NEBRASKA HIGH SCHOOL RODEO BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING
February 19th, 2023 Stapleton, NE
DIRECTORS PRESENT: Jason Ohm, Shane Gorwill, Tim Vaughn, Jenny Johnston, Jasper Fanning,, Will Druery, Jim Buss, Levi Fisher, Adam Clark & Sharlene Buss, Richard Schrunk
DIRECTOR ABSENT: Jamie Olson & Brett Miller
Meeting was call to order @ 1:25 pm by Jason Ohm
Minutes from the February 5th meeting were read.
Jasper made a motion to approve the minutes with striking action taken in executive session. 2nd by Tim Motion carried
Jason gave financial reports
Central Entry – $6500.60
Raffle – $109,630.60
Awards- $18, 377.04
Student – $6,715.74
General- $21, 276.51
Jasper made a motion to approve financial reports. 2nd by Jenny Motion carried
Visitors were invited to share public comments.
Tammie Swanson spoke of her concerns with compliance with the by-laws. She feels the compliance issues were not caused by this board, it came from a culmination of many years. Her concerns are the following:
- The National office has a different set of bylaws on file than the board is operating under.
- No one can confirm if the bylaws have ever been filed with the state of Nebraska.
- If Nebraska is not compliant with the National Office, our kids could be ineligible to compete at Nationals.
She would like to see the bylaws updated and compliant with the National office.
Per Paul Cleveland he was there as an extension of James Higgnebotham. James has had 20-30 calls from parents of members concerned with the non compliant bylaws. Paul shared his perspective with the board about what they are up against.
- Nebraska is out of compliance with the National Office.
- First Issue out of compliance. No two voting members of the Board can receive mail at the same location.
- Potentially bringing in the National Board to clean things up, if they do that the first thing they talked about is probation. Probations could be as deep as Nebraska kids not being able to go to Nationals.
- The current Board did not create this, but it has to be fixed and has to be fixed now.
- There are a lot of things the Board can do to clean things up and get compliant and get the National Office happy with Nebraska again.
- The next issue they have is the mid-season resolutions.
- Paul agrees the window of opportunity for change is longer between Fall & Spring rodeos, but the changes that were made would have been more well received had they been implemented for the Fall 2023 rodeos rather than the Spring of 2023.
- Paul expressed concerns as to how the judging policy was handled by the Board. While he agrees there were judges that needed to retire from judging, but it could have been handled better.
Adam asked Paul what step one was going forward. Paul stated the first thing to do is to get the Board compliant. James Higgnebotham wants to see the Board take steps to get a complaint.
Jason asked Paul for suggestions on how we solve the judging concerns we have. Paul stated it was an “age old problem” and didn’t provide any solutions to the board other than to have judges and directors fill out reports after each rodeo to create a papertrail to back up every decision the board makes.
Jim Buss Resigned from the board of directors.
Jasper, Levi, Will, Sharlene will form the By-Laws Compliance Committee to begin the process of getting compliant.
Jess Hegloth gave an update on the State Finals Update.
When Jess came to the board 2 years ago and presented Burwell’s Bid to have State Finals, he had an agreement with Trotters that the High School Finals would use their tents for the stalls. In December, Comstock decided to host the Windmill festival the same time as the rodeo and Trotter always lets Comstock use their tents and are no longer available for the State Finals. When Jess started calling around to other tent companies, he found out all the tents for the summer are already rented out.
As of now, they have 180 stalls available. Still working on options. Some of the campsites will have the ability to build pens other campsites will not have that option.
Electricians have everything in place to have sufficient hook ups, assuming it dries up and they can get them in.
Jess stated the Burwell community is excited to have the opportunity to host the State Finals. He recognizes that due to the tornado that hit last year and FEMA being very slow to work with, that their facility is not what they had when the contract was signed. He would understand if the Board feels the need to move the State Finals to a different location, but he said their board will do everything within their power to make it a great State Finals. The biggest concern he has is the number of covered stalls that are available.
There was a discussion concerning who would be used for the State Finals Program. Halie presented quotes from The Quiz and Nebraska Print Works. She stated both companies have been very easy to work with. Halie mailed out copies of last year’s programs to both companies asking for a bid for a similar program.
Jasper made the motion to go with the Quiz for State Finals program & the day sheets. Richard 2nd. Motion Carried
Jenny, Richard & Adam will be on the Program Committee to assist Halie with making additional decisions in regurages to the program as well as helping to gather information.
The State Finals announcer was discussed. Levi made a motion to hire Travis Schauda. Jasper 2nd. Motion Carried
The State Finals Contractor options were discussed. Sharlene will call Tricia to get information on State Finals that was sent out in the past. She will contact all approved contractors. Bids will be due back April 1st.
The State Finals Judges were discussed. Jason will contact Ray Brown & Tray White to see if they are interested in judging State Finals Judges. If they are not interested he will contact Darrin Boots.
Levi will bring cutting judge options to the next board meeting. Jason will call Jamie and make sure he has a reined cow horse judge lined up.
There was a discussion concerning the open rodeo weekend of April 22nd & 23rd. Halie presented the board with Albion’s approval application and stated that it was the only application she received as a possible replacement for that weekend. Halie shared that Albion worked really hard and really fast to put their application together quickly and that Albion was bending over backwards to give the contestants a replacement rodeo for McCook. Levi stated that McCook wanted to be reconsidered to have a rodeo this year. Halie responded that McCook did not reach out to her to re-submit their application. Jason Mathis, former High School Rodeo Board President shared his perspective that if a rodeo withdraws their application they should not be allowed to be reconsidered for that rodeo season. Halie shared with the board the struggles she had in working with the McCook rodeo committee from the secretary’s perspective.
Levi had concerns that if the board allowed Albion to have a rodeo it would go against a motion the board passed in June of 2021 regarding the deadline for a rodeo to turn in an application. There was discussion if that motion was applicable for a replacement rodeo who was never given a deadline because they were never given an approval packet or if the intention of that motion only applied to existing rodeos who had received the deadline when they received their approval packet.
Chuck from Albion spoke on behalf of the Albion High School Rodeo committee and shared the willingness they have to host a high school rodeo on short notice.
Jasper moved to approve Albion for this year, with the stipulation they do not have a reservation on that date for next year and all rodeos be able to apply for next year. Scott 2nd
Tim shared his concerns about the rough stock arena Albion has available & if there is frost in the ground, it could be a safety concern. Shane shared his concern about the turn back fence used at the Jr. High Rodeo was free standing panels.
Motion was voted on. 4 – 5 Motion Failed
There was a discussion of the appeal process for judges and stock contractors. Jasper shared what the appeal process is for the PRCA. If we went by the PRCA process it would go back to the Event Director. Levi asked what the process will be for Judges to get added to the list for Fall rodeos. It was decided it would be best to form a committee to work out details on an appeal process. Richard, Shane & Tim will be on a committee to start the procedure for the judge approval process.
New business:
Adult memberships were discussed. Adam will take responsibility for collecting and tracking the memberships.
Queen contest was discussed. Potential contract and if the queen raffle causes any conflict with our big raffle. Halie will check with the Nebraska Gaming commission to see if the association can have small raffles in addition to the big raffle we do each year and will report back.
Richard made a motion to adjourn @ 6:00 PM. Jasper 2nd. Motion Passed
