Operations Division
April 3, 2001 Report


    Officials Committee
  • Lynee Phelps and Ron Whalen were selected by the Officials Committee to attend the USA Swimming Officials Clinic in Salt Lake City on Memorial Day weekend
  • Boots Hall as PVS Officials Chairman will attend this quadrennium's USA Swimming sponsored meeting for LSC Officials Chairs in Chicago in late August.
  • Lynee Phelps is making arrangements to resume making name tags for PVS certified officials. Some "seed money" will be needed to acquire the initial inventory of teardrop pins from USA Swimming.
  • PVS officials are to be commended for the strong support they gave to the large number of championship level meets held within the LSC during a five week-end period. More consideration should be given to this in the future -- both in terms of both setting the competition schedule and bidding for multiple sectional, zone and similar meets that will be held in close time proximity to each other.
  • PVS Officials Committee staffed PVS SCY Championships. Ron Whalen served as Administrative Referee. In absence of a permanent Meet Referee, he also served as the "de facto" Meet Referee and did a superb job.
  • Bob Richardson took responsibility for assuring the proper staffing and conduct of PVS 14/U JO Championships.
  • The March Sectional Meet was successful. Frank Ching from New England Swimming served as the Meet Referee. He was very pleased with the facility, staffing, and general cooperation. Suggestions for future hosting of this type of meet again include (1) the requirement that marshals be required as there were problems with crowd control on the deck and (2) more money be allocated to hospitality. All five LSC's contributed officials to staff the deck, However it is likely if these meets are continued and National Championship certification (or even re-certification) is not allowed, future meets will not be as well staffed. Many officials withdrew when they became aware National Championship certification would not be possible. The meet was held the same weekend as Mini Champs. It would have been difficult to staff both meets without the help of the other LSC's
  • Entries to Spring Championships were about 6500 this year, which required staffing of two courses for all sessions.
  • The Eastern Zone meet was very well staffed. In contrast to Sectionals where many officials who initially volunteered did not materialize, most requests to officiate this meet were received in the week immediately prior to the meet. The number of officials available allowed us to provide an environment very similar to Nationals for the evening sessions. Approximately 60 officials volunteered to work the meet with approximately 2/3rds coming from other LSC's. John Hirschmann served as Meet Referee and Jim Garner as Administrative Referee.

    • Equipment Manager
  • PVS did not have sufficient operating equipment to permit it to provide electronic timing capability to both the Spring Championship Meet (which was being run in two courses) and the March Madness. Consistent with guidelines discussed at the July, 2000 Board meeting, preference was given to the Spring Championship Meet since it was open to all PVS athletes.
  • The Board will be given an opportunity to determine whether it wishes to recommend funding for a third set of equipment as part of the FY'02 budget formulation process.
  • Spring Championship meet also experienced problems with printers it was provided as well as one starting system. Host club elected to install PVS equipment. Defective equipment was replaced as soon as the Equipment Manager was made aware of the situation.
  • PGS&LC continued to have problems with its Daktronics timing system on one course as experienced at both PVS SCY Champs and Eastern Zones. Daktronic's staff was present regularly throughout Eastern Zone's as they tried to isolate the source of the problem. They are expected to inform PGS&LC of their conclusions in writing this week.
  • Inquiries are being made whether there will be any operational problems pertaining to holding Early Bird Long Course meet at PGS&LC in early May.

    • Meet Management
  • Meet announcements for first four meets of LC season (thru Maryland States) will hopefully be released this week.
  • In coordination with Senior Chair (and after he met with coaches at meet) Sunday program of PVS SCY Champs was restructured to minimize risk of athletes missing swims due to impending severe weather.
  • Issues arose with FCPA regarding the number of swimmers and spectators expected to be present at 14/U Champs as well as the time needed to reconfigure pool into championship mode for finals. Consideration needs to be given to the size meet that should be put into this facility in the future.

    • Safety Commitee
  • After no "Report of Occurences" this competitive season to date, four have occurred since the February board meeting Injuries involved two cuts on the foot for which stitches were appropriate, a finger broken at the finish of a race, and bruises to leg resulting from slipping on metal bleacher.
  • In addition, two EMS calls were made due to medical problems (seizure, asthma attack) arising -- one at Sectionals and one at Eastern Zones.