

                        Anne Teutsch

6. Plans for 2010 – Randy expressed his plans as follows:

                                 i.      Support Richard and Lorna in their effort to put on the Best COC’s ever;

                               ii.      Continue to put on a very ambitious schedule of meets in the spring and fall seasons;

                              iii.      Continue to develop our juniors;

                             iv.      Support our mappers in the development of our new maps;

and his Personal Ambitions or Goals:

                                       i.      Improve the function of OQ as our Provincial Federation;

                                     ii.      Explore the creation of an inventory of neighourhood park O-maps throughout the city;

                                    iii.      Update our existing inventory of maps, especially those located in Quebec.

7. At 6pm Rorry moved the meeting be adjourned, seconded by Andreas.

Following the meeting and supper, Randy organized all comers into an Orienteering Quatrathalon.‏ 

Ottawa Orienteering Club

Annual General Meeting

January 17, 2010

President's Report

2009 Marks the 40^th year that the Ottawa Orienteering Club has been operating.  We owe more than we can say to those hard-working and visionary folks who introduced the sport of orienteering to Ottawa and who put it and this club on such a firm footing.  Thanks to their start and the continued hard work of our many volunteers OOC is one of the most active and most respected Orienteering Clubs in the country.  Those who visit and work with other clubs can confirm my experience that we are looked upon as models of what can and should be done in this sport.  We have more and better meets, more and better athletes, more and better officials than almost any club in the country.  This is not my doing, it is yours.  Before we let our heads get all swollen, though we also have much to learn from our sister clubs on how to promote and organize our sport.

In the 40 years since the club's first meet on a black and white copy of a topo map to today much has changed.  No longer are maps lovingly hand drawn on mylar, then sent to printers for offset printing in their hundreds, only to become out of date.  Now they are lovingly drawn on computer screens, courses added and printed as needed with all the updates the course setter had time to include.  No longer to we copy master maps before setting out on a B-meet and no longer are courses printed on A-meet maps with what are, in effect, gigantic rubber stamps.  Comparing split times used to be only for those who remembered to punch their stop watches at each control.  Now they are posted on the Internet for the whole world to see.

To celebrate our 40^th we got Alan Gravelle, Colin Kirk and Gord Hunter to reminisce on old time orienteering and the club's founding and posted these reminiscences on the web site.  Liran Raz provided three illustrations.  I hope you all enjoyed reading the stories of the olden days.  Less popular were the on-line contests we posted, but they were fun to post.

But back to the present...

In 2009 we continued to ramp up our mapping efforts through the use of three professional mappers, Bill Anderson, Ales Hejna and Bryan Chubb, and one apprentice, Eric Kemp as well and hard working volunteer mappers like Stefan Bergström and Andrew Cornett.  We were successful in getting a grant from the Ontario Trillium Foundation to help us pay for this.  More in Bill's mapping report.

In 2009 we formally applied for and received authorization to host the 2010 Canadian Championships, for which we will use three of the new maps we creating this year.  OOC last hosted the championships in 1996.  More in Lorna's report.

This year, in addition to keeping our affiliation to Orientering Québec, the Club is now a full member of the Ontario Orienteering Association.  We have had a close relationship with our Ontario colleagues for many years, being associate members and obtaining our initial SI equipment through working with them.  We used our strengthened relationship to once again get OOA assistance in obtaining the Ontario Trillium Foundation grant, I mentioned before.  We also have received approval to host the 2011 Ontario Championships.  These will be, as usual, on the Thanksgiving weekend.

I mentioned at the outset that we had more meets and more officials than probably any other club.  This year Stefan held a very well attended Level One course and from this we have four, soon-to-be-certified officials.  We had incomplete records with COF of the status of many aspiring officials and Linda Connell brought bring the records up to date last spring.  There remain a number of folks who have half-completed certifications.  I propose to make it one of my projects this coming year to get folks the other half.

It is in part because of these official that we are able to host so many meets. -That and the hard work of Andrew in organizing the schedule and getting folks to volunteer.  More in Andrew's report.  Equally important are the contributions of the two teams that help put on all meets: the registration folks and the SI team.  My thanks to Linda as registration spark-plug and Eric Teutsch as SI chief.

The major story for Lorna and me in 2009 (and an even bigger story in 2010) is the Canadian Championships.  Getting this going is more work that I ever imagined and we're just getting started.  We would not be able to even come close without the hard work of the COC 2010 team members who are ramping up to make this event a great success.  More in Lorna's report.

In closing, my special thanks to the members of the OOC Board of Directors for their dedication, work and ideas.  Also,my thanks to what we call the “Extended Board;” folks who used to be Board members and who continue to attend Board meetings and be active in steering the club and doing what needs to be done.

Richard Guttormson

January 2010

Membership Report – 2009

In 2009, the club introduced a new membership fee structure, to align with changes that were made to the Canadian Orienteering Federation (COF) membership fees.  As a result of this change, the “limited” membership category was eliminated, and all OOC members are now also members of the COF.

The new fee structure did not have any negative impact on OOC membership numbers in 2009, and the club received several positive comments on the changes.

As of the end of 2009, our club had a total of 210 individual club members, including 26members who reactivated their membership this year, after letting it lapse in 2008 (or earlier).  The total membership is an increase over 2008, when we had 184 active members of the club.

56 new members (45 adults, 11 juniors) joined the club in 2009.  This was offset by a loss of 56 members (43 adults, 13 juniors) who did not renew this year.

Adult Members:  162 of the 210 active embers or 77% of the club

Junior Members:  48 of the 210 active members, or 23% of the club

Between 12% and 20% of people who join our club will remain members over the long term.  That means that a large portion of our club membership consists of relatively new members:

Orienteers  who have been with the club for 10 years or more:  31.0%

Orienteers who have been with the club for 4 to 9 years:  25.6%

Orienteers who have been with the club for 3 years or less:  43.4%

Membership Fee Proposal For 2009

The OOC board of directors is recommending that membership fees remain unchanged in 2009.  The proposed membership fees for 2009 areas follows:

• $20 for the first adult,  $10 per additional adult family members, $6 per additional junior* family member

• $10 for an individual junior* membership

*Juniors are those not yet 21 as of December 31, 2010

This proposal is identical to the 2009 membership fees.

ORIENTEERING PUBLICITY REPORT - 2009

Welcome Meet:

Good turn-out of approximately 70 people at McCarthy Woods. Combined the meet with a celebration of our anniversary and a cake bought at COSTCO. Great value.

City of Ottawa Program:

We were in their pamphlet for a spring session but not enough people registered to run it. Linda Connell and Lorna Guttormson ran it in 2008.

Trailhead Spring Outdoor Show:

Gloria Rankin and Linda Connell set up a booth in the parking lot of Trailhead for 4 hours on a Saturday. We handed out brochures and had examples of maps and courses. A lot of interest shown and pamphlets taken.

Pamphlets:

translation by Julie Yelle 613-526-9725

Coverstock 500 sheets: $29.92

Printing - $177.09

Printed at Staples Business Depot on Merivale Road

Distribute to:

Aylmer City Hall

Bushtukah*

Camp de base Relais*

Carleton and Ottawa Universities

City Hall

Cycle Bertrand*

Duguay Sports, 400 boul. A. Taché in Hull*

Fresh Air*

Gatineau Park Visitor Centre* – Danielle 819-827-6056

Greg Christies*

Marc Sports, 455 boul. Maloney in Gatineau

MEC*

Nepean Centrepointe*

Nepean Sportsplex*

RA

Running Room – Merivale*

Sports Échange Outaouais, 1065 boul. de la Carrière in Hull

Sport4 – Kanata Centrum

Trailhead*

The Expedition Shop

Walking Club Pamphlet Exchange: Benoit 746-9071 and Nigel Brereton <nigeltb@primus.ca>

World of Maps*

YMCA - Merivale*

Richard*, Bill A*. and Gloria*, Cherie*, Isabelle*, Stephan*

Submission to Papers and Contacts:

Eg:

ORIENTEERING

The Ottawa Orienteering Club will be holding their next meet on Sunday, October 5th at Cite des Jeunes. There will be several different levels of courses suitable for all abilities whether you are a family of walkers preferring trails or a runner/competitor who enjoys off-trail compass work. There are experienced orienteers on site as well who will help beginners get started ..... everyone is welcome. Visit our website at www.ottawaoc.ca for more information and the location of future meets (under Local Meets).

Come and join us!!  This meet is part of the Summer Solstice series of meets in the city on Tuesday nights. Come and see how many controls you can get in one hour. There are experienced orienteers on site as well who will help beginners get started ..... everyone is welcome. Visit our website at  www.ottawaoc.ca for more information and the location of future meets (under Local Meets).

Ottawa Citizen

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/index.html

Local Sports Calendar

sports@thecitizen.canwest.com

 Mail to: Glenn Horner c/0 The Ottawa Citizen, 1101 Baxter Rd, Box 5020, Ottawa, ON K2C 3M4

(published every second Saturday and information must be received no later than the Monday preceding the date of publication).

E-mail Martin Cleary for Monday column  mcleary@thecitizen.canwest.com   613-596-3748

Get Out There Magazine: (done by Linda May 23^rd)

Contact: info@getouttheremag.com.

http://www.getouttheremag.com/evententry.php

Barrhaven Weekender Newspaper:

Margaret 823-9284 ext 221

Nepean Weekender:

Send community event by e-mail to nwedit@runge.net or call 823-9284

Community calendar, article of interest

Nepean This Week

Submit ideas/story to editor editor@nepeanthisweek.com

Christie Mailey, Editor, Nepean This Week, 9 Camelot Drive, Ste 22, Nepean, ON K2G 5W6  at 723-7951 EXT 18

Bushtukah:

Dave Morton: davem@bushtukah.com

Ottawa Board of Education

Sean Clancy – Sports Coordinator  613-721-1820

Ottawa Outdoors Magazine:

Dave Brown editor@OttawaOutdoors.ca

2706 Alta Vista Drive, Ste #107, Ottawa, ON K1V 7T4

613-860-8687

Ottawa Outdoors http://www.ottawaoutdoors.ca/index.php .  For posting of events on their calendar.

Ottawa XPress:

Matt Harrison, assistant editor

613-237-8226 ext 228

mharrison@ottawaxpress.ca

www.ottawaxpress.ca

Summer guide articles on interesting sport’s events/activities

PennySaver:

sfouchard@thenewsemc.ca.

Sabine Gibbins
Reporter
Kanata, Stittsville/Richmond EMC
Phone:          613-599-5520 ext. 208
Fax:            613-599-9389

SleepMonsters: (sent on March 25^th – reply to hotmail account)

http://www.sleepmonsters.ca

West Carleton Weekender (published every Friday)

Send information to: tboland@runge.net

West Carleton EMC

sgibbins@emckanata.ca

Zone Sports:

http://www.zonesportsnews.com

**You can also find an extensive list of local papers at http://www.runge.net

Submission to Calendars:

MEC: submitted to calendar May 23^rd 

http://www.mec.ca/Apps/communityEvents/events_submission.jsp

Trailhead: submitted to calendar on May 23^rd 

https://www.trailhead.ca/?view=addevent

eg:  ORIENTEERING: Sunday, April 15^th

Local Orienteering Meet near Kanata Lakes organized by the Ottawa Orienteering Club. Everyone is welcome and several courses will be available to suit all ages and abilities - novice through expert. Please check the club website www.ottawaoc.ca for further details.

Suggestions:

E-mail addresses from non-members kept anywhere? There should be a follow-up of new participants.

Encourage articles from club members.

Personal contacts in the media?

Hopefully, a spin-off from the Canadians.

A spring rogaine?

Encourage people to introduce orienteering to established clubs such as running clubs, ski clubs etc.

MAPPING REPORT 2009 AGM – Bill Anderson

Received a $12,000 Grant in Kind from Trillium.

Canadian Championship Maps – 4 mappers

Bryan Chubb (Month of May)

Spreckley’s Trails on Carp Ridge

March Highlands – east side

Foley Mountain – NE corner

Ales Hejna  (6 weeks in the fall)

Barrens on Carp Ridge

March Highlands – west side

NRC sprint map – 2 corners

Bill Anderson (winter, spring & summer)

All base maps

Wellness Centre on Carp Ridge

March Highlands – SE corner

Foley Mountain – SW corner

Andrew Cornett (summer, fall)

NRC Sprint map – base & core area field work

New Ottawa Area Maps

Carleton University Sprint Map – Bill Anderson

McCarthy Woods – Bill A. and Eric Kemp

Timm Rd. North (in progress) – Eric K.

YMCA Camp Ski-O - Stefan

Updated Maps in 2009

Lac Philippe (Bill A.), Stoney Swamp (Peter Laurich), Lac Beauchamp (Bill M., Randy Kemp), plus others that I can’t specifically recall.  Stefan for sure has updated his maps.

Priorities for 2010

Wellness Centre extension & trail construction (COC) Bill A.

Extension of Spreckley’s Trails to equestrian farm – new landowner (COC) Bill A.

Update Nakkertok for relay (COC) Bill A.

Mapping Clinic (plus refresher) for new & old mappers

Update south side of Fortune – Bill Meldrum

Complete Timm Rd. North – Eric Kemp

Update most popular areas – Cite des Jeunes, Stoney, Sportsplex, Kingsmere, etc. (Eric K., Bill A., etc)

Other Projects

Check out Mer Blue

Complete Foley Mountain

Base maps for Meech Valley, Charleston Lake, Gould Lake

Pinhey’s Point – City of Ottawa

U. de Sherbrooke