June 2012 - 9

From the CEO
The American Contract
Bridge League
President
Sharon Anderson
Chair, Board of Directors
Craig Robinson
Chief Executive Officer
Robert Hartman
ACBL Counsel
Peter Rank
Chair, Board of Governors
Mike Kovacich

Board of Directors
District 1 * George Retek
District 2 * Paul Janicki
District 3 * Glenda Calkins
District 4 * Craig Robinson
District 5 * Sharon Fairchild
District 6 * Margot Hennings
District 7 * Bob Heller
District 8 * Georgia Heth
District 9 * Shirley Seals
District 10 * Bill Cook Jr.
District 11 * A. Beth Reid
District 12 * William Arlinghaus
District 13 * Suzi Subeck
District 14 * Sharon Anderson
District 15 * Phyllis Harlan
District 16 * Dan E. Morse
District 17 * Bonnie Bagley
District 18 * Claire Jones
District 19 * Donald Mamula
District 20 * Merlin Vilhauer
District 21 * Bruce Blakely
District 22 * Ken Monzingo
District 23 * Rand Pinsky
District 24 * Alvin Levy
District 25 * Richard DeMartino
To contact your district director,
address your email to
district#director@acbl.org.
(Enter the district number
where you see #.)

Notes from the road
I've had the opportunity to visit a number of our regional tournaments
recently. I enjoyed my interaction with a broad cross-section of Members,
Volunteers, Club owners and teachers. Whether at the bridge table or at roundtable forums, speaking with our Members has given me greater insight into the
challenges faced by the League. I also met with unit and district officials to
understand how the ACBL can better support their local initiatives.
I heard two recurring themes from our stakeholders while on the road:
The ACBL needs to attract more young people to the game.
The ACBL needs to capitalize on technology.
As you may have read in some of my earlier columns, the ACBL is committed to improving our education, marketing and technology efforts. We recently
hired Bryan Delfs to head up our Education program. Bryan, a Silver Life Master, served as a Junior Ambassador and represented the United States in the
World University Bridge Championship in Poland in 2008.
We also signed a contract for a new version of ACBLscore, which will become the new technology platform for our organization. The development of
the new ACBLscore+ software will take approximately a year and a half and
will be beta-tested extensively before the rollout to our 3,000-plus sanctioned
clubs.

Believe it or not
You can't beat some of the stories that you hear at our tournaments. A tournament director in Gatlinburg relayed a story about a player wanting to know
where the closest hospital was located.
The TD was obviously very concerned and inquired as to the nature of her
problem. She explained that had fallen on her arm between sessions of the
Swiss teams and thought she had broken a bone. Given the severity of the
situation, the TD offered to get her immediate assistance and was even willing
to help arrange for transportation to the hospital. Her response: "How kind of
you. But we're having such a good game, I'll play in the evening session and
then go for treatment later tonight!"

Don't miss it
Induction ceremonies for three new members of the ACBL Bridge Hall of
Fame will take place at 8 p.m. on Sunday,
July 15, during the 2012 Summer NABC in
Philadelphia. The new members are Kyle
Larsen, the late Grant Baze and Jan Martel.
More details are contained in the ad on
page 21 in this issue. I hope to see you
there.
Robert Hartman, CEO
June 2012 Bridge Bulletin

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of June 2012