News

AGENDA for Directors’ Meeting

Monday, September 11, 2023 at 7:00 pm Zoom

ECTRA members are invited to attend all Directors’ meetings

1. Call to order
2. Review and approval of Minutes June 12, 2023 – Diana Murphy
3. Treasurer’s Accounts Second Quarter Report– Megan Meldrum
4. Old Business:
   1. ECTRA Promotion and Advertising update – Jeannette Cole
   2. Mail Chimp/newsletter progress
   3. Data Collection Program File Maker Pro :
   4. Should ECTRA update their original DVD on competitive trail riding for promotional purposes?
   5. Update on the new Printify Store and how it works and who will oversee it going forward?
   6. Plan for disbursing new ECTRA logo sticker/decals.
   7. Do we want to do Equine Affair 2023 or Harrisburg 2024?
   8. Action to have new 3-fold brochures printed.
   9. Should we allow ride managers to have access to our rider/horse numbers for their use creating their ride entry information? [This would give them up to date information to determine who is a current member/horse.] – Marilyn Miles
   10. Search for new source for drug testing. – Joan Hiltz VMD
   11. Ideas about how to make online payments more secure. – Beth Sheldon d.
   12. Sanctioning/Insurance Report – Rebecca Wachtel

6. New Business:
   5. Discussion on how ECTRA can help ride management with the cost of hiring veterinarian judges.
   6. Discussion on how to encourage riders to enter rides before a ride entry deadline.
   7. Consideration of a policy that the board can vote to notice the work/involvement of a member by a donation to their favorite charity. – Louise Lester
   8. Discussion on whether Volunteers can obtain mileage for each of the jobs they do at a single ride i.e. timer/secretary. – Louise Clarino
      
      
7. Membership questions and comments.
8.  Adjourn

Updated distances are as follows: 100 mile CTR 9/1 – 9/3.  60 mile CTR 9/2 – 9/3.  25 mile CTRs 9/1 & 9/2.  15 mile CDRs also available on 9/1 & 9/2. More information and updates will be available HERE!

Due to another catastrophic rain event GMHA has had to cancel all activities planned for the next few weeks.  For more information please see the full message below from GMHA’s Executive Director or visit the website at Green Mountain Horse Association | South Woodstock, Vermont (gmhainc.org)

7/23/2023 Hello GMHA members, friends and family – I left work on Friday with thoughts of an update to all of you with the completed work on the facility after the July 10th storm. Instead, you may have heard that last Friday night GMHA experienced another flooding event. Unlike the earlier July statewide rain event, this one was more localized. A series of thunderstorms lined up over GMHA to drop over five inches of rain in three hours. The resulting flash flood was more disastrous than the flooding ten days before. The flood waters came up faster, ran swifter and deeper than before. All the work that had been completed the previous week was washed away, and more. The Connemara Show had started to move in earlier on Friday ahead of the storm.  Ponies were moved out of C Barn to Upwey Barn as water came into their stalls. The dumpster that was behind the workshop now resides stuck under the car bridge at Upwey. The porta potty from the lunging ring is now halfway down the stream in the Upwey arena and another one is in the retention basin by Morgan Hill Road. All the hard work on the roads, parking areas and grassy edges is washed out and we will have to start from scratch again. The XC and Jump fields have another layer of sand, silt and rocks covering them with some deeper channels running through them creating dangerous conditions. The Dust Bowl Arena will need a complete rebuild. As a result of all this damage, CVDA cancelled their two-day dressage show and I limited the Connemara Show to in-hand classes in the White ring, only. I have asked that the GMHA Summer Dressage Days Show for next weekend be cancelled (July 28-30). In addition, the GMHA facility, in its entirety, and Member Trail loops are closed to riders and visitors until at least August 7th. Any shows, clinics, members days during that time frame are cancelled. This will result in the cancellation of the CTR, Pleasure and Starter rides scheduled for August 5-6 and the Wheel Runners Clinic on August 1st. I don’t make this decision lightly as we are in the busiest time of the year, but it is for everyone’s safety. The scope and breadth of the repairs all over the property will require our undistracted attention so we can get them completed in the next two weeks. Over the next couple of days GMHA staff and Board will work on how we can reschedule, or modify the cancelled events, following the two week time frame allowing them to run safely. We will have further information from the Board later today, or tomorrow, on how to support GMHA during this time. If nothing else, GMHA teaches resilience and patience. We will need lots of both in the near future and I thank you in advance! Bruce Perry, Executive Director

Sorry to report that Moonlight in Vermont and all associated rides and runs are cancelled due to the extreme weather conditions.  For more information please see the ride website HERE and also the runner website 2023 Vermont 100 Cancelled – Vermont 100 Endurance Race.  

Wellwood Orchard is also cancelled due to a conflict.  Please contact ride management for more information. 

ECTRA lost our ONLY newsletter editor suddenly last week. For anybody interested the organization Judy was involved with building schools in Africa is actively fundraising to build their 32nd school and they would probably be very grateful for donations in Judy’s memory: Contribute | Build a School in Africa.  You can read more about Judy’s work with the organization here: Thanks to her, children in Mali have a future – Lowell Sun

Please contact Linda via her cell number (on Ride Manager page) for ride packets until further notice as she is having computer issues.

Next BOD will be: Monday, June 12, 2023 at 7:00 pm

For Zoom information please contact Carolyn Blocker

All are welcome.  Agenda can be found HERE