MOZ

We have sight of 5 significant RESERVES of major chess administrations in Australia.

• ACF. Thought to be between $50,000 cash and $100,000.
• NSWJCL. Thought to be more than $100,000 cash.
• NSWCA.
• CV. Now at $18,000 cash, plus some equipment assets.
• MCC. Owner of one building.

There are probably a few others that would be useful to see in the list, but are related to commercial coaching organisations.

So, what is the right number to hold?

There are probably a few separate reasons for holding reserves.
For example, the ACF may argue that in a given year they may get no bids for an Australian title Event and would need to underwrite the full event themselves. In this situation, at least $20,000 would be justified.
Another example may be an organisation with ambition to purchase or expand a building. This was a hot topic on chesschat for quite a few years as the CDS building was the focus of attention for some members of the NSWCA.
The above two examples could well be classified as i) managing a risk, and ii) saving for a major project. And if the business case stacks up, both i) and ii) could be quite justifiable to the community that created the reserves.

In other situations, reserves 'appear' because a regular activity is consistently profitable and the surpluses just stack up from one year to the next and the next, and suddenly it is a six figure sum. While this is a goodness in the sense of a healthy bank balance, it has the down-side that expenditure of part of the reserves can cause indirectly some nonsense arrangements such as the 1 game per day for the Australian Junior Titles Under 8 division (fortunately corrected this year after being entrenched as a practice for ages).

In the case of Chess Victoria, the reserves reached $35,000 until the AGM held at Croydon. A motion from the floor indicated that that the schedule of charges for ratings and affiliations was stretching local Club budgets. The motion moved a 20% decrease in the rating fee, and a 50% decrease in the affiliation fee for juniors. I supported the motion for two reasons:
A) The CV Executive just elected in that year had no large scale election platform that required financing from reserves, and

B) I believe that those who create a reserve or surplus should have a big say in how it is spent. In the CV situation the surplus belonged to Clubs, and reducing the schedule of fees effectively returned portions of the money to Clubs. This appears equitable to me as I have sat on many (non-chess) Committees over decades where spending occurs simply because the money is there. We see this even at a Federal Government level even though the ANA Office and the Parliament should serve as a handbrake on pork-barrelling.


So, the CV Reserves have been reducing in each of the past 4 years. For 2011, we anticipate a break-even budget.

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FReedom though Fischer-Random chess to enjoy the whole game.

antichrist

Now Moz, I hope that prediction better than previous ones, I am only quoting another poster, have no idea myself.

MOZ

Actually, an important point you raise Mr Byron Bay.

A budget is a prediction, and unforeseens may well intervene.
A budget is not an authorised level of expenditure that is a hanging offence if not exactly followed.

__________________
FReedom though Fischer-Random chess to enjoy the whole game.

JaK

Hey Grant, MOZ has put us in the equation!
MOZ claims that CV has a stash of $18 grand, while Sobby in the CV-GM refers to no such thing!
He starts with a pompous We followed by an equally pompous have ...
Who's having what????

antichrist

according to Abbott it is, cyclones, floods earthquakes not withstanding

MOZ

If you return to my first post in this thread a/c you will see that I have outlined quite a different view from the current federal aversion to declaring deficits. In that arena it is currently regarded as a no-no, to be avoided at all costs.
In that post I outlined sample reasons for holding reserves, and who should spend the reserves.
At the chess club level, logically, if no-one has a professed major-projects manifesto, (with a mandate from the voting community), then the reserves can be used to keep the schedule of charges as low as possible to assist the Clubs that created the reserves in the first place. In a measured way the reserves can decrease to the level of reasonable working capital only.

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FReedom though Fischer-Random chess to enjoy the whole game.

Iconoclast

I do quite agree. Your problem is that chess associations are populated substatially with visionless cowards. First cure their lack of vision with a vision. Then cure their cowardice with ....... I don't know! What do you do with cowards?

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The individual is hopeless without the group.
The group is hopeless without its individuals.

Just2Good

You slowly build their confidence until you have a raging lion, and a coward no more!

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"The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing."

~ Isaiah Berlin ~

Iconoclast

What if the coward is also a robot? You then have a raging robot. (See: Skynet)

__________________
The individual is hopeless without the group.
The group is hopeless without its individuals.