Minutes for
General Membership Meeting
February 14,
2004
President House
called the meeting to order at 12:20p.m. President
House asked Gene Frye to give the Invocation.
Then President House asked Secretary Betsy Michael if there was a quorum,
and she informed yes there was with a total of 83 voting members present.
President House
thanked everyone for coming and thanked all the members for everything they do.
He also wanted to thank all of the Board members and the Associations for
their hard work.
President House
discussed the Executive Board meeting, which was held on Thursday, February 12,
2004. We were asking for
suggestions that would make our breed better, things that we could do to improve
our breed. Some of the suggestions
we came up with that we took to the full board are following. We are losing the identity of our horse.
The statement was made that the Walking Horse is coming back to us and we
are going towards the Walking Horse. We
think some of the things we came up with will help correct these problems.
President House said just going to all the meetings and talking to the
members this week, it’s a little more serious this year than it has been in
the past. One of the members told
President House that they were seeing some enthusiasm.
It was also stated that we come to these meetings on the bases that we
are going to do this and we are going to do that but we leave here and it’s
the same thing. President House
said if he has anything to do with it, it’s not going to happen that way this
year. In the past we made to many
exceptions for this and to many exceptions for that.
We are not benefiting from it.
President House
asked if everyone had a chance to look at the minutes from the last meeting of
September 27, 2003. Jake Jacobs
made a motion to accept the minutes. Charlie
Brown seconded the motion and the motion carried.
President House
asked if there was any New Business. There
was no new business. He then asked
for any Old Business.
At this time he turned it over to Laura Parish to talk about the new
Sweepstakes program, which will be done by the Ladies Auxiliary.
The divisions are:
2 Year Old
3 Year Old
4 Year Old
Stake Horse
Youth Horse
Trail Pleasure
Pleasure Racking
Country Pleasure
Show Pleasure
Amateur
2 Year Old Amateur
3 Year Old Amateur
4 Year Old Amateur
Park Pleasure
Style Pleasure
Amateur Owned and Trained
Two
optional divisions
Yearling Horse
Ladies Auxiliary Rider
Three places will
be awarded for points in each of these divisions.
At the end of the year, 2 Year Old Rider, 3 Year Old Rider, 4 Year Old
Rider will be paid out of the money. In
order to qualify for a sweepstakes show, the show must be sanctioned with the
RHBAA, will pay $200.00 sweepstakes application fee with letter 30 days prior to
show date and return show results within 15 days. They will have a website.
They already have 3 sweepstakes shows: Pro-Trainers, Spring Celebration
and Mississippi State.
President House
called for the Committee Reports. The
Chairman of each committee made a report on their committee.
a.
Rules
Enforcement Committee-Ed
Heirs-Chairperson
Our goal as the
Rules Enforcement Committee is the enforcement of the rules and to determine if
there was a rule violation. We are
to interpret the rules. A discussion followed on “Vote on judges”- only
eligible members can vote. You must
have paid annual dues for the current year and must have been a member by Dec.
31st of the previous year.
b. Trail, Field & Pleasure-Randy Siniard-chairman
This year we had sixty
books turned in. Thirty-four of
them accumulated the points for the certificate of merit. Twenty-five were in the adult category and nine in the youth.
Four adults achieved enough points for the High Point award, two youths
for the Youth High Point award and one Superior Versatility Champion this year.
c.
Advisory
Committee-Jim
Roberts-chairman
The Advisory Committee is set up for people with recommendations or has
problems that want taken to the board. It
is taken to the Advisory Committee first and then it would be determined if it
should be taken to the board.
In the meeting some of the issues brought up were:
1.
bands on lite shod horses
2.
redistricting of
territories
3.
pleasure horses doing to
much for their classes
4.
speed racking classes
qualifying-flat shod and padded classes
d.
Breeder’s
Committee-Elane
Berry-chairperson
The Breeder’s Committee reported:
1. Foal registrations and commission registrations are down
2. Geldings do not have to be blood typed
3. The Board asked the Breeder’s Committee to offer a plan to close the books. The committee came up with a plan. Board went over the plan. They saw some things we needed to change. We are taking it back to this committee and then will submit it back to the board. This is an eight-year plan.
e.
DQP
Committee-Wilburn
Williams-chairman
There will be no changes in the way we will check horses in the Spring and Fall Celebrations. The Board feels we need to do research on what will be best for our association.
f.
Exhibitor
Status Committee-Jim
Morris-chairman
Remind everyone to get their exhibitor status cards in before you get a
late fee after March 15 of $25.00. This
was Board approved on January 17, 2004. The
Trainers cards are now $50.00, $25.00 will go to RHBAA and $25.00 to Trainers
Association. This also is a
complimentary membership to the Trainer’s Association per Charlie Brown,
president of the Trainer’s Association.
g.
Horse
Show Committee-James
Morrison-chairman
Spring Celebration class sheet will stay the
same except there will be a Ladies Auxiliary Country Pleasure class instead of a
Ladies Auxiliary class. James
Morrison will go back to the committee to see if the Country Pleasure class can
be added and also keep the Ladies Auxiliary class. There will be a new announcer.
Jack Greene will be the photographer for the Spring Celebration.
h.
Judges
Committee-Larry
Street-chairman
Pleasure classes do what the rule book says. Horses must be shown in three distinctive gaits in three gait
classes. Horses that come in should
present a good image. If a horse
comes in the ring, spins out, and continues spinning out they will be dismissed.
Horses with excessive head nod will not be tolerated.
They will be penalized. We
want a Racking Horse with a head set.
i.
Personnel
& Property Committee-
Clyde Creech-chairman
The Personnel & Property Committee still
wants to come up with a plan to cover the warm up ring.
j.
Membership
& Promotions- Jake
Jacobs-chairman
The Membership & Promotions Committee asks
members to think of something to help the industry. They ask each member to get a minimum of three new members a
year. They ask the each Board of
Director get a minimum of five new members a year. They also ask each member to promote their own state by
trying to get new members. Membership
is down. We are working on
exhibitions. We are going to try to
exhibit our World Grand Champion at the Alabama Football show.
A committee is working on this. This
is something we can do without money. We need to do something to keep our members interested in
staying a member.
The Racking Review
is back. This is owned by David
Turnbow. Nicole Rehkemper is the
executive editor. They are
celebrating the 30th Anniversary.
Please send in any show dates. Subscriptions
are:
$25.00-1 year
$40.00-2 years
$60.00-3 years
Jake Jacobs introduced Randy Davidson (Rack Across America rider).
He promotes the Racking Horse. He
loves to trail ride. He has ridden
in all of North America. He has a
website. The only state he has left is Hawaii.
President House
asked the 2004 Board Members to stand. He
also thanked Melisa Taylor and the office staff for all their hard work.
President House
asked Gene Frye to talk about an alternate way to pick Spring and Fall
Celebration judges. He went over
the proposed plan. There will be no
discussion. This will be voted on
at the Fall Celebration in September at the General Membership meeting. (See
attached proposal)
President House
asked James Morrison to give the treasurer’s report. We need to cut expenses.
Income is down. Registration,
income for transfers, and memberships are all down. Income sponsor fees are up $14,000, concessions up $4,000,
Arena up $7,000, and Booths are up $3,000.
Championship Circle is down. We
will try to come up with a plan to revise the Championship Circle sponsorship.
Clyde Creech made a
motion to accept the treasurer’s report.
Jake Jacobs seconded the motion. Motion
was carried.
James Morrison made
a motion to adjourn and was seconded by Jake Jacobs. Motion was carried.
We propose to have
the following committees, groups and organizations elect judges from a qualified
list provided by the Judges Committee. The list compiled from a questionnaire sent to all judges
eligible to judge the respective show and returned to the Judges Committee.
The names selected
will then be provided to the show committee and those names placed in a hat and
names drawn until the required numbers are drawn according to A, AA, and AAA
classification.
Each time a judge
is selected by the groups, then name will be placed in the hat for the drawing.
| General Membership | 8 |
| Board of Directors | 3 |
| Trainers Association | 3 |
| Pleasure Association | 3 |
| Amateur Association | 3 |
| Futurity/Breeders | 3 |
| Ladies Auxiliary | 3 |
The date, time and
location of the drawing to be published and may be attended by RHBAA members.
Respectfully
submitted by the committee of:
Jake Jacobs
James Morrison
Gene Frye