CURL MESABI

CURRENT WEATHER AT CURL MESABI

SEPTEMBER 2001 NEWSLETTER

The Board of Directors has spent a great deal of time tackling issues related to our lease with the RR@CC and on the 2002 Men’s/Women’s National Championships.

Lease

Negotiations have progressed slowly over the summer, complicated by several issues… Mark Forte, Pat Wainio and Ardy Nurmi-Wilberg are to be commended for the "above and beyond the call of duty" time spent on the lease.

Curling Club Issues

We felt that the current management structure served us poorly over the past year. There were numerous complaints from curlers and bonspiel chairpersons – especially in the areas of food/beverage costs charged to us for our club-run spiels and poor service (primarily the building not being opened up early enough and shortages of staff). In addition, we are concerned about keeping the utility costs down. Management and staff at the RR@CC need to better control electrical and gas consumption. Some steps were made in this direction during the latter half of the past year.

Joint Powers Issues

 Primarily focused on utility costs. The huge increase in natural gas prices last year severely affected the facility’s bottom line. Total utility costs last year increased about $18,000 from the previous year.

The negotiating committee (after much Board discussion) pursued the curling club taking over complete management of the facility for the Joint Powers. We simply felt that we would be better served running the facility ourselves. We would have hired our own manager to operate the facility, thereby making us totally responsible for all finances etc. We felt that this tact was not only feasible, but necessary – to provide us with the service and atmosphere we need and to once and for all put aside innuendo that the curling club is not paying it’s fair share of the bills. The Joint Powers considered the idea, but eventually decided to continue forward with the current management configuration. We have since been negotiating a new monthly lease payment that is not finalized at this time.

The negotiations have been extremely time consuming and difficult for both the Joint Powers and Curling Club. We are working on securing a longer-term lease. The evolution of the facility continues …

ICEMAKERS

The Board decided to hire Jim Wainio and Chuck Rozinka as ice- makers for the coming year. We are confident that they will continue to provide quality curling ice for us.

PA SYSTEM

The Board decided to spend approximately $8,500 of our pledge account money to install a PA System in the facility. Scott Weappa and Gordy Dahl are chairing this installation and have done an excellent job in its’ design. The system will basically cover the whole facility; varying from light coverage in the arena to being rather sophisticated in the upstairs great area. We felt that the system was long overdue and not only important for the curling club, but for the facility in general.

BUDGET AND DUES

As mentioned above, the $18,000 increase in utilities last year was a shock!! Surely all of us have personally felt the energy crunch over the past year and have had to adjust our budgets accordingly. In addition, two other items are pertinent to budget discussions: 1) The dues we pay the USCA will go up $4 per curler this coming year and $2 more each of the next two – for a total of $8. 2) The curling club operated about $4,000 in the red last year. We accurately budgeted for this deficit. We cannot continue to erode our operating fund cash position, however.

SOME THOUGHTS FROM THE PRESIDENT

many of us are finding out that the funding and construction of our marvelous curling facility may have been the easy part. Finding the "recipe" that will make our partners in the venture (the four cities) and the curling club both happy has been difficult, at best.

I believe this coming year is critical. All of us need to become more involved. We need to find ways to increase income and decrease expenses. We need to become a curling club – similar, certainly to the old Eveleth, Gilbert and Virginia clubs, which were more closely knit and extremely inventive. There is so much more to the game of curling than just paying and playing. The camaraderie and friendships made are even more important than the recreation. Let’s all attempt to become more of a "club" this year.

We are hosting two national events at our club this year – the USWCA Senior Ladies and the USCA National Men’s/Women’s championships – certainly two challenging and important events. We have an opportunity to show off our new club and to show everyone some IRON RANGE HOSPITALITY. More importantly, these events probably give us all the opportunity to become the "curling club" we should be - mentioned above.

FALL MEETING 10/25

The annual Curl Mesabi fall membership meeting will be held on October 25^th at 7:00 p.m. The Board will have our budget for the coming year prepared for this meeting. There are many important issues to talk about – please attend this meeting and give us your input. In addition, we will have updates on the help we need this coming year to properly run the nationals events. We need time from every member of the club!

BOARD MEETINGS NATIONALS MEETINGS

Sept. 27 6:30 Sept. 13 6:30

Oct. 25 6:00 Oct. 11 6:30

EVENTS/ACTIVITIES

October 6 and 7 – Level 1 and Level 2 Officiating Courses – CALL SHIRLEY COE to sign up.  We need numerous in-house officials for the men's/women's national.  Please help!

Oct. 14 – Ice installation begins and needs to be complete by Oct. 26^th. Call Jim Wainio and Chuck Rozinka to schedule some time where you can help.

October 26-28 United Way Spiel – contact Walt Rockstad

October 30 - Nov. 1 Open House: We need more members – bring someone new to the club. Instruction and snacks etc. will be provided.

Nov. 9-11 USWCA Senior Nationals – Shirley Coe (need help here too)

Nov. 12 Leagues Start – sign up someone new!

Dec. 7-9 Early Bird – Dennis Jorgensen

Dec. 14-16 Junior Open - (unsure of chairperson at this time) HELP??

Jan. 4-6 Doheny Spiel - Brandon Mattson

Jan 18-20 Ladies Spiel – Jane Rockstad

Feb. 1 - IMA SPIEL

Feb. 2 - Inland Spiel

Feb. 3 - Servicemen’s Club

Feb. 8-10 Eveleth Inn – Bill Maki/Tony and Ann Dreshar

Feb. 15-17 Bergan – John Kuitunen ran it last year – He would like someone else to Take over.

Feb. 22-24 Elks Mixed (Tentative)

Feb. 27-28 Ice preparation etc. for Nationals

Mar. 2-10 USCA NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS

Mar. 15-17 Queen City Mixed - Ross/Rhonda Harvey and Mark/Chris Mikulich

Mar. 22-24 Spring Spiel – Jim Wainio?

Mar. 30-31 Sportspage and Bartenders Spiels (tentative)

Send mail to curling@curlmesabi.com with questions or comments about this web site.