By Larry Waters, 2018 Chairman of the Board
As in the past, your Board of Directors will continue to provide overall leadership and direction for our organization. Thanks to more than 200 volunteers who serve tirelessly, ALTA provides an unparalleled tennis experience to metro Atlanta. The 2018 Board of Directors is in place and working hard for our members to continue that.
The role of the board is to manage the overall well being of the association through policy and funding decisions. That includes approval of budgets, spending and ALTA Foundation grants. To accomplish that, the board has a number of committees. Over the past several years, those included nominating, IT, bylaws, policies and procedures, contracts, finance, employee benefits, ALTA Foundation and long-range planning committees, which provide valuable information and recommendations to the overall board.
While all committees perform their duties as needed, we expect the IT committee will be the most active this year. Since much of the interaction between members and the organization is through the website, we will continue to invest in this area with a plan to significantly enhance the user experience, providing more services and features regardless of the device members use. Our goal is to make it much easier to manage lineups, enter scorecards, check standings, etc.
This year, as board chairman, I have created two committees that I feel are important to ALTA’s future. The membership committee will evaluate ways to increase membership, bringing in more adult and junior players and creating more teams. A committee also will look at The ALTA Foundation with the goal of extending ALTA’s involvement in bringing tennis opportunities to disabled and underprivileged groups in the Atlanta metro area.
The ALTA Foundation is an important part of what we do, but often the activity is not widely known. The foundation was created to support juniors and amateur athletes and programs for the disadvantaged and physically and mentally challenged players. This past year, the foundation issued $70,000 in grants to various programs that provide opportunities that include bringing tennis to inner-city youth. While the foundation has done an excellent job managing ALTA’s involvement in these programs, the board believes even more can be done. The new committee reviewing foundation activity will look at ways to better promote the foundation, not only across the ALTA area but also among our members.
In addition, I have asked the first vice president to work with the various league VPs and others to create a more digital presence for ALTA. That may include online captains’ meetings and how-to videos for new members and captains that would help them understand roster entry, scorecard entry and other website activity.
With all that in mind, your ALTA 2018 Board of Directors has a lot on our plate. Rest assured, though, that our primary focus will be to maintain our organization and its sound financial position.
