Lawsuit update

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My Friends in Amateur Boxing

A couple of years ago, you may have heard rumblings about a lawsuit against USA Boxing’s Board of Directors and how they mismanaged the money of the membership. Many of you may be wondering what happened? If you would like specific details, please sign in and your name will placed on a communication list.

I filed the claim!!!!!

Approximately 2 1/2 years ago, the newly elected treasury of USA Boxing was given the task of reviewing the budget and bring the his findings back to the BOD(board of directors). I was asked by the treasurer to help review it.

Once we started to review the budget, we both realized many supporting documents were missing and requested them. When they were sent to us and reviewed, the more questions we had and request more documentation. It became apparent after 4-5 requests for more documentation, we felt someone was trying to hide things or hoping we would not uncover items like, CD money all gone, line of credit , all gone and over spending of line items by $500,000. As we continued our examination, the more we looked the more waste of money we found.

I can tell you after examining more than probably 800 pages, we realized USA Boxing and management was out of control and putting us deeper in debt, more than ever before and the worst part nothing to show for it.

You may recall the, Chairmen of the Board having conference calls to calm everyone down and you may also remember, I demanded he and the entire BOD resign for incompetence.

After reviewing all the piecemeal documents we received and the audits from USOC, where the statement was made and in writing ”approaching fraud“, the audit from the CPA for the year end tax returns, we then knew we had to take this further. When the BOD votes unanimously on a budget in the past and they never reviewed them and even one stated he never understood them but vote for it anyway! We knew trouble went back many years. The more we researched the more problems we found from the USOC dictates down to our BOD.

At that point in time our insurance was coming up for renewal and that was the topic of the BOD meeting, the insurance company we had, mention mismanagement of our money and it was not going to renew our policy. My background is insurance , so I asked for a copy of the policy and we had them nailed under the “D and O” ; Director and Officers section of the policy, where it cover mishandling and management of money. Bingo.

At that point I filed the claim against the BOD of USA Boxing. It is below:

Trish, I have been a dues paying member of USA Boxing for approximately 20 years and have been following the recent financial disaster of our organization with the current BOD. I am completely disgusted with the way they have misused our hard earned dues. This could possibly be due to the dictates of the USOC, however we are now placed in this situation. I know USA BOD have mismanaged our membership dollars as well as borrowing money to be used by an incompetent President and his pie in the sky spending spree, without performing any type of due diligence, nor holding him accountable. It would seem reasonable to me, after spending so much money, we would see some type of return and we have received nothing. We are now stuck with a court decree ,$1.8 million dollars of debit, due to their inadequate checks and balances of common sense. This is a court decree, based on the loan USA BOD from the USA Boxing Foundation.
The BOD members prior to April of this year, voted to borrow money from the USA Boxing Foundation, used our entire credit line and completely spent all of our money market account. Our BOD knew of items that were many hundreds of thousands of dollars over budget and did nothing. An example of this is going over budget by $250,000 for our recent National tournament, as well as hiring outside companies for marketing, when our then CEO was supposed to be a GURU of Marketing. A Board member was assigned the job of auditing our books, only it was never done, nor was he reprimanded or questioned as to why? A recent audit of our financial’s, by the USOC disclosed, USA Boxing has been virtually accused of mismanagement of membership dollars. We are now faced with may debits, loss of providing our boxers travel expenses, etc to major tournaments and demands that are now being placed upon our membership, that certainly could have been avoided. The above mentioned items are only a few, therefore I would like to start the process of filing a claim against our BOD, under the current D and O insurance policy for mismanagement; for an amount no less than $2.5 million dollars. My basic belief is based on the fact, if I have car insurance and have an accident, I file a claim. We have D and O insurance, so please file a claim. If you have any questions, I can be reached at the following numbers. Thank you Ken Cartonla

Now the wonderful details, here is the definition of what triggers the claim against the D and O part of the insurance.

In keeping with our telephone conversation late yesterday afternoon, here is the page on the policy which defines a “Wrongful Act”. This is the basis of coverage and what triggers coverage under a D&O policy. The insuring agreement of the policy states that they will defend and indemnify against a wrongful act on behalf of the Named Insured,
which includes the organization (USA Boxing), and it’s past, present and
future directors, officers, employees, volunteers, trustees and their spouses against a wrongful act for any actual or alleged breach of duty, neglect, error, misstatement, misleading statement, act or omission. As you can see, the definition is quite broad.

I am out of space, but sign in, your e-mail address will be captured or send me an e-mail @ strategiesunltd@aol.com. I had to my web site so I can see who is reading it and I would recommend all LBC officers read it, so send it to them also, we are almost out of time for a lawsuit, it must be officially filed shortly.

We have to move very quickly and I will tell you why. Ken

This entry was posted in Empower Network

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Teddy Atlas comments Friday Night Fights

Last Friday night I was watching Friday night Fights and heard a few disturbing comments by Mr. Teddy Atlas.
During the Chris Arreola fight a new commentator asked Teddy about the Heavyweight division and I was shocked by the response, or was I.
"Our heavyweight division has not fared well "recently and he goes on to compare our sport to Major League Baseball and the farm system, all the clubs have developed. They continually look for and develop new talent for their teams. They have college as their training ground, we have nothing but amateur boxing.
He also stated,"Our amateur program has BEEN A FAILURE, it has been a disappointment, "I should say"
If you follow boxing in recent years, you should have noticed the lack of Gold medals this country has produced and there are many reasons for this and some of them may be. Our best boxers are approached before the Olympics and sign on with a professional promoter, I have heard of this at the box off's in prior years, they come out of the woodwork during these tournaments. Unfortunately we have no governing body, ie NCAA, to stop the promoters. They all know the financial condition of our boxers and their families.
Which lead me to another reason; is the fact, that our boxers typically come from very poor families and have to give up boxing to help support their families. Unfortunately our country doesn't not support our program with a lottery as it does in the UK.
We are funded thru membership dues and an occasional gift or donation, however, the majority of the money goes toward insurance to keep our boxers safe and our program alive.
Can we really blame our boxers for turning pro, not in my mind.  Imagine you work for 8-10 years in our sport to possibly get a shot at the Olympics, which are held only every 4 years and if you have potential, a promoter offers you a juicy contract to turn pro before the games. Now he tell you::: if you win your a star and make a huge amount of money, but what if you lose? In most cases you get one shot at the Olympic team, I can imagine every cannon is brought out by the promoters comments, crooked judging, being hurt, not making the team, can't make weight or you may get robbed, etc. One spot on a team out of 30,000 boxers in America, will you be one of the choosen few?
Can we really blame the kids for jumping at the chance of going pro, unfortunately Teddy Atlas never mentions this fact of our sport and he knows it.
If we stopped the promoters from stealing our boxers or a Federal Governing Body stops the pilfering of our sport,  better yet, MAKE THE PROMOTER PAY  FOR ALL THE TIME AND MONEY USA BOXING HAS CONTRIBUTED TO MAKE THESE BOXERS AS GOOD AS THEY ARE, now we have an organization which can support a boxer, in a form of stipends.
It should be a LAW, that ever ticket sold in this country for a pro show, the amateur boxing program receives a portion of the money, so we can continue being their training ground or FARM CLUB.
If you speak to anyone in the amateur boxing community, we help these kids stay off the streets and out of trouble and for our hard work the kids we develop are taken from us. Just my opinion.
Until the next time
Ken Cartonla
http://mistakesinboxing.blogspot.com/

IF YOU LOVE THE SPORT OF BOXING

If you love the sport of boxing, then you have to get involved on an amateur level. You have many options of what you can do to help. If you own a business, donate to a local club, if you have the ability to raise money, do it for the kids. If you don't have money but have time, become an official: you can handling the gloving table, be a timer, become a coach or judge and score the bouts. I have found in the may shows that I have done, the best way was to get guest judges from the audience, they would get instructions from the real judges and a score cards. They would then score the bout and once this was done, they would have a better understanding of our scoring system. I would then call them into the ring after announcing the winner and read their score cards. Believe it or not, their scoring , did pick the winner, however the points were a little off( sometimes a lot)  at times. I have done this with the Mayor and City council people of our community as well as county officials and our sponsors. Now the remarkable thing is that we were able to pick up some more officials and sponsors for the next bouts.

 

We need more involvement on all levels, if we are going to keep this sport alive, in my last article, I mentioned how bad attendance is, at most shows and even at the Pan Am games, no seating was provided for spectators, so again we have to do it our self. Take a friend to the next amateur show you are aware of, explain the difference between amateurs and the pro's and if you don't know the differences yourself, learn them. Our bottom line is 2 fold, keep the sport alive and have the clubs make a few bucks to continue to help the kids or you will never see the likes of Holyfield, Ali, Forrest, DelaHoya,Taylor, Scully's,or Brelands grow thru our ranks and become who they are today.

 

This is your shot to make a difference and help our sport gain momentum for the future, if you ever had the calling now is the time to step up to the plate. I would venture to say the majority of our boxers come for poor families and we maybe their only salvation.

 

If you have any question you can reach me directly at Strategiesunltd@aol.com

 

Until the next time

Ken

http://mistakesinboxing.blogspot.com/

 

ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF THE PROBLEMS AMATEUR BOXING HAS

I find this disgusting and can not understand why something like this happens? I woke up this morning checking the internet and always find myself looking at the USA Boxing site for the latest info. The first picture which appears is a shot for the PAN AM games. If you look at the picture, it must be as the games were setting up, but look closer and you see NO SEATING available for spectators!!!!

 

What is this saying about our sport and WHY?

 

Now we know someone is making big money off events like this, but I can almost say with certainty, it is not the NGB's or nothing is being filtered down to us.

 

I hope I don't offend anyone with this comment, but we are providing free entertainment and have become space fillers for their events. While someone is making big bucks from these international games, what do our clubs receive? The fortunate kids receive, medals, ranking, and possibly a shot at the Olympics.
But the training grounds of these kids are the LBC's, which receive nothing.  Again I say Marketing and Promotion of our sport sucks!, thereby no visibility.

 

If you analyze this you will see the host cities and countries are making a huge monetary impact for the hoteliers, restaurants and businesses in their areas. We in Florida were fortunate enough to utilize the same method to receive a grant from our Tourist Development Group, to bring  in the Eastern Trials a few years ago, as well as the PAL National Championships many years ago, Why not use the same method the big guys use?

 

In my opinion, nothing is worse than having a party and no one shows. Is this different than many of our local club shows, where the coaches, boxers, parents and maybe a few spectators show up?

 

It is disheartening for everyone involved, because as most of you know it takes a lot of preparation to do a show and many hours of your time and money, that can't be recovered.

 

We must realize, we have a one of a kind of product to market and promote and in most cases have not succeeded in it; to a great extent.

 

The heart and sole of our sport lies with the coaches, the kids, the volunteers and the few sponsors we may have.   WE HAVE TO DO A BETTER JOB of promoting USA Boxing or we will vanish.

 

I have said for years, USA Boxing, needs to establish a classification of Promoter or farm it out and let them make some money as long as the LBC's and local clubs get their share. In fact the LBC's can establish their own promoters without USA Boxing permission, we have to take care of ourselves!!!!!!

 

I have done many shows and once you establish a handful of sponsors and a following, your group Will not have a visibility problem any more and you can breath easier because you now have some money the bank.

 

Think of it this way, you have discovered a pill to cure a major disease.  According to the law of the land, you can sell this pill for 5 years before anyone else can duplicate it and sell it. Would you sit back and wait for someone to come to you to buy it after you spent millions of dollars of research to develop it? Or would you beat the bushes to get someone to buy it. Naturally you would get out there and sell the hell out of it.

 

Now we have our boxers (pills) that you have devoted countless hours of training and money to develop(research and development) and now you have a cure, will you sit back and wait for the public to beat down your doors do to see the your boxers in action.  I think not, we should promote our kids as companies promote their product. We have to been salespeople also.

 

The key is Promotion, when you do a good job of promotion, you gain more boxers, more interested people for coaching, more officials and more sponsors and son of  a gun  more money.

    Until the next time

    Ken

 

 

 

Your Boxing Dear Abby

I am beginning to feel like the  Dear Abby of the amateur boxing community, I had something posted on another site(http://www.boxingforum.com/amateur-boxing/) and have gotten a lot of good questions about our sport and the problems  locals are having in general. So, I know I am heading in the right direction with a traning program to increase the income and support of boxing. As I mentioned in the last post, I am putting together a program which I have used and learned thru trial and error, for the last 18 years of doing boxing shows and it will be exciting for the clubs that need a big boost in their bottom line of income. I will tell you, I normally I didn't handle the money; but I asked the President of our LBC, in his estimation, how much did we make on the shows? His answer did not surprise me, simply because we had many shows with STANDING ROOM ONLY. What does that boil down to, well the place we normally did our shows was in a REC Center, nothing more than a basketball court, with pull out seats. The full capacity was 1100 people and the fire department tried to shut is down a few times, because we had standing room only.
I do believe 1300 people, was our record and we did that 3 trimes . So, How much did we make?  As much as $11,000 and as little as $2500 and as far as he calculated the average was around $5000-$6000. We were also written up in Ring newspaper, as the best amateur show in the country.

So I decided to add this to my Bucket List, I am putting together a program that will teach you or someone in your organization, what I did and how I did it. In my heart, I believe at least 5-6 people in each LBC, maybe even outside Promoters, should take this training. I certainly believe this can help most clubs. At the time of this writing, this program will be a planned 26 week program, with audio's-video's, webinars and have a training manual. I am new to this internet thing, so it will take sometime to develop some of these skills, but after speaking to others in our organization, they all feel I should do it. I look forward to working with you and seeing your results. So please tell me if your interested and send a comment, what ever it is. If your happy with the money your shows have generated, please disregard this, If not let me know if your interested. You can reach me at :Strategiesunltd@aol.com. I am sure there will be a cost involved; but nothing compared to raising $5,000 to $10,000 a year for your group.  For more information.  e-mail me   Thanks  Ken

Biggest Mistakes in Boxing

I have been involved in boxing for 18 years and I realize the Biggest Mistake in Boxing is, not coaching, not volunteers, not conditioning, not gyms, not equipment, or enough competition.  The main problem is Not enough MONEY, to fund our programs. Our National Organizations can't do it for a few reasons, the cost of our insurance, the limited amount of sponsorship money is basically dried up and the major source of their income is our dues and membership fees and how often can they raise that. You heard the complaints, with the recent increases!

What can we do to make sure our sport doesn't vanish and get removed as an Olympic sport, as some sports have recently.

The passion that comes from anyone in our sport is not the problem. Our visibility sucks, people really don't understand our sport, we don't have enough shows around the country to develop a following, we don't develop our own local stars, in many cases, we have trouble having good quality local shows and why is that?

We have heard the term GRASSROOTS, until it is coming out of our ears, but a major part has been left out. So lets take care of our self !!!!!!!

We have training for coaches to reach certain levels of expertise and as well as officials, level 1-2-3, or AIBA status, but no where is there a program available to train people on DOING  A PROFITABLE BOXING SHOW, naturally for the grassroots . Until now and if this interests you, please post a comment and I will tell you, what I have been working on, so your club can make between $1000 to $20,000 per year. Until the next round.

Ken