July 25, 2025

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SOCIETY MEETING

SUNDAY, AUGUST 24th

There will be a meeting for ALL members to attend on Sunday, August 24th.  (There will not be a virtual option.)  This fall will provide more opportunities for you to challenge yourself with higher level matches, and we will need more Teams of 3.  

We’ll review:

• AR responsibilities
• Grade assignments
• Review Laws and Expectations
• Regulation 18 violations/management
• Other Business
• And socialize!

This will be our last time for us all to come together in person before our annual banquet.  Please save this date! Venue details will be sent separately.

Additionally, there will be a combined Development Opportunity on August 16th hosted by the Kenosha Mammoths and include the Northwest Woodsmen.  There will be an initial discussion on law, followed by a scrimmage where we will rotate in referees.  We will also be reviewing AR training for new AR’s.  

The day will kick off at 12:00pm and end at the Tipsy Kiwi, the Mammoths home bar.  More details to follow. If you have any questions, please contact Dawn McKenzie (development@carfu-rs.com).

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Chawn White recently resigned his position as Treasurer due to growing job responsibilities which will hamper his ability to manage the daily communication of the role, particularly in light of the implementation of Arbiter Pay (see below).

Chawn stepped up when we needed him when Don retired from the role.  That really shows his commitment to the Society and the game, and it is greatly appreciated! I encourage anyone else that is interested in helping out to contact a board member and ask how you can get engaged. We will need future leaders.

Sydney Ramgolan has been voted in by the board to replace Chawn.  She will serve until our next AGM when we will hold a full member vote to approve her to complete the current Treasurer term through the end of 2026.

Amelia Vojt has been supporting Sydney with recruitment and has volunteered to step up into the Referee Recruitment Officer (RRO).  The board accepted her appointment.  She will serve until the next AGM.

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Chicago Area Rugby Football Union Referee Society has been fully recognized as an Illinois Non-Profit Organization!! As such, under Dawn’s leadership, we were able to secure a free Google Workspace account.  This will provide us with a central platform for all of our documents and communication and provide us with some additional tools for meeting management, etc.  

Going forward we will now have consistent email addresses by position that align with our website domain:

president@carfu-rs.com	Tim Sheridan
vicepresident@carfu-rs.com	David Zaccaria
treasurer@carfu-rs.com	Sydney Ramgolan
development@carfu-rs.com	Dawn McKenzie
assignor@carfu-rs.com	Laura Nevill
recruitment@carfu-rs.com	Amelia Vojt

Chawn will still be on carfurs.treasurer@gmail.com until the spring season is finalized.

If you’d like to reach the entire board (including at-large members) you can email board@carfu-rs.com

Thank you to Dawn and Tim Walsh for seeing this through a fairly arduous process.

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This coming season is going to be a good one!  The Blaze have been promoted to D1 to join the Griffins and the Lions. This is a huge commitment for the club.  On the Women’s side, Chicago Northshore has moved up to Women’s D1 alongside the Chicago Lions. Congratulations to both teams!  We wish them great success in their new divisions.

D2 is going to be exciting, competitive, fast, and, no doubt, physical.  These matches will be some of the best games in the Midwest.   We are pleased to see The Riot and Lake County are moving up to join:

• CRC Westside Condors
• Fox Valley Maoris
• South Side Irish
• Lincoln Park  
• Lions D2

D3 will have solid competition with no shortage of pride on every match.  Teams in this division are:

• Blaze D3
• Rockford
• NW Indiana
• NW Woodsman
• Peoria
• CRC Silverbacks

You can see all of the competitions and matches on the Midwest Rugby website:  Competitions – Midwest Rugby Union

What’s this mean for us?? First off, make sure your availability is up to date!!!  D2 and D3 will be some of the most competitive matches in the Midwest. These matches may prove to be barn burners.  We need to ensure we provide them with the best game platforms possible with professional, fair and reliable officiating.  If you’re aspiring to move up, sharpen your saws now: commit to your training, study your law, and practice your signals.  These games will be fast and challenging…and you’ll have the best seat in the house!!

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We are pleased to announce that the board has approved the adoption of Arbiter Pay.  This will provide us with a completely integrated platform from which to assign, invoice, collect, and pay.  In the long run this should significantly ease the burden on the Treasurer, however, it will take some time to implement along with a whole lot of communication.  We ask for your patience as we set this up, and also ask you to respond quickly if asked to complete any actions. It will make things much easier if we don’t have to chase down information.  

We think moving referee payments to AP should be relatively easy.  Moving clubs to paying through AP will take the majority of time and hand-holding.  We hope to complete conversion by the start of 2026.

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In the spring, CRC Silverbacks were reported for Referee Abuse following a match whereby the captain and players consistently challenged calls and verbally berated the referee throughout the match.  This was against a very seasoned C1 referee.  The team was relentless in their hounding of every call and disrespect of the referee.  

A referee abuse report was immediately filed.  The CARFU Discipline Chair (Marques Plummer) convened a non-partisan committee of USAR disciplinarians led by a representative of the Mid-America Rugby Union.  Their investigation concluded that CRC Silverbacks were in violation of Regulation 18 and have been put on probation for 12 months.  

This is to show you that there is a process in place to address complaints of abuse.  Players, captains, and coaches may not dispute any decisions by the referee (Law 9.28). In order for this process to work it is critical that the referee report any abuse.  Without an official report there is nothing to point back to, no history. .  

While we don’t want to seek out trouble, we need to be diligent.  Behaviors won’t improve if we don’t take action. Marques will join us at our meeting and discuss this process in greater detail.  We appreciate his support of referees and all that he does for CARFU.  

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DON’T FORGET TO ATTEND THE SOCIETY MEETING ON 8/24!! And thank you for reading to the very end.