Meeting held Saturday, June 27
Sheraton Station Square Hotel, Pittsburgh
Called to order by President Garry D. Howard at 12:35 p.m. Motion to open meeting by Ruben Luna, seconded by Josh Barnett.
Roll call:
President Garry D. Howard
First Vice President Phil Kaplan
Second Vice President Michael Anastasi
Third Vice President Toby Carrig
Outgoing President Lynn Hoppes
Past Presidents Jerry Micco and Glen Crevier
Executive Director Jack Berninger
Regions:
Todd Adams, Atlantic Coast
Ruben Luna, Great Lakes
Judy Connelly, Mid-Atlantic
Reid Laymance, Great Plains
Matt Pepin, Northeast
John Bednarowski, Southeast
Brad Lehman, Southwest
Joe Baird, West
Absent: Northwest, Canada.
Membership attendance:
Patrick Obley, Charlotte Sun
Jeff Kuehn, Oakland (Mich.) Press
Ben Brigandi, Williamsport Sun-Gazette
Jason Lieser, Palm Beach Post
Holly Lawton, Kansas City Star
Joe Baird, Salt Lake Tribune
Gerry Ahern, Yahoo Sports
Jason Wolf, Danville Register and Bee
Matt Pepin, Times Herald-Record (Middletown, N.Y.)
Glen Crevier, Minneapolis Star Tribune
Josh Barnett, Philadelphia Daily News
John Bednarowski, Marietta Daily Journal
Greg Brownell, Glens Falls Post-Star
Eric Olson, Northwest Herald
Paul Skrbina, Sauk Valley Newspapers
Todd Adams, Fayetteville Observer
Bob Sutton, Burlington Times-News
Ruben Luna, Detroit News
Roy Hewitt, Cleveland Plain Dealer
Judy Connelly, Scranton Times-Tribune
Bill Vilona, Pensacola News Journal
Adam Mertz, Capital Times
Reid Laymance, St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Gregg Dewalt, Florence Times Daily
Jerry Micco, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Gene Warnick, Los Angeles Daily News
Chris Stevens, Midland Daily News
Monte Lorell, USA Today
David Sell, Philadelphia Inquirer
Brad Lehman, San Antonio Express-News
Mary Byrne, Associated Press
Matt Solinsky, Palm Springs Desert News
Joe Sullivan, Boston Globe
Also attending:
Tim Franklin, National Sports Journalism Center
Kurtis Beavers, Indiana University School of Journalism
Bruce Wawryniak, International Softball Federation
Committee Reports:
1. Commissioners, Anastasi: Executive committee must decide whether to continue annual meetings. Options include periodic meetings and/or inviting commissioners to existing meetings.
2. Futures, Sullivan: Contest is integral part of organization and must continue; Web judging must move forward; new proposal forthcoming to adjust categories to reflect changes in newspaper circulations; Brownell working on a proposed complete revision of APSE bylaws.
3. Convention, Anastasi: APSE convention for 2010 on track. Evening programs have been finalized; Salt Lake Tribune has re-emphasized its sponsorship support; additional sponsorships from area and region news organizations to be sought; Berninger to begin negotiations to reduce room rates in Salt Lake shortly.
4. Diversity, Howard: Diversity programs supported by APSE remain strong and vibrant. APSE’s commitment to diversity as a core mission of the organization re-affirmed.
5. Olympics, Hewitt: Deadline is Aug. 31 to send in names for credentials for Winter Olympics. E-mail to do so should be coming out shortly from USOC. For those organizations not attending, Hewitt will be posting a story shortly on how games can be covered from home. Hewitt re-emphasized support available to do this from USOC. Members reminded to renounce any unused credentials with USOC as soon as possible.
6. Contest, Howard/Kaplan: Contest judging set for March 6-10, 2010, in Kissimmee, Fla. Room rate reduced to $99. With 62 attendees at Pittsburgh convention, and lowered room rate, no problems anticipated to fulfill contract obligations with hotel or with numbers of judges.
New Business:
1. 2009-2010 budget. Budget of $86,900 proposed, significant reduction from previous year. Discussion about contest plaques and costs. Should plaques be continued for second and third places? Straw vote shows unanimous support to continue. Discussion about membership directory and costs. Overwhelming support to continue hard copy but also to create password-protected version for the site and adding mugs of members. Executive committee passes budget proposal without dissent.
2. Indiana University and APSE partnership with new National Sports Journalism Center. Howard reviews proposal for partnership and creation of Hall of Fame for Red Smith Award winners and past presidents of APSE. Howard proposes that contest judging in 2011 be held at the university in Indianapolis and membership will be able to see facilities first-hand. Howard and Tim Franklin review facilities and accommodations. Howard reports they are outstanding. Costs also expected to be much lower than previous judging. Franklin hopes editors can meet with students. A letter to APSE officers spelling out the details of the partnership proposal will be published on the site. Howard’s proposal to hold judging at National Sports Journalism Center in 2011 passed unanimously.
3. Judging online members’ writing. Proposal to place online members in over 250,000-circulation category for judging writing entries. Adams calls for vote. Passed without dissent. Carrig abstains. Further action on amending contest rules with regard to how entries are to be prepared is forthcoming.
4. Judging members’ Web sites. Proposal to include Web sites in forthcoming contest. Details must be worked out by Howard/Kaplan. Ahern says Web members should take lead on judging and volunteers to organize. Proposal passed. Bednarowski opposes.
5. Membership eligibility change. Anastasi proposes amending bylaws so that those who have been members of APSE for at least five years can retain membership in the organization if they are moved outside of their newspaper’s sports department, as long as they continue as an employee of a qualified news organization. Proposal supported unanimously. Howard directs Anastasi to work with Brownell to make appropriate changes in bylaws in Brownell’s proposed overhaul.
Old Business:
1. Sponsorship agreements. Discussion of ethics of allowing sports organizations to sponsor breakfasts at APSE convention. Program began as experiment in 2006 in Las Vegas, has grown beyond original intent. Straw vote taken. Sponsorships overwhelmingly opposed. Howard announces sponsorships will end. Announcement met with applause.
Adjournment: Jerry Micco makes motion to adjourn. Patrick Obley seconds. Meeting adjorned at 1:53 p.m.
