The USOA year began January 1st. The Society year is January 1 to December 31 for membership, committee appointments and membership dues.

The Status Report is required annually to maintain club active status in USOA. Voting, representation, participation, bidding and hosting are all dependent on current Status filing. The Status Report should be filed by the March annual meeting, and only those filing can vote at the meeting.

The Status Report also allows your official appointment(s) to the Underwater Hockey Committee. Please appoint your committee representative(s) who will be considered your official voting reps to the committee. Once appointed for the year reps can only be changed in writing.

Please fill out the Membership Roster form with members’ complete address (including zip code). Membership dues for each calendar year are as follows:

-      USOA dues are $15 for the year. USOA Family memberships are $15 for the first member and $5 for each additional member at the same address. (To indicate family memberships, write the member’s name on a line indicating $15 in the USOA column; for each additional member in the same household, indicate $5. )
-      Underwater Hockey Development Fund dues are $10 per member.
-      Northern Calif also pays CenCal dues of $15 per member (CenCal does not offer family rates).

Waivers

-      USOA waivers must be signed each calendar year by all members, and ALL FIELDS MUST BE FILLED OUT- address, phone number, email, etc.
-      Clubs using USOA insurance must have all of their players sign a waiver whether they are USOA members or not.
-      It is strongly suggested that all teams have players sign waivers to alleviate potential liability.
-      It is suggested that waivers be signed by new players/drop-ins by the second time of play.
-      USOA dues and waivers are required for anyone participating in a USOA sanctioned tournament.
-      3-part, hard copy forms are available from Carol Rose (croseusoa@aol.com). Forms are also available for download from the USA Underwater Hockey site at www.usauwh.com.

Remittance

Status Reports, Membership Forms, signed waivers and dues checks (please make checks payable to USOA) should be mailed to:

USOA Underwater Hockey
Postal Annex
39270 Paseo Padre Parkway, Box #452
Fremont, CA 94538

Questions?

Please refer to the www.usauwh.com website for additional information (UWH committee & regional contacts, waiver forms, FAQs etc).

Our goal for this year is the same as last year. In 2010, we want everyone who plays underwater hockey on a regular basis in the US to be a dues-paying member of USOA. We developed this incentive plan to encourage all members to join. If your club’s membership improves the most, you win!

As a club leader, we would like you to become actively involved in ensuring that everyone who is playing underwater hockey on your club is paying USOA dues and signing an annual USOA waiver. It might mean that you change the ways you have been doing things in the past.

In getting your team to submit USOA dues and waivers, do feel free to use a little common sense. If someone has just joined your club, you needn’t hit them up for dues right away, though you must get a waiver signed. But those people who play hockey with you regularly must be USOA members. It shouldn’t matter how many times a month they attend a practice or if they never play in tournaments. It should be a bigger issue of insurance coverage, improving underwater hockey in our country, and improving play on your team.

There will be winners in three categories:

Category 1: For the club with the highest raw number increase over last year’s membership.

Category 2: For the club with the largest percent increase over last year’s membership.

Category 3: For the new club, established in 2009 or 2010, with the greatest increase in total numbers. (2009’s membership is assumed to be zero.)

The deadline for this competition is March 31, 2010. So there is an incentive to get your players to sign up early.

Prize: A new competition puck will be given to the winning team or club in each category.

New information has been posted on the WAA regarding the 2010 World Championships in Medellin. Early entry deadline, with discount, is January 20th.

Go to:
http://thewaa.org

Click on “worlds info” at the top right to download informational PDF documents.

Dear US Underwater Hockey Friends:

Well, it has been two years since Patty and I were selected as your
Development Directors for US Underwater Hockey. Our main goals were
twofold: One, to increase the number of people playing; and two, to
increase the level of play in our country. We added 54 new dues-paying
members to the US roster in 2009, a 14% increase. They say it takes a
community to raise a child. Patty and I have taken this attitude to help
raise awareness of underwater hockey and the skill level within our
sport. We are proud of the support that we have been given on both the
regional and national level. With your help, we have seen progress in
both of our goals. And with your help, we hope to carry this momentum
into 2010.

Please take a look at what has been sent out from the development
directors in 2009. We have been very busy. Programs initiated in 2009
include the Incentive Program for early sign up as well as our logo
competition. We listened to your suggestions and had an even better 2^nd
Annual UW Hockey Symposium. New promotional items have been created for
your use. A refereeing course is being produced, which will improve play
on all levels. More than 40 players were given an award for
participating at Nationals for the first time. The word about our sport
is spreading through regional and national articles. We have had a
productive year.

As you can imagine, this sort of effort requires a lot of time, effort,
and, of course, capital. We need your help to fund these activities.
Underwater Hockey is sponsored by the Underwater Society of America, a
501(c)(3) organization. Please consider a donation to help us to
continue our efforts to grow our sport — you can write it off on your
2009 taxes. No donation is too small, and we will put every penny right
back into the development effort!

Please take a look at our website, usauwh.com to learn more about what
we are doing in the development of Underwater Hockey! You can send a
check made out to Underwater Society of America, to:

USOA Underwater Hockey

Postal Annex

39270 Paseo Padre Parkway, Box #452

Fremont, CA 94538

You will receive a receipt for your tax purposes.

Thank you for your support.

Tom & Patty Redig

Development Directors

US Underwater Hockey

Some of the items sent in 09

1 DVD to Houston TX

500 Brochures to San Francisco Gustavo Pesce

5 DVD to San Francisco to Matt Blair

1 Club in a Box to Newport Oregon

Club in the Box Cortland New York

Club in a Box Orlando, Florida

30 Brochures to Rob Sykes

1 DVD to Joseph GeisserPaid)

1 DVD to Robin Duquette(paid)

1 Club in Box to Kennedy King College-Chicago( pd)

5 DVD’s to Ben & Karen-Minnesota

2 DVD’s to Eric-Chicago( paid)

1 DVD & 10 Cards to Nicole(Georgia Tech)

5 DVD to Karen Chevrier(paid)

1 DVD to Mike Urum(paid)

1 DVD to Cara Fritz(Oregon) (paid)

1 DVD to D Masselink(Holland, MI)(paid)

100 Brochures, 100 Cards & 1 DVD Matt Goodrich(pd)

4 DVD Matt Goodrich(pd)

50 brochures &50 cards West Palm

30 cards Chicago(Maria)

4 sticks to Oregon(Shawn Tucker)

10 mouth guards & Ear protection(Georgia Tech)

Club in a Box=Yuma AZ(Richard McClure)

10 DVD’s, postcards & brochures-(Terry Sutton)

5 DVD’s to Mary Jo

5 DVDs to Mary Jo

Start a Club Packet Doug Topp

100 postcards to Champaign(Mark)

100 postcards to Atlanta(Nicole)

Club in the Box(Steve Dild) East Carolina U (Pat & Lynne Harris)

UWH Banner to Chris N

30 Brochures & DVD to Mehan C

50 Brochures, 50 postcards, 1 poster and 1 banner to Nick Iannacone(Gabe
Mathais)

UWH Banner to Joe Klinger(Rhode Island)

Promotional materials to Joe Klinger (Rhode Island)

Summary:
The first successful California Club Tournament was held this past Saturday, November 7, 2009 at San Jose State University and hosted cooperatively by Club Puck and San Francisco. There were over 60 people attending. Final placings were:
1st Place: Club Puck 1, San Jose, CA
2nd Place: Club Puck 2, San Jose, CA
3rd Place: Los Angeles (AKA Santa Clarita, CA)

The Details:
The six teams that entered the tournament from south to north were:
San Diego, CA
Los Angeles (AKA Santa Clarita, CA)
Club Puck 1, San Jose, CA
Club Puck 2, San Jose, CA
Sea Lions, San Francisco, CA
Rasta Sharks, Sebastopol, CA (Formerly Santa Rosa, CA)

The tournament was highly successful with a fluid schedule that went very well. Participants enjoyed the tournament format and duration and were very happy with the competitive level of play. The tournament was very competitive with the results after the round robin having a tie between half the teams. Club Puck showed that their club history, continued high level of play, hard work, and commitment to the sport pays off. Los Angeles showed how well a team with only six players (no substitutes) can fare in a competitive environment - you could tell this young team is working very hard.

The reffing was also very successful as the organizers brought in three refs: Phil Hickey from Colorado and John Kulsa from Seattle and full-time deck ref, Doug Roth from Club Puck. The Minnesota rule was in effect and worked well as usual and was alleviated somewhat with the full-time refs being present. I don’t think there were any ‘penalties’ for clubs not putting refs up on the board.

The tournament was a complete single day of hockey (10am-8pm), preceded by a half hour of setup and a half hour of breakdown. Play was limited to one court, with the exception of three games. The sport courts were amazing!! In the near past, the courts had sustained a lot of wear and tear and were on the verge of unplayable conditions. Club Puck, especially Rich Gray and Bob burres, took considerable amounts of time to repair the courts and restore them to a beautiful playing area. The puck used was the new version of the CanAm Uni2 puck with brass sliders. It was heavier than the puck at the USA Nationals and slid across the SportCourt even better than the pink puck on the brand new sportcourt in 1998. It was truly a World-Class setup!

The tournament was followed by a party at Greg and Julie Appling’s place where they served up some great eats and drinks. Awards were handed out and people had a great time stuffing their faces after a full day of hockey. At least people were contently rested before their trek home on Sunday.

There were no injuries that required first aid, except for that people may have eaten too much afterwards and went into induced comas shortly thereafter.

The potential for continuing the California Tournament is very high, but the timing and locations are to be determined. One possibility exists that would have the CaliforniaClub Tournament taking place between clubs (as PCC’s is done) and in substitution of the regional tournament that is held by that club (e.g., SF Potluck or San Diego ‘No Worries’ Tournament) . As originally designed, the tournament will keep with the ideals of team unity and growth and the policy of being a team tournament. Only regular club members will be able to be entered onto a team’s roster (i.e., a non-whore tournament).

We look forward to seing you at the next one!!!!

Sean Avent, Northwest USA Regional Director