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CFC Presidency - Message to Governors.
Dear Governors, CFC Members and lovers of chess.
Please accept this post as confirmation that I will be running for the CFC Presidency in the upcoming election.
As many of you know I am very discouraged by the direction the CFC has taken in recent years. I never thought I would run for CFC President, but given the current plight of chess in Canada, Nava Starr, my wife, 8 times Canadian Chess Champion, executive with the mid-size Toronto company, and I have decided to try and make positive change for the CFC by dedicating both our personal time and financial resources to bringing about positive change.
The CFC today is a slowly dying organization that desperately needs several new ideas and initiatives to grow and become more vital than ever. Its greatest weakness is that it never seems to do anything new. Its greatest strength is that among the community it has several dedicated and long serving professionals who could adopt a new vision and make the CFC a new and vibrant organization.
There are a lot of new initiatives that should have been adopted by CFC, however the present leadership was busy with the Non Profit Corporation Act and the endorsement of Kirsan Ilyumzhinov. The endorsement of Ilyumzhinov took place in spite of the fact that in the Chess Talk poll put up by Mr. Drkulec showed only 1 vote for Ilyumzhinov against nearly 30 for Kasparov. Executives have failed even to explain how and why this endorsement ever has happened other than to criticize supporters of Mr. Kasparov. The non-executive Governors’ vote was about split, so it is possible that CFC could vote for Kirsan at the end of the day, but an endorsement? That could happened only because CFC is run by the old boys’ network, who stripped away all the powers away from the Governors, who in spite of all the work they do lost all of their powers, except for voting once a year at the AGM.
As a part of my program I’d like to offer the following:
• Give the power back to Governors/voting members. They are a back bone of our organization. I’d like to see them highly motivated and have personal goals and plans.
• Increased membership/participation. Over the past 15 years the CFC has experienced a steep decline in membership. In its most general sense, the CFC has never gotten it right in terms of implementing effective membership drives or staging events that are conducive towards attracting high levels of participation. While the CFC membership has fallen, the participation in many other federations has risen drastically. In Turkey, for example, the federation grew to having 80,000 adult members. This explosive growth was largely attributable to the fact that the Turkish Federation established a relationship with a bank in which anyone who became a member of the federation received a free bank account. The bank account/federation membership drive in Turkey is a wonderful example of a win/win corporate partnership and there's no reason a similar initiative couldn't occur in Canada. The Turkish initiative proves that Canada need not re-invent the wheel in terms of implementing effective membership growth programs. The Presidents/Executive Directors of a large number of federations will be surveyed to determine which membership initiatives worked best in their nations and a concrete plan will be implemented to achieve the objective of increased growth. Goal: Increasing Membership to 5,000 members by September 1, 2015.
Aside from soliciting other ideas, this will be achieved by the following actions:
• Establishing an educational membership, and sending direct solicitation on this, whereby every school and library may obtain a special membership to allow on-site access by their interested members
• Duplicating what amateur pool associations have done (250,000 members in Canada), by offering a grass roots restaurant/bar league, whereby patrons can sign up for a nominal membership charge and play a game, which is part of a ladder tournament, with donated corporate prizes at the end of the yearly league
• Reaching out to all historical inactive members with a special discount offer, along with a personal letter from the CFC President indicating our goals to earn back respect for chess in Canada
• Discussion/negotiation with all other entities running rating systems (mostly for kids, e.g., Chess & Math, etc.), to attempt working out a fair deal to have their members as CFC members, and we provide the rating management/output for this
• Hold events (meet the master, simultaneous, demonstration) in shopping malls to promote chess, with an active membership recruitment element
• Youth Membership. Never before has the participation levels in scholastic and youth events been higher in Canada. Chess is currently considered a very popular activity for parents seeking to enroll children in programs/events. Aside from the initiatives of the Chess and Math Association, there have been other highly successful chess programs aimed at kids that have enjoyed enormous success. In Kitchener the Chess-For-Kids program has had several thousand kids register since inception and is run as a for profit business. Even in a small province such as New Brunswick there were nearly 400 kids that participated in the provincial scholastic championships in May. There has been no CFC presence at any of these activities, and not only should the CFC establish an attractive program of its own, but it also should establish co-operative relationships with existing programs aimed at increasing youth membership.
• Much more effective use of the chess events. The standard swiss-system weekend events in Canada have not been customized to attract high levels of participation. Most require a two night stay over for travelers, and are run on schedules that are demanding for both travelers and host city participants. I have remedies available. Some of them are revamping the way swiss tournaments are being run, for example, Curling and Bridge events, which often attract thousands of participants, have a build in social component. Certain pockets of the country, such as Quebec and Ottawa have been fairly constant in terms of offering a full calendar of events each year, but in much of the country there aren't many events to play in.
• The establishment of the Grand Prix system. Starting with the densely populated Quebec-Windsor corridor, CFC should establish an annual Grand Prix of attractive chess events. The Grand Prix should have an attractive website, and consistently high standards in terms of game display, live and online. There would be corporate sponsors to ensure the events are executed at a high level and attractive to all of Canada's top players.
• Patronage. Each year the Olympiad Team faces challenges generating the revenues necessary to participate in the Olympiad and each Olympiad members and patrons are called upon to support the team. In the case of the Olympiad team, patrons don't see any long term benefit from their contributions.... they give money, it is spent and there is no enduring benefit to the team. All donations to the Olympiad team, for example, should have 50% of the donation go towards the current team and 50% go towards an ongoing trust fund that supports all future Olympiad teams. Also, there are clauses with federal tax law that make it extremely attractive for chess players who die to include donations to charitable organizations in their wills....often with 100% of the donated amount going back to the estate of the donor. The CFC has never properly explored this channel of funding. And finally: a program of aggressive corporate sponsorship in Canada a renewed focus on chess in schools that would include the help of the Kasparov Chess Foundation, facilitation of corporate and individual sponsorship in Canadian chess. Any new initiatives will be financed by the new revenue and/or donations, the present balance sheet and the assets will be preserved and prudently managed.
I’m offering you an opportunity to start building a new, exciting organization. The CFC is due for a change, and it must start from the top.
I love chess, and although very busy, I am announcing my intention to be your President. I’m encouraging any voting member who wishes to know more to contact me at alexander.starr@gmail.com
Let’s do it together!
Sasha Starr
Dear Governors, CFC Members and lovers of chess.
Please accept this post as confirmation that I will be running for the CFC Presidency in the upcoming election.
As many of you know I am very discouraged by the direction the CFC has taken in recent years. I never thought I would run for CFC President, but given the current plight of chess in Canada, Nava Starr, my wife, 8 times Canadian Chess Champion, executive with the mid-size Toronto company, and I have decided to try and make positive change for the CFC by dedicating both our personal time and financial resources to bringing about positive change.
The CFC today is a slowly dying organization that desperately needs several new ideas and initiatives to grow and become more vital than ever. Its greatest weakness is that it never seems to do anything new. Its greatest strength is that among the community it has several dedicated and long serving professionals who could adopt a new vision and make the CFC a new and vibrant organization.
There are a lot of new initiatives that should have been adopted by CFC, however the present leadership was busy with the Non Profit Corporation Act and the endorsement of Kirsan Ilyumzhinov. The endorsement of Ilyumzhinov took place in spite of the fact that in the Chess Talk poll put up by Mr. Drkulec showed only 1 vote for Ilyumzhinov against nearly 30 for Kasparov. Executives have failed even to explain how and why this endorsement ever has happened other than to criticize supporters of Mr. Kasparov. The non-executive Governors’ vote was about split, so it is possible that CFC could vote for Kirsan at the end of the day, but an endorsement? That could happened only because CFC is run by the old boys’ network, who stripped away all the powers away from the Governors, who in spite of all the work they do lost all of their powers, except for voting once a year at the AGM.
As a part of my program I’d like to offer the following:
• Give the power back to Governors/voting members. They are a back bone of our organization. I’d like to see them highly motivated and have personal goals and plans.
• Increased membership/participation. Over the past 15 years the CFC has experienced a steep decline in membership. In its most general sense, the CFC has never gotten it right in terms of implementing effective membership drives or staging events that are conducive towards attracting high levels of participation. While the CFC membership has fallen, the participation in many other federations has risen drastically. In Turkey, for example, the federation grew to having 80,000 adult members. This explosive growth was largely attributable to the fact that the Turkish Federation established a relationship with a bank in which anyone who became a member of the federation received a free bank account. The bank account/federation membership drive in Turkey is a wonderful example of a win/win corporate partnership and there's no reason a similar initiative couldn't occur in Canada. The Turkish initiative proves that Canada need not re-invent the wheel in terms of implementing effective membership growth programs. The Presidents/Executive Directors of a large number of federations will be surveyed to determine which membership initiatives worked best in their nations and a concrete plan will be implemented to achieve the objective of increased growth. Goal: Increasing Membership to 5,000 members by September 1, 2015.
Aside from soliciting other ideas, this will be achieved by the following actions:
• Establishing an educational membership, and sending direct solicitation on this, whereby every school and library may obtain a special membership to allow on-site access by their interested members
• Duplicating what amateur pool associations have done (250,000 members in Canada), by offering a grass roots restaurant/bar league, whereby patrons can sign up for a nominal membership charge and play a game, which is part of a ladder tournament, with donated corporate prizes at the end of the yearly league
• Reaching out to all historical inactive members with a special discount offer, along with a personal letter from the CFC President indicating our goals to earn back respect for chess in Canada
• Discussion/negotiation with all other entities running rating systems (mostly for kids, e.g., Chess & Math, etc.), to attempt working out a fair deal to have their members as CFC members, and we provide the rating management/output for this
• Hold events (meet the master, simultaneous, demonstration) in shopping malls to promote chess, with an active membership recruitment element
• Youth Membership. Never before has the participation levels in scholastic and youth events been higher in Canada. Chess is currently considered a very popular activity for parents seeking to enroll children in programs/events. Aside from the initiatives of the Chess and Math Association, there have been other highly successful chess programs aimed at kids that have enjoyed enormous success. In Kitchener the Chess-For-Kids program has had several thousand kids register since inception and is run as a for profit business. Even in a small province such as New Brunswick there were nearly 400 kids that participated in the provincial scholastic championships in May. There has been no CFC presence at any of these activities, and not only should the CFC establish an attractive program of its own, but it also should establish co-operative relationships with existing programs aimed at increasing youth membership.
• Much more effective use of the chess events. The standard swiss-system weekend events in Canada have not been customized to attract high levels of participation. Most require a two night stay over for travelers, and are run on schedules that are demanding for both travelers and host city participants. I have remedies available. Some of them are revamping the way swiss tournaments are being run, for example, Curling and Bridge events, which often attract thousands of participants, have a build in social component. Certain pockets of the country, such as Quebec and Ottawa have been fairly constant in terms of offering a full calendar of events each year, but in much of the country there aren't many events to play in.
• The establishment of the Grand Prix system. Starting with the densely populated Quebec-Windsor corridor, CFC should establish an annual Grand Prix of attractive chess events. The Grand Prix should have an attractive website, and consistently high standards in terms of game display, live and online. There would be corporate sponsors to ensure the events are executed at a high level and attractive to all of Canada's top players.
• Patronage. Each year the Olympiad Team faces challenges generating the revenues necessary to participate in the Olympiad and each Olympiad members and patrons are called upon to support the team. In the case of the Olympiad team, patrons don't see any long term benefit from their contributions.... they give money, it is spent and there is no enduring benefit to the team. All donations to the Olympiad team, for example, should have 50% of the donation go towards the current team and 50% go towards an ongoing trust fund that supports all future Olympiad teams. Also, there are clauses with federal tax law that make it extremely attractive for chess players who die to include donations to charitable organizations in their wills....often with 100% of the donated amount going back to the estate of the donor. The CFC has never properly explored this channel of funding. And finally: a program of aggressive corporate sponsorship in Canada a renewed focus on chess in schools that would include the help of the Kasparov Chess Foundation, facilitation of corporate and individual sponsorship in Canadian chess. Any new initiatives will be financed by the new revenue and/or donations, the present balance sheet and the assets will be preserved and prudently managed.
I’m offering you an opportunity to start building a new, exciting organization. The CFC is due for a change, and it must start from the top.
I love chess, and although very busy, I am announcing my intention to be your President. I’m encouraging any voting member who wishes to know more to contact me at alexander.starr@gmail.com
Let’s do it together!
Sasha Starr
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