September 17, 2025 Board Meeting

Randonneurs USA Board of Director Minutes

September 17, 2025

 

  1. Call to order: The meeting on September 17, 2025 was called to order at 8:00 p.m. Eastern time, over Zoom. The following members were present.
    1. Dawn Piech
    2. Bill Bryant
    3. Charlie Martin
    4. Chris Argo
    5. Gardner Duvall
    6. Dave Thompson
       
  2. The minutes of the August 2025 Board meeting were approved.
     
  3. The prior Board email vote appointing a new RBA to FL:Southern was confirmed.
     
  4. The Treasurer submitted a written report for August. Dave confirmed that he had reviewed back-up information. There was a brief discussion about the net worth of RUSA exceeding $300,000.
     
  5. Gardner reported that the Financial Audit Committee received the July Treasurer’s Report before the Board meeting, and made no comment about it.
     
  6. Chris made the RBA-L report. He has an onboarding session with new RBAs on September 18, and a plan for follow-up in January 2026. He is considering a November RBA roundtable. Chris reported a lack of contact with one RBA. Dave reported that RBAs are submitting calendars with late 2026 events, beyond the ACP fiscal year calendar that ends on October 31. Dave also reported that no one has presented a proposal for PBP drop bag service for 2027, and that volunteers are welcomed for this service to RUSA members. Dave reported on some discussion about adding more rides out of the SF East Bay. Dave also reported that a dispute between two RUSA members, which had previously come to the board's attention, has not been resolved.
     
  7. The Board noted the limited reaction to its report on gender treatment changes by RUSA. The (F) designation was pulled from the magazine, and additional work remains to remove the designation from the website.
     
  8. Dave noted that the current editor of American Randonneur will be retiring from that position at the end of 2026. The Board considered the possibility of having two editors developing every other issue. Volunteers are welcomed for this service.
     
  9. A written Web Team report was submitted. Charlie addressed the display of events on the RUSA calendar prior to their official approval, to preview potential events to riders. There was also a discussion about how the Coast to Coast award for riding four unique grand randonnees is applied to multiple events conducted in one region. The current principle for uniqueness is whether a subsequent event adopts prior marketing. The intent is to consider this further in consultation with the Awards Review Committee. Charlie noted that there is no current process for the board and organizers to agree on Coast to Coast assignments, so he will follow up with each 2026 organizer to ensure everyone's expectations for 2026 align. Charlie noted that the member demographics report has been updated, but has not yet been fully conformed with the new gender policies and practices.
     
  10. Dawn reported on the upcoming edition of Between Controls, and on the statistics for uptake of the August edition. She will lead a call with the 5 reviewers of Between Controls in October-November to discuss the medium, improvements and feedback. Additionally, they are working to identify the 2026 quarterly regional highlights.
     
  11. A motion to approve a proposed philosophy for RUSA awards to guide the Board and the Awards Review Committee passed. The document is to be finalized for publication at https://rusa.org/pages/awards.
     
  12. Dawn reported that the Marketing Committee is working on a set of principles. There was a zoom meeting at which the committee discussed its goals. Bill said that the committee is looking for members with an interest or background in marketing. The Board needs to develop a marketing budget. A critical concern is the identification of new markets where potential randonneurs might be. We need to make randonneuring part of the modern cycling lingo. Potential markets could be the League of American Bicyclists and USA Cycling, or others. Dawn also expressed the need to approve a marketing charter and also identify and work to find a Marketing Chair and/or Co-Chairperson to take the lead on marketing initiatives in 2026 and beyond.
     
  13. There was a preliminary discussion of the 2026 budget, with committee follow up with the Treasurer on September 18. Income has been exceeding expenses. There was a discussion about the practicality of eliminating the permanent fee and even including permanents as an aspect of every membership. One issue with this is that changes to the current perms registration workflow cannot be rolled out without significant risk of breaking the website. Currently the server system in that regard is fragile, and several server upgrades are needed to make that change. Additional ways to make first-rides easier to join were discussed.
     
  14. Don Hamilton will run the November 2025 RUSA election. Bill and Gardner confirmed that they are not running for reelection for new terms. Chris confirmed that he is running again for RBA-L. The conduct of Board candidate interviews was discussed.
     
  15. The next meetings are scheduled for October 8, 2025 and November 12, 2025.
     
  16. Adjournment: The meeting was adjourned at 10:07 Eastern time, without objection.