Lisa Tate, the USHPA President, has been on a personal crusade to
change, reform, or dump the existing USHPA competition system for years. She
runs the King Mountain meet and thinks that there is a better way to run our
competition system. Unfortunately, she has never articulated just what the new
system should be like.  You can see her arguments and my rebuttal
here.


At the last USHPA executive committee meeting, it was reported:

President Tate describes her progress with identifying a working
group to explore reforms to Competition. Several issue have prompted this:


· Difficulty in finding a Competition Committee Chairman who will address the
Strategic Plan Action Items


· Currently the only focus of the Competition Committee is the World Team
ranking, not of growing the number and quality of competition.


· The need for regional and national sanctioning.


The mandate of the Competition Reform Work Group is to evaluate the current
state and make recommendations to the Board for changes such as standards for
sanctioning.

Over a year ago, just before I was fired as the USHPA Competition
Committee Chairman, I appointed a volunteer to take on this task, as per the
Strategic Plan. It would appear that that person hasn't worked out. Of course,
she was the only person willing to take on the task. We have had two Competition
Committee Chairman since.


It appears that no one, not even Dennis Pagen, is willing to do Lisa's bidding
here. Perhaps she should do it herself. I wonder how this Competition Reform
Work Group will do and who is on it.


BTW, it is the "national team," not the "world team." And, that was not the
focus of the competition committee, and I doubt that it is now. The competition
committee's focus is (was?) on promoting a successful competition season in the
US. In 2006 I included Sport Class and Single Surface class competitions.


While the competition committee and the EC stumble around we've still got an
upcoming competition season that needs a little nurturing. Are we going to see a
little love from the executive committee?


Dennis Pagen out as USHPA competition committee chairman? That's the rumor and
the above minutes sure seem to back that up.