Rex Harvey: Charlotte acts ‘bordered on criminal’
A couple weeks after Charlotte nationals, I wrote to Rex Harvey of the Games Committee, saying that meet director Gordon Edwards was upset about Masters T&F Chair George Mathews insisting that Gordon find shuttles to the far-away Dining Hall for older athletes staying in the dorms Sunday night, and about a performance deposit that Gordon said he might have to recover through legal action. I wrote Rex: “Every year, I hear the same thing. The Games Committee (is) at war with the LOC. Why is this?” Rex replied almost immediately, but didn’t want his response divulged. Yesterday he sent me a reply for posting. Still a lot to ponder — and some serious accusations.
Rex Harvey writes:
George Mathews is not on the Games Committee and the Games Committee has nothing to do with the performance deposit. And neither of them choose where the Championships are held, but rather the MTF and MLDR Committies at the National Convention.
The Games Committee exists to insure that the Championships are conducted in accordance with the rules and in a uniform manner from year to year. In order to do that, they insist on things like a realistic schedule, a minimum number of qualified officials, minimum safeguards for the athletes, and about 5000 other details.
Mr./Mrs. meet director/LOC — wanting to expedite the meet and to put as much money as possible in his/her pocket, or his/her cause’s pocket — resists about 2500 of these 5000 items that the Games Committee insists on because they cost extra money and or effort. This year’s Outdoors Director puts the former record holder to shame when it comes to shortcutting the athletes and the Championship.
I understand that Gordon is leaving immediately to live permanently in Costa Rica. As to winning any suit, he is out of luck. His actions, in my mind, bordered on the criminal. It seems to me that he could easily be the target of a suit, rather than the instigator.
In fact, left to him alone the local authorities would have canceled the meet and sent everyone home with no questions asked — at the middle of the first day. I really think that he was just a babe-in-the-woods, way over his organizational ability’s head, but he refused help and continued (to be) abrasive and opinionated to the end.
At the middle of the first day of the meet, when over 40 people had been treated and three transported to the hospital, the Charlotte Chief of Police, the Charlotte Fire Chief, the head of Campus police, and the local Charlotte Medical authorities, after seeing his attitude, refused to talk to Gordon, but instead got George Mathews in a room and grilled him mercilessly.
He alone was able to save the meet by negotiating with them. George and the Games Committee then confronted Gordon with what “had to happen” including more medical coverage, more water, more ice, electrolytes, etc., etc. as dictated by the authorities.
He uniformly refused to pay for any of these, saying “Where is the money coming from? I’m not going to take it out of my pocket”. But he certainly had the entry fees of 1371 athletes and if they paid an average of $50 each, then he had at least $68,000 plus sponsorships. I doubt if his expenses were that great for, as an example, he got an experienced person to do the Hy-Tek data entry for about a dollar an hour, maybe $2.
And he got many hours of the MTF administration, and the Games Committee’s work for $0/hour. No, that is not true, he had to house the Games Committee. The contract calls for hotel rooms, but after being shown some of the dormitories, George Mathews tried to help his budget by accepting dorm rooms for the Games Committee. Gordon repaid that favor by assigning the Games Committee to another “institutional grade” dorm for the duration. This was confirmed by dorm officials.
Gordon did subsequently come up with two more truckloads of ice, some electrolytes for the officials only (which I think the University gave him) and maybe some other things that I am not aware of. The air conditioning did not work in the offices and especially in the press box. The university maintenance people there working on it said that they could have had it prepared, but Gordon had not coordinated at all with their offices and that they had no idea that anything was going on at the track until they got the emergency call.
George was able to negotiate with the paramedics to double their coverage at no additional cost, saving $100 per hour normal costs. Then George and I went to Sam’s and used my Sam’s card to buy 800 bottles of Gatorade for the athletes. Subsequently, George had to buy more ice and more water (and I think more cups) and several of us had to relieve the poor awards crew that Gordon had mercilessly used for 16 hours per day out in that heat (although I guess it was not that hot by the time it got midnight).
They were so dehydrated and tired that they could not think and had the “shakes”. We will probably never see those volunteers again. We do not need people like Gordon around this sport, we cannot afford to have people like Gordon around this sport if we want to continue it. I think the only reason George was willing to do so much was that he knew it would be the last time as he was quitting. One can only expect so much from volunteers.
The officials coordinator, at one point, was going to send the officials home. They were overworked, overheated, and desparately needing rest out of the heat. He wasn’t afraid of just heat exhaustion, but much worse. One of the negotiated points that George and the Games Committee were able to make to keep this from happening (with the subseqent canceling of the meet) was to only allow 4 attempts in the field events until conditions improved. I have never heard such childish whining as from the throwers especially. And I have heard a lot of whining. They didn’t seem to realize that it was 4 throws or nothing!
(End of Rex reply.)
Me again:
I gave Gordon an opportunity to respond to George’s column in National Masters News (also critical of the Charlotte meet organizers and Edwards), and he has not done so publicly yet. I’ll invite a response to Rex’s note as well.
13 Responses
From a whining thrower:
I did not know the story behind the fiasco in North Carolina. I apologize to the organizing committee for whining about getting only four throws. I would hope in the future that we could get meet directors who care more about the athletes than making a profit.
I am looking forward to competing in Maine. Both Nationals they hosted were excellent.
WOW – worse than I had imagined. And this behavior from the meet director with whom I chatted at length in Honolulu about how much “better” the Charlotte meet would be than what he seemed to think was a fiasco in Honolulu. Frankly I am blown away by Rex Harvey’s description of the backroom scene. I have always viewed Rex as a gentleman who could pour oil on troubled water and have been at meets where he has worked hard behind the scene to help the LOC pull itself together and keep things going. The tone of his letter tells me that things were very much worse than I imagined.
I want to thank the Games committee and George Mathews for keeping the meet going in spite of Gordon Edwards best efforts to kill it, the officials, and the athletes.
All of us need to take a deep breath and let it out slowly before criticizing a meet for all perceived “sins”. Sometimes we just do not have a clue what is going on behind the scenes.
As I have written before, there are venues where there is a record of accomplishment – and one can have confidence that things will go pretty well. Personally I look forward to the meet in Orono – this is the 3rd time there, one can hope that things should run smoothly. For new venues and new directors, hopefully the games committee can find ways to babysit them to a great extent so that a money grubbing meet director does not wreck havoc with the meet or one who “just knows how to do it” because he/she has run NCAA meets learns the realities of masters meets before screwing up completely. Perhaps a warning flag is the meet director who talks too much about the color of the track or the wonders of the facility – and discounts the complexity of running a national masters meet.
Meanwhile – has Mr. Edwards fled the country or gone into the witness protection program? I hope this is the last the masters track scene sees of him.
Knowing Rex Harvey quite well, he is not one to critice or play politics. As Mary pointed out in the previous posing, Rex is an individual who works behind the scene to smooth things out, defuse conflicts and get things to work despite others’shortcomings.
Which means: the situation was, if anything probably worse than Rex described it.
Let’s be thankful that George Matthews et. al. were able to salvage the meet. Thanks, George
I just read Charlotte acts border on criminal. I don’t know about the whole meet, but I was an awards ceremony volunteer and I was a fly on the wall about the four throws only. George did not relieve one volunteer, he was so rude to her she left. The shaking volunteer was out of shape and had run the 1500 that morning. Again, I think(do not know)he used George’s rude behavior as an excuse to leave. There were no 16 hour days for awards people. I was there at all times and Gordon had told exactly how each day would be. The four throws was posited to save time becaused the meet had been shut down by the fire dept. That brings up the great negotiations George did. They shut the meet down. Exactly what did that save. So if all the other stuff you wrote is as far off as what I know – get your facts right.
A complete financial report is supposed to be submitted within 90 days after the National Masters T+F Championship by the Meet Administrator/LOC, right?
How can all interested parties gain access to such financial reports for the last ten championships, as well as the Charlotte report as soon as it is available? We need to study the facts and learn about where we succeed or fail financially. Follow the money!
I just watched again the movie, The Producers. It teaches how to make lots of money by securing donations and ticket revenue and then putting on a flop of a production, allowing the organizer to maximize their ill gotten gain. Sounds like this happened in Charlotte. No cash for ice,etc.?
Future bidders for the Nationals should have proven track records and should be well aware of the revenue and expenditures of recent Championships in order to submit realistic bids and budgets.
Many thanks to George, Rex, Sandy, Ken, Jerry, Sandy, Al and others who have kept Masters Track alive.
Jack
FR: David E. Ortman (M53) Seattle, WA
I was not at Charlotte ’06. However, I commend George Matthews and Rex Harvey for their efforts to patch things together under what were obviously very trying circumstances. I would hope that George and Rex were reimbursed for having to step in to purchase suvival supplies and keep the meet and athletes going. If either George and Rex are out of pocket I hope they will let the rest of us know so we can chip in if necessary.
Everybody, don?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢t rush to judgment of a person or persons you don?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢t even know. The organizers being in it to maximize their ill gotten gain? You must be joking. I believe the problems started by not having enough funds, not by putting the green stuff away in a retirement fund. Actually, the biggest problem of the organizers was a late start to the fundraising effort. All potential big sponsors already had allocated their money for 2006 when approached (much too late) in 2005. Maybe at that point, the meet director should have returned the event to the USATF and pride got in the way of sound decisions. As just a club member and not having been on the organizing committee, I don?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢t know the details. A few Carolinas T&F members put up $ 2,000.00 each, not enough, as I can see now. After having helped the meet and the masters movement with $ 2,000.00, I don?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢t like to get even indirectly accused of being a criminal by anybody. Follow the money, my friend, and it will lead you to a few ordinary members of the club, not to the organizer. Members who donated their money and countless hours of their lives to make it happen. They did not even know that maybe, just maybe it was doomed from the start due to insufficient funds. And if you think my donated money was stolen and not spent on the event, you are misinformed!
Maybe the selection commiittee needs to take a more careful look at the financial plans of the potential organizers. Maybe a $10 higher fee would have made people less unhappy than a meeting like this. I personally rather pay $60 for a good meeting than $50 for a bad one. As far as I am concerned the worth thing happened, the people with best intends accuse each other of misconduct. No good, we will loose badly needed people…
I competed at the Charlotte meet in the 5,000m, 10,000m, and 1500m. I understood prior to the meet that the conditions would be less than ideal, and I questioned the scheduling. The one thing that really surprised me was that there was no split timer for the three races I ran. After the 5,000 meters I went to the meet director to inform him of this error, and he said it was the meet offical’s responsibility, and “brushed” me off. I thought to myself “I guess he has bigger complaints to deal with.” My thoughts must have been on the mark.
Reid Harter
Speaking of being brushed off at Charlotte, My 1k discus was rejected as being too large in diameter. I knew my discus was within specs and I complained that the measuring device was out of adjustment. All I could get from the officials was “we checked it and it is right”. After I got home I checked my discus with an expensive micrometer and confirmed that it was more than 10 hundredths of a mm under the maximum allowed. I have communicated with Tony Wayne, the chief weights and measure man asking him to have the measuring device checked. Tony has ignored my requests and simply wrote “the gauges were correct” and “the games are over” Tony won’t give me the names and contacts for the officials who were incharge of the measuring, so I am unable to let them know that the measuring device needs recalibrating.
From a thrower who didn’t whine, but thought the “solution” was wrong:
If the meet organizers in Charlotte got a late start on fund raising it is another example of their incompetence. Charlotte was awarded the meet in a highly unusual manner at the same time time as Hawaii was awarded the 2005 meet, at the USATF Convention in Kansas City in December 2002, a full three and a half years before the meet. In other words they had a full year more than others have had to prepare and yet they still failed! Excuse me if I’m not sympathetic to their failure to deliver on the many promises they made the persuaded the Masters Committee to violate its own rules and make the award to them without competition and out of the normal sequence.
What is this tempest in a teapot all about any how. The meet went off very well and I was there for every virtually award winner in the meet I did not hear any complaints from the participants. I am most reminded of the Canadians who were very impressed how well the meet was organized. They cited that two major weather conditions caused major problems. The fire marshal closed the meet down due to 100 + heat index, and the second was shutting the meet down due to lightning in the area. In spite of this the meet was completed very successfully, So instead of running around with recriminations and fault finding, the appropriate thing would be congratulations all around. After a major victory in difficult circumstances it sounds like all the generals are running around screaming but it would not have happened except for me. Petty! The games committee worked long and hard to reschedule the meet, and the LOC successfully implemented it.
I have been to all outdoor Master natls since 2000 and haven’t had one bad Natls so far. Is it something wrong with me or somebody else??
Honolulu was awesome, had a great time in Charlotte.
Are there too many whimps and whiners here or what??
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