US Youth Soccer Region IV Fall Planning Workshop
Denver, Colorado
October 16 - 19, 2003

Richard Yoder
Disciplinary Committee Chairman
Utah Youth Soccer

Meeting face to face with counter parts in other states and sharing experience, procedures and techniques is an invaluable educational tool. The workshop is the only occasion during the year when many of the actual committees of Region IV meet and interact with the Region Chairman. During this workshop some of the committees met jointly with other committees to share information. Many of the committee's share overlapping responsibilities and understanding the interactions that are necessary to functions as a whole, within the state, is necessary.

The Rules and Appeals Committees met jointly for this year's conference.

The Rules were covered very quickly in the meeting due to the fact that no new USSF or US Youth rules were passed in during the recent AGM

Rules as discussed in this document refer to Bylaws, Policies and other Rules that an organization uses to run its operations.

In making rules changes, we must be cognizant of and make sure they are in compliance with Fed/State/IRS rules as well as consistency with FIFA, USSF and USYSA rules. Some discussion involved a State Associations right to adopt Bylaws or rules that are more restrictive than those adopted by the Federation. While this is a generally accepted practice and principle no one was able to come up with the authority to do so off the top of their head. Suggest a review of Roberts's Rules to confirm or deny.

Washington is using a "Coaching Contract" that they feel allows them to get rid of underperforming coaches during a seasonal year. I will get a copy and review it.

Region IV rules committee will provide information, upon request, regarding how other states are handling a particular aspect of the rules.

There was a good bit of discussion about the USSF "statement" on player movement. There is apparently a move afoot to make a major change to the way players, at all levels, are tied to a team. The USSF Board of Directors has published what they are calling a "statement" on player movement. No state had received a copy of this statement, except Cal North. Consensus of the group was until the "statement " is published in some normal way (Bylaw or Policy) it does not apply.

Mediation was discussed as an option to Disciplinary or Appeal hearings. Washington is well along to formally adopting mediation.

Other rules/procedures

Regarding Temporary Suspensions, despite what the USSF position is on this matter, all states intend to continue to use temporary suspension where they are appropriate.

Appeals

No more than one level of appeal is authorized within a State Association.

Appeals can go straight to the Federation, for example, referee assault, where the minimum punishment is established by the USSF Bylaws.

Discussion on what actions a State Appeals committee can take when they received an appeal of a Disciplinary matter. USSF Rules only allow the Federation Appeals committee to uphold, reverse, or reverse and remand. The Federation does not have the authority to modify a decision by a State Association. About a third of the states allow their appeal committees to modify decisions of their disciplinary committees. The rest of the states only allow their appeals committees to uphold, reverse, or reverse and remand. We need to decide and document what we are authorizing our appeals committee to be able to do.

A long discussion ensued regarding a state Association right to review the financial statements and audit subordinate organizations, specifically clubs. Consensus was that state associations all have the authority in their bylaws to review and audit. Caution was encouraged to not use the authority to perform witch hunts. Special financial reviews should only be done if there is substantial reason to believe that there is a problem. It should not be initiated if a club member requests the review without some factual basis.