The meeting was called to order at 6:35 PM by Chairman Andrey Geva at the Houston Athletic Fencing Center. Other Officers present were Vice Chairman August Skopik, Secretary Matt Delevoryas, and Treasurer John Trojanowski.

The Chairman addressed the meeting and outlined the topics he viewed as deserving attention during the meeting, of which he named two as particularly important: 1) 2004 Divisionals, and 2) a telephone call he had received from a USFA representative.

The assembly quickly agreed that the 2004 Divisionals were a pressing issue. Months earlier there had been an announcement indicating that Divisionals would be held April 3-4 at Salle Mauro. Andrey stated that when the current fencing year was approaching, August asked the clubs for responses of interest in hosting the 2004 Divisionals, that there were no responses, that Salle Mauro did respond, that there was a result of going with what was submitted. He further remarked that the Salle Mauro venue does not satisfy the rules of fencing, and that in general the members of the Division currently thought the venue to be sufficiently not in conformance to allow Divisionals be conducted there. He stated that clubs are not supposed to be involved in the running of Divisionals except at the discretion of the Division. He suggested that the Division, rather than a club, run Divisionals at some neutral site. Matt argued that this would not be in accord with the wishes of The Committee [Secretary's note: The phrase "The Committee" herein is meant to refer to the committee with no known official name which was constituted by agreement at the November 16^th meeting of the membership of the Division, composed of a representative of each club, to recommend a policy for awarding certain key tournaments including Divisionals to host clubs]. He stated that The Committee was in near unanimity that the 2004 Divisionals should be allocated to a host club selected with priority determined by lot, and not run directly by the Executive Committee. Andrey responded that The Committee, constituted months earlier, had yet to make any report whatsoever to him, and, as such, opinions from within The Committee did not yet have any relevance. After some discussion, a majority agreed that by default the Executive Committee would run the 2004 Divisionals, but that were The Committee to produce a report or partial report before the end of Friday, February 13^th, that report would be deemed not to be too late to apply to hosting of the 2004 Divisionals. In the meantime, the Officers would investigate possible venues for Divisionals, in the anticipation that the results would be of value either to themselves or to a selected host club.

Andrey reported to the assembly that he had received a telephone call from a USFA representative expressing a concern that there were a lot of problems at the USFA office relating to the Gulf Coast Division, and that it would be advisable to take action to improve the situation. Further, a representative might be being arranged to be sent to the 2004 Divisionals to observe the proceedings. Andrey stated that he responded by explaining that no reply or action should be expected from him without a bill of particulars first being presented to him. Andrey indicated that if an observer were to come, it sounded like the Division would be expected to pay all the expenses of the observer even though the Division did not request such an observer. The assembly agreed that a USFA observer would certainly be welcome, but that the Division would not voluntarily pay expenses of any observer it did not request.

The assembly discussed the requirement of the USFA that there must be some level 5 or.better referee present at Divisionals, and the difficulty expected to satisfy that requirement. There were only two members of the Division rated 5 or better in any weapon, one who never referees competitions below national level, and one who was out of the country for a year. One idea which did get discussed was trying to arrange to bring Jerry Benson from Oklahoma.

By agreement, when John completed the latest financial report for the USFA, he would send it to the USFA and to the other Officers, and Matt would post the report on the Division's Web site.

It was mentioned that there existed a $90 check written by the USFA to the Division, which through some confusion was still undeposited when the check became stale. John reported that it would be simple to have the USFA reissue a check upon return of the stale check.

By general consensus, the meeting adjourned at 7:38 PM.