I can only hope that there are more coaches out there that will question some of the sections of this revised plan. Because some of the items can take some time to write and make sense, I will try to keep each part short. This is part 1.

One thing I did notice while reading this version of the LRP is that in almost 3 years of writing my concerns to the powers that be, many were addressed in the Revised Version. I do get some gratification from that however I also have many more reservations now that I was able to review the document. As I read the LRP this time, it struck me that this appears to be a giant wish list for the people who came up with this idea. Some of it is achievable and some is just a pipe dream and some doomed to failure. The people who initiated these proposals are too far removed from the reality of what is happening below the elite level.

Let me start with my first reservation, which was just reading the text. That's when I remembered that there was a lawyer chairing this committee and another one serving as President. I now have the feeling I'm going to need my own lawyer to interpret what was written and what was intended by what was written. Complication breeds confusion and further mistrust. We have just taken another giant step toward being way too serious and complicated for our own good.

If we have 10,000 registered divers and 600 coaches across the country, why do we need more Training Centers and more office space? Both of these items involve great expense. As I mentioned in a previous article, if the current group of elite divers, with an invitation, refused to go to the training center this year and train, why would we be looking to build, rent or buy additional training centers? It reminds me of all of the strip malls across the country that sprang up and then were left vacant. Illinois has more high school girl basketball players than US Diving has divers. That is one state as compared to the entire country. We don't have enough business or interest at this time to warrant any more training sites than we have now. We aren't that big. We do need to find out exactly what it is costing to run the one we have now and ask questions about related expenditures.

As for office space, I looked at the future projection of what they think they need. There are blank spaces for someone's name in some of those offices. When I looked at other parts of the plan, creating new positions seems to be a wave of the future in our organization. The point here is that it appears that some of these proposed jobs are inconsistent with the descriptions that are already in the code. Do we want people in any of these positions that don't have a diving background? Future problems will be related to the people who will assume these new positions and the job descriptions that eventually get written. I don't understand why we need these new positions in the first place. If we eliminate these proposals, we won't need additional office space or training sites.

What I do see here is the creation of a bureaucracy and all of red tape that goes along with it. If you think we have problems now, if this goes into effect they will seem minor by comparison. If they are so willing to spend big bucks, then spend it where the majority of the athletes can reap the benefits. That would be within the mission statement. If they are not willing to do that, then spend it on the coaches by paying their membership fees, class fees and books etc. The return would be greater by doing this than what they intend to do.