History of the Coldwater Club

President Gary Pipher called the meeting to order directly after shuffling on June 26th , 2008.

All of the club members were invited to attend. Attendance was taken and a quorum declared.

Before we begin the meeting President Pipher wanted to congratulate the members of the Coldwater Shuffleboard Club who took part in the Napanee Summer Slam. Doris Bumstead was the winner of high score for the ladies. Doris was one of many who only lost one game but she had high score when all of the games were totaled. Grace Pipher played on the winning team with only one loss and Ross Pipher also only had one loss and finished with the second place high score for men. Coldwater players made up 20% of the players.

Minutes of Last Meeting:

Motion by Pat Niepage and seconded by Marie Kinnear to dispense with reading the minutes. Carried.

Treasurer’s Report

Treasurer Barb Pipher reported a balance of $5,208.63. Report will be filed for audit.

Unfinished Business:

The financial records for the year 2007 will be given to the audit committee and they will report the results at the AGM in September.

At the AGM in 2007 it was suggested that in 2008 the dues might have to be increased to cover the increase in rent from the Curling Club. President Pipher was happy to announce that this was not necessary because of the increase in membership. It was shown on “The Shuffler” as being $20.00 but was corrected as soon as Stan was notified.

I think everyone knows that we received our grant from the Ontario Trillium Fund for the new equipment and the PA system as per the minutes of the 2007 AGM.

New Business:

We have a letter of resignation from board member Ed McGrath. Our bylaws read as follows Section 5. When an office becomes vacant by resignation or as outlined in Section 4, it is the responsibility and duty of the club’s executive board to appoint a qualified member to fill such a vacancy for the remainder of the current year. We have asked George O’Reilly to be the new director and he has accepted. Thank you George and congratulations.

The executive board decided that we should go ahead with the purchase of a storage shed making use of the money we received from the CNSA for our help with the ISA tournament in Midland and designated for this purpose. We need a place to store our equipment in the winter when the Curling Arena is in use. Ross Matthews looked into purchasing the required shed. He checked with Jim Oakley, CBCO Building Construction of Township of Severn regarding putting up a storage shed 8ft. x 12 ft. at the Curling Club in Coldwater and if we were required to have a permit. He was advised that because it was a preconstructed type under 100 square feet no permits would be required..
Motion by Bill Pollock and seconded by Bill Kinnear that we purchase the shed for storing our equipment in during the winter when the arena is being used for curling. Motion carried.

Last year a survey was taken about how you wanted to play each week. Many of you voted to continue the way we are and just have fun. We seem to have enough on our hands just to find courts for everyone to play our regular games. Some listed some new games to play. We need volunteers to show us how these games are played. We welcome any ideas that will improve the level of shuffleboard and keep the games interesting for everyone. If anyone cares to oversee a new game we would welcome your input and participation.

Congratulations to Peter Berg for his effort to create more interest at our club. Peter has entered some of the Coldwater players into a World Wide Shuffleboard Competition of Hoss Collar. Peter reports the progress to Germany each week. Thank you Peter.

A comment was made by a former member of our club that he and his wife would show up twice a week to play but there was no way in our club for players to improve their skills. They chose to leave our club because the skill level of most other members here in the Coldwater Club was not up to their level of play and they felt this lower level of play would impede their game for tournament competition. President Pipher said he would disagree with the comment about no plan in place to improve the player’s skills. In the past year we have had Grace Pipher, Peter and Erica Berg and Bill and Lorraine Pollock giving lessons. Improvements in playing skills take a great deal of time and lots of practice. For Snowbirds that spend their winters south of the border this is easier to do as facilities are outdoors and courts are always available. There are also more competitive games played in the 6 months in Florida than we will see here in a lifetime. We have tried to develop a better level of competition but turnout for the lessons have been rather poor and this would indicate that our members are not interested or possibly not aware of the lessons available. I would like to say at this time that I can see a tremendous improvement in the skills of the players from when they started. Please indicate by a showing of hands if you are interested in the lessons and would be willing to take part if we continue. (Very few raised their hands) This indicates to me that most of you prefer to continue the way we are and just have fun.

Just a reminder that we all need to pitch in to make things happen at our club. After each days shuffling we should bring the discs to the storage room. There is only one way for the discs to fit into the baskets and that is crossways to the handles. All of the black discs should be put together and all of the yellow discs together. It would be great if someone could spell off Leo Fowler in the job of polishing the discs. Leo will show you his secrets of disc waxing and polishing. Tags need to be sorted and counted after each day and the same applies to the court sticks. Scoreboards need to be washed regularly and the brushes vacuumed Just good housekeeping for the court area is needed each week. Inside the clubhouse the floor is to be cleaned and garbage gathered. Remember we look after everything here ourselves and not the Curling Club. We pay a low rent for this facility and we do not want to have a problem. The coffee and cookies each week are made and donated by club members. Thanks to each and everyone who make these donations. Today the cookies were made by Edward and Ella Smith and the donuts were donated by Ross and Isabel Matthews. We always need more volunteers and the list for volunteer names is on a clip board and Barb has the list. The supplies to make the coffee as well as cups, soft drinks, bottled water, napkins, stir sticks etc. are purchased with money that is collected each week in the “donations” dish (called the Coffee Club) This money goes toward other things such as a reduction in the cost of your year end banquet. We have always placed an advertisement in the “Preview” shuffleboard magazine and because of the dead line for printing our President Pipher has ordered an ad again this year for next season.

President Pipher told us we now have a club logo that was made up by the sign maker here in Coldwater called “Sign Wise” Chris was the one who made all of the little dots for the shuffleboard discs and the sign for the front window. The logo can be made available for shirts, sweaters and other club memorabilia.

We are having an “in Club Fun Day on August 19th starting at 10:00A.M. We will break for lunch and have hot dogs or hamburgers cooked on the BBQ. It was suggested by our President, Gary Pipher that the club pick up the cost of food that day. The cost to enter the fun day games will be $3.00 and all of the money taken in will be turned back into prize money for the winners. The teams will have an experienced player at one end and a not so experienced player at the other end.

President Pipher said he was pleased with the progress our club has made in the short time we have been in operation. We are now the largest club in Ontario and possibly Canada and you the members are to be congratulated. We now have 115 members. Our courts here are as good as most and far better than some that we have experienced.

Meeting adjourned 3:40 P.M.

Minutes prepared and submitted by: Lorraine

(Minutes edited - spacing and underlines only not content - to better fit webpage - by webmaster) Pol