THIS 'N THAT FROM YOUR DISTRICT DIRECTOR

December 2007

The first news as this year draws to a close is very sad. Many of you knew Peter Kalat, District 3’s president for the last two years. He passed away peacefully in his sleep on December 1st leaving his family and the bridge world stunned. Peter’s wife Nie Lih is someone many of you know and admire and his 4 children, 2 step children and 11 grandchildren are all trying to cope with this great loss. Peter served on our district 3 board for 15 years in many varied positions, the last of which was our president. A great husband, a wonderful father and grandfather, Peter also loved bridge. In fact, he played the day before he died with Nie Lih at the Bridge Deck and he told people that he had played a particular hand very well. Peter will be missed by all who knew him.

On to tell you about the great bridge year we had in District 3. Our four Regionals were all well attended. Hilton Rye Town in January was up more than 400 tables; Saratoga Springs, Parsippany and Danbury all held their own as did the GNT’s. We held an extra section of the NAP’s, Flight C in Schenectady and this gained us 15 extra tables along with a small increase in Allendale so we had a record attendance of 78 tables.

The ACBL is alive and very well. Attendance is up at Sectionals, Regionals and STAC’s. Our financial status is good which means no increase in dues. The membership in the ACBL may be the greatest bargain that there is. I can’t imagine that anyone would disagree that the Bridge Bulletin once a month, and the recording of your MP’s is quite a bargain for that amount.

I like to give you all different news here on the web site than I do in each of your Newsletters. In my last article, almost a year ago, I talked about International Bridge. This time I will talk about the Junior Bridge Program. Please folks, whenever you can – support Junior Bridge. If we don’t get young people into our game, we will not grow and as our older members are no longer with us bridge will not survive. Many of the units in District 3 are working on getting bridge into the schools and on another level, many are working to support the numerous junior bridge competitions. There are many other diversions for young people today but none as challenging as bridge. Andrew Dubay, from, our Capital District Unit was named the King Of Bridge this year and he received a scholarship towards his college tuition. His parents, Judy and Bill Dubay are avid bridge players in our district.

Hat’s off to some of our key volunteers: Steve Arshan, Steve Maltzman, Mike Kanerick., Eli Schneider, Jerry Goodman, Glenda Calkins, Betty Ann Smith, Carlos Munoz, Jeff Allen, Mimi Bieber, Jon Green, Fran Leary, Steve Surasky, Ed Zuckerberg, MaryAnn Klopfenstein and Lynn Baker as well as many others. A list of thank you’s would not be complete without mentioning District 3’s Field Rep and Director in Charge, Sol Weinstein – always willing to attend meetings when asked, to help with conditions of contest and to give us advise to make our regionals the best they can possibly be.

Both Ron and I wish all of you a very happy and healthy New Year. I hope to see you at all of District 3’s tournaments in 2008. Watch for the news about our new dates for one year only in Saratoga Springs, May 27th – June 1 and our new location over July 4th in Fairfield, New Jersey (just 10 minutes from Parsippany).

Joan Gerard, District Director

January 2007

January is the start of bridge in District 3. We kick off with the Hilton Rye Town Regional and this year exceeded our wildest hopes. 280 more tables of bridge – a more than 13% increase over last year. Thanks to everyone who made this tournament the super success that it was. Next year we are told that there will be brand new ballrooms with bright lighting so as long as the snow stays away we can expect great attendance again.

Moving along in the year, Saturday, March 24 is the GNTs back at the United Methodist Church on Bryant Avenue in White Plains. Flights B&C are both 2 session Swiss Teams while Flights A and the Championship Flight will be KOs continuing on past Saturday if entries warrant. Check on this website to see all the details. It’s a fun day starting with a brunch. Gold points for overall placements. A great day of team bridge. Please be aware that in order to compete this year you must actually reside within District 3- being a member of one of our Units is not sufficient.

I hope you all know that our Saratoga Springs tournament is earlier this year. April 30th – May 6th with some innovative changes to the schedule. On Tuesday there will be a Senior Swiss Teams, not held in Saratoga since 2001 and then there will be no more Senior games. This will work out much better. The Pair games will be a decent size with many more MPs being awarded than in the Senior Pairs. And after all, we’re all seniors anyway so we should be playing together. Then on Sunday, a new event – Bracketed Swiss Teams – a masterpoint bonanza. Your team plays in a bracket just like the Bracketed KOs . Lots of fun and it will be a playthrough so everyone will get home early.

The ACBL is developing a new web site to reach out to member and non-member bridge players. It will be called : mybridgetable.com. Watch in the ACBL Bridge Bulletin for more news about the opening of this site.

2006 ended with 156,961 members – an increase of over 1,195, from 2005. ACBL had 11,000 new members in 2006 – also an increase over 2005. Regional and Sectional attendance was up and number of tables at STACs also increased. NABCs are declining somewhat and the attendance in Hawaii was almost 2000 tables below expectation. Perhaps we estimated too high considering that the tournament was over Thanksgiving and people surely couldn’t get home. With our aging membership a trip as long as the trip to Hawaii might just not hold enough interest for our members.

In my last article, I said I would talk about International Bridge, Junior Bridge and Publicity. Well – I’ll pick just one of these topics – International Bridge. I think you all are aware that the ACBL is part of the World Bridge Federation (WBF). The US,Canada, Mexico, and Bermuda form Zone 2 of the WBF. There are 8 zones including Europe, South America, Central America, Asia and the Middle East.the Far East, the South Pacific, and Africa. The WBF runs one world tournament a year. Every other year it is the Bermuda Bowl/Venice Cup and Senior Cup, one year the World Teams Olympiad and the 4th year the World Pairs . About 11 years ago World Junior Bridge was started and there are now world junior camps and world team competition for juniors under the age of 26. Many of you participate in the World Wide Pairs each year in June. This is an event that is run by the WBF. It is wonderful that we have many foreign players coming to play in our NABCs and joining the ACBL. Bridge For Peace is the motto of the WBF and it is , for example, very special to see Jordan play against Israel as they did in the Junior Championships in Thailand last summer. I hope everyone realizes the importance of playing our game with our friends all over the world and will support the newly formed United States Bridge Federation (USBF). The USBF handles all international competition in the US .

Use our web site for up to date info about all District 3 events. We post changes to hotel info as quickly as we get it. We hope to see you at all our regionals and special events. There is no better form of entertainment for people of all ages. See you soon.

September 2006

It's been an exciting and good year so far for District 3. Most of you read
my articles in your Newsletters so I don't post to the web site too often.
But this will bring you all up to date.Our Regionals in '06 were all great so far... Hilton Rye Town was it's usual success and we are looking forward to holding the snow up in the sky this coming January and increasing our attendance there. The GNT's were held in May and Flights B&C were excellent. Let's not talk about Flight A and the SuperFlight. Come on out you Flight A players. It's a great team event. Then came Saratoga which again grew bigger followed by our July 4th Regional in a new location - Parsippany, New Jersey. Attendance was good and those of you that think Parsippany is not only hard to pronounce but hard to get to
are wrong.... It's an easy trip for most of District 3 and was well attended
by our Central Jersey Unit where the tournament is located. And to round
out the year, our Fall Regional in Danbury. Ct. is expected to set new
highs.

At the end of this month, our District is saying farewell to Steve Surasky
who has been a member of the District Board since 1981 and except for his first year on the Board and two years as president, he has been the District Treasurer. When Steve started, we had about $1000 in the bank and now we have upwards of $150,000. True we have more Regionals and GNT's and NAP's but a lot of it is due to Steve's dedication to this District and to bridge. A long time close friend and bridge partner he and his wife Betty, also a good friend, will be sorely missed by me but his expertise ,we all know, cannot be replaced. Thanks for everything Steve.

Watch for my next article at the end of the year where I will be talking
about International Bridge, Juniors and Publicity. Our excellent web
master, Steve Maltzman keeps everything up to date on this site so check for the latest info on our tournaments and tournament results. Results get
posted by 2am after the conclusion of the day - except of course if there
are glitches.

See you at the tables. Joan Gerard, District Director

December, 2005

'Twas the night before Christmas and time to think about what has happened in ACBL Land and in District 3 during this past year and of course to take a look at what's in store for us in 2006. Before I say anything else, I want to thank all those members of our unit Boards who voted for me to serve another 3 year term as your District Director. I am both pleased and proud to have been re-elected and to represent District 3 on the National Board. Appreciate your continued vote of confidence.

District 3 had 4 great regionals in '05 - Hilton Rye Town, NY; Saratoga Springs, NY; Secaucus, NJ, and Danbury. Ct. Attendance was up a few % at each one of them. Additionally, we co-hosted a regional in White Plains, NY with the NYC unit over the July 4th weekend and that was also a booming success. Everyone loved being able to walk to great restaurants and great shopping. Masterpoints galore... a great way to celebrate the 4th.North American Pairs District Finals was very successful and only the GNTs showed no increase in table count.

This year District 3 sponsored a Social Bridge Event primarily as an
Introduction to Duplicate for players with no duplicate bridge experience.
This Event was organized by Cheryl Angel and Jesse Reisman from our North Jersey unit and it was a grand success. 84 players came to the Meadowlands in Secaucus, had a light lunch, a short duplicate game, prizes and gifts and wine and cheese during a question and answer time at the conclusion .We gained more than 15 new members and hopefully many others will be seen playing at the clubs and at the sectionals in our units.

Jerry Goodman, our current District President, has served in this position for 18 years and will be retiring this April, '06. Words cannot possibly express what he has done for this district over these years. ..everything from soup to nuts.... No task has been too big and none too small. He is loved by all and needed by all. I will likely miss his constant help more than anyone else but I am hoping he won't desert us completely. Please say thank you to Jerry every time you see him! He is the BEST!

Kicking off the new year at Rye in January we are running a Club Director's Course which will be given by Millard Nachtwey. Hoping to have 12 to 15 interested people who would like to become club directors and perhaps move on to be ACBL tournament directors. Also, in 2006, we'll be back in Saratoga Springs in June and in Danbury in October but.............ANNOUNCING OUR NEW HOLIDAY REGIONAL AT THE SHERATON PARSIPPANY HOTEL OVER THE JULY 4TH
WEEKEND. Many of you may remember the old Sheraton Tara. Well that's where this is... new name... renovated and a super location for a tournament. This will replace our Secaucus Regional that was in August. Don't miss our grand new location - a great place to spend your 4th of July Holiday weekend.. Watch our ads and posters for all the details.

I can never write an article without mentioning what is most important to
me.... the development of Junior Bridge. The average age of an ACBL member is now 67.If we don't interest young people in this game, there will be no organized bridge in the very near future. The ACBL has a new web site for juniors: www.bridgeiscool.com Take a look at it and tell your children and grandchildren about it. We hope that young people will be drawn to this site and then interested in downloading the free Learn To Play Bridge tape written by Fred Gittleman. Our USA1 Junior Team won the World Junior Team Championships in Australia this past August and the Canadian Junior Team came home with the Bronze. A super showing! We are invited to send 2 junior teams and 2 schools teams (up to 21 years) to the World Teams Competition in Bangkok in August '06. The Junior Program needs money to support these activities. Contributions can be made to the United States Bridge Federation earmarked for Junior Bridge. Donations are tax deductible. Checks may be sent to the ACBL but made out to the United States Bridge Federation.

At the end of the year, it's always appropriate to say thank you to those
who have contributed greatly to the success of District 3 activities: Jerry
Goodman, president; Steve Surasky, treasurer, Fran Leary, secretary &
co-tournament chairman for Saratoga; Jon Green , chairman of appeals, member of the Executive Committee, Steve Arshan, tournament manager, Eli Schneider, recorder and daily bulletin editor, Steve Maltzman, web master and NAP coordinator, Glenda Calkins, tournament coordinator and advertising chairman, Betty Ann Smith, GNT coordinator '06, Mimi Bieber, tournament chairman for Rye,
MaryAnn Klopfenstein, in charge of press releases, Peter Kalat GNT coordinator '05; Gene Leary, charity and co-tournament chairman for Saratoga and many other volunteers from the various units
who help us at out tournaments.

Don't forget to check our District web site for the latest information
about our tournaments, news for Newplicate players, news about Juniors and other special activities. Both Ron and I want to wish all the members of District 3 a very healthy and happy New Year. Hope to see many of you at our district events.

Joan Gerard, District Director

July 2005

Six months are gone in 2005 and what has happened in District 3.... and whatcan we look forward to in the last six months of '05.Our annual tournament at the Rye Town Hilton was wonderful in spite of a few
problems with the Verizon trucks that were using our parking spaces in the hotel lot. There's always something to make it not a perfect tournament. Hardly any snow at all kept our attendance figures up and everyone has a great time.

The GNT's were held in White Plains and the turn out was pretty dismal. Hard to believe that a delicious brunch , gold points for winning and the
opportunity to play in a National Event in Atlanta would not bring all the
players out. Maybe next year when the winners go to Chicago will be more enticing.

Saratoga Springs was really well attended. We were almost 20% up in attendance. Many folks came down from Montreal and told me that they loved it and we had a larger group then usual from Westchester. If you haven't been there, you should put it on your "must go" list.... great restaurants within walking distance; beautiful golf courses , lots of fun and MP's for all. Next year the hotel will be completely renovated (those of you that were there this year know the pains of going through a renovation) but it will be worth it next year.

Hopefully our White Plains Regional that we are running over July 4th with the New York City unit will be a holiday spectacular and then Secaucus in
August, the NAP Finals for all 3 flights in September, Danbury in October and then rest up for the holidays and get ready again for Rye.I think we have a great schedule of tournaments and offer wonderful events for everyone...

Those of you with 200 points or less will have the opportunity to meet a fabulous person ; Cheryl-Porter-Garofalo.. Cheryl is our new Chairman and Director. She will be with our Newplicate players from start to finish:
selling the entries, explaining how to use bid boxes, making the rulings as well as the tuna fish and going over the hands. We have chosen Cheryl because she loves Newplicate players and wants them to become regulars at all our games. Cheryl is from Unit 106 and has been running Newplicate games there for many years. Welcome on board Cheryl. We know everyone is going to love you.

Juniors! Juniors! Juniors! We need Juniors. Believe me when I say that if we don't develop juniors who love bridge, the day will soon come when there will be no duplicate bridge for us to play. Try to help your unit with their teaching programs, with mentoring juniors and encourage your children and grandchildren to play. You teach them. It's a great activity to train the minds of people of all ages. Our numbers are rising slowly. We have a total of 1459 youth and juniors . Not nearly enough but I am proud to say that District 3 has the second largest number..... 115 tied with Texas and Texas is a bigger District than we are. District 6 , Washington & Baltimore area is first with 147.

Promotion and publicity is what we need. District 3 is sponsoring a Social
Bridge Day in Secaucus on the first Monday afternoon of the tournament. If you know any of your friends who might like to get started with duplicate and know a teeny bit of bridge encourage them to come to the Crowne Plaza at 11:45am and eat a delicious brunch. This will be followed by a social duplicate game with door prizes and goody bags. The day concludes with some wine and cheese and a little bit of talking about the game. We hope to have 50 tables of bridge and then have all those folks go out to the clubs and start playing duplicate. With Jesse Reissman and Cheryl Angel at the head of this project, we know it will happen!

Hope to see all of you often playing bridge. There is no better use of your leisure time! write me at: joanandron@at.net with any questions, praises
or compliments. ( not too many complaints please:) Would love to hear from you.

Take care. Joan Gerard, District Director

December 2004

December is a good time to look back on what happened in bridge in '04 and to get a glimpse of what is to come in '05.

Perhaps this was a banner year for District 3. Number 1 on the list should be our superb NABC in New York City. After a long hiatus of 30 years, the players descended upon the city and the bridge tables and the tournament was 2000 tables over estimate. Perhaps ACBL management doesn't realize how the Northeast bridge players love to play bridge and we even had a lot of out of towners. While the highlight of this NABC was clearly the happy players and the huge volume of newcomers, special thanks must go to our chairpeople who always had a smile on their faces and for whom nothing was too much: Jerry Goodman, Billy Rosenbaum, Steve Surasky,Jim Schneider, Steve Arshan,Roberta Magnus, Steve Maltzman,Zeus Arias, Ruth Basu, Anne Mittman,Carol Matthews, Jon Green,Cheryl Angel, Jesse Reisman,Bonnie Gellas, David Moss, Augie Boehm,Glenda Calkins, Mike Kanarek, Florine Garber, Gene & Jan Saxe, Harold & Debra Thaw and scores of volunteers who worked daily at the Registration, Information, Newcomer and Pairing Desks to make certain that our players had a good time. Special thanks to Solly Weinstein and Doug Grove who had to work hard to handle the unanticipated crowds.Surely the 2 productions of Bridge To Broadway will long be remembered as the best entertainment ever at an NABC! Thanks to all those who made it happen and to all those who made it grand by attending and having a great time.

For the first time in many years, District 3 has gone over 6000 tables at our four Regionals. This places us way above average in the ACBL. Rye didn't have much snow so we were able to maintain better than 2200 tables; Saratoga Springs goes up every year and is over 1100, Secaucus maintained it's expectation of about 1500 and then
our brand new Danbury Regional was, as anticipated, almost as big as Secaucus so we hit the 6000 table mark with ease. All four of our locations are special and for most of the players in our district - no more than a 3 hour drive for anyone... not to mention that many can roll out of bed and be at least one of our regionals.....
As most of you know, Danbury, CT is not in our District and is on loan from District 25 (New England). Our thanks to them for making it possible for us to move out of the mountains and have such a great location. The 2005 schedule is an exact duplicate of locations with updated schedules... more KOs; more Fast Pairs; more morning games and less time between afternoon and evening sessions so.........check our web site: www.bridge-district3.org and the ads in your unit newsletters and the ACBL Bridge Bulletin for exact dates and the schedule.

Grand National Teams and North American Pairs were also both up in attendance this past year. These are great events. The GNT's require no pre-qualification.... Just show up in April at the United Methodist Church in White Plains and have a great day of team bridge starting with a brunch. The NAPs requires qualification at the clubs during June, July or August but then join us for another great brunch and a full day's Pairs competition at the church in Mahwah, New Jersey.

The ACBL has turned the corner and membership is growing. As of the end of October, we have a total membership of 167,955 - an increase of 1,150 from 2003. ,,slow but steady progress. Retention is the key and this is up 9% from a year ago. NABC, Regional, Sectional and club table counts are all up.

Near and dear to me is what the ACBL is doing to promote Junior Bridge and this is also improving slightly. We have added a High School Team Competition to the on-line College Bridge Team Championship that will be held on BridgeBase.com on February 16, 2005. College scholarships will be awarded to the winners. And the ACBL has contracted with a marketing firm to work on getting bridge into the school systems. In addition to our every other year Junior Camp, the ACBL is promoting other junior camps for young people under the age of 21.

The ACBL has signed an agreement with Edge TV, a start-up cable channel. We have a commitment from them for a minimum of 14 hours of bridge programming for 2005. Look for more news about this right after the first of the year. This should be happening about mid-year.

I again had the honor of representing the ACBL on the World Bridge Federation Council and this year we met at the World Bridge Olympiad held in Istanbul, Turkey.
USA came home with the Gold Medal in the Seniors; the Silver Medal in the Women's and the Bronze Medal in the FISU University Championship. Only our Open team failed to medal... they were unlucky enough to draw Italy in the round of 16. The Turkish Bridge Federation did a superb job of hosting this Olympiad and I found Istanbul to be a magnificent city with very friendly people. World Bridge has the same problems as we do.... only they deal with countries - how to help countries foster junior bridge and foster interest in the game? There are 104 countries that are members of the WBF, many are small and poor but all have bridge communities that are active and interested.

I personally want to thank the unit boards and the board members on the District 3 board for working so hard to keep bridge alive in District 3. Good volunteers are hard to find and even harder to keep and you all are a great group! Both Ron and I want to wish all the members in District 3, a happy Holiday Season. Make one of your new year's resolutions to play bridge more often. See you all at the tables!

Joan Gerard, District Director

March 2004

There are so many places now that you can all read the news about bridge - the ACBL Bulletin; the ACBL web site; the District 3 web site; your own unit's web site and of course all the units own newsletters so here in these articles I am going to try and discuss some of the topics not always discussed.

First... about us... Big New Exciting News.... Our Fall Regional has been moved to Danbury, Conn. What, you say, Danbury, Conn. is not in District 3.... that's right. The New England District has graciously loaned us the state of Conn. so that we can have a new beautiful location to play bridge.... The Danbury Sheraton on October 18-14 is the place to be and be seen. Only about 10-15 minutes further than the Hilton Rye Town.... great sleeping rooms, great playing conditions, unbelievable room rates of $72 - you can't afford to stay home. Watch for full details but in the meantime, make your plans to spend 6 days with us in beautiful New England.Don't be caught at home!

I have been your district representative for many, many years and proudly represent the beliefs of the district board and the units in District 3. I think it's important that you know I feel very strongly that the future of our game lies in being able to develop young players who will become the core of our membership. The average age of our membership is now well over 65 and if we can't reverse this trend it will not be possible to maintain growth. Junior Fund games that are run throughout the year are the only source of revenue to support our junior teams in International Competition and to run the ACBL World Junior camp every other year.Junior membership dues supports the Junior Newsletter and various receptions at NABC's for juniors as well as mailings. Schools programs are supported by the Marketing Department in conjunction with the Educational Foundation. If there are junior players in your unit. take the time to say hello and let them know that they are important to us.Tell them about all the junior activities. Refer them to the Junior page on the ACBL web site for further information.

Jay Baum, our CEO, is interested in our future. He is looking into the possibility of doing some TV cable shows relating to bridge; having an involvement with AARP; entering more State-Wide Senior Olympic Games and hopefully trying to get bridge into more schools. We have new people working with us in Marketing and Publicity and should start seeing results soon.

Play in the North American Pairs this summer....June, July and August at the clubs. There is a reduced sanction fee so it should cost you only $1 more to play and you only need to finish in the top 50% of the field or over average to qualify for the District Finals. There are no unit rounds this year and the District Finals will be in Mahwah, New Jersey on September 18th.... long before any of you snow birds leave us for warmer climates.

And finally, make sure you don't miss the Return of the NABC to New York City.... after a 30 year hiatus, New York and District 3 are co-hosting an NABC July 8-18th..... Great bridge! Great Hospitality! Great Entertainment! Be part of the Greatest Show On Earth or at least in ACBL Land..... the New York NABC. Check out our web site by going to the ACBL web site or the District 3 web site and clicking on the NY NABC logo. Bridge games from early morning to late at night...
discounted parking to make the trip in worthwhile.... Earn those gold points right in your own backyard.... no plane to catch.. just drive on in and join the fun! We'll be waiting to greet you.

There is nothing like a bridge game to make you forget all your troubles and work that needs to be done! Grab a partner and play bridge... See you at the tables.

Joan Gerard, District Director

December 2003

The end of another year.... time to reflect on what has happened in the bridge world that has an impact on all of us.

Membership has finally started to grow. The end of October showed us with a new gain of 830 new members compared
to half of that last year at the same time. Our District is #1 in Membership Retention which means that all of our units
are running good activities and publishing great Newsletters and keeping our new members interested and rejoining!
District 3' membership is the highest that it has been in years.

Would you believe that there are more than 10,000 tables of bridge playing on ACBL On-Line each month. The anticipated
table count for 2003 will be approximately 127,000 tables. And club attendance is higher than it has been as well. I knew
that on-line bridge would not hurt the clubs in the long run and it really hasn't. Clubs may feel that their night time atten-
dance would be higher if not for on-line bridge games but every time there's a special event, the players come out in
droves.... The club owners need to make games in the evening more enticing to get the folk out of the house!

Our bridge calendar starts the year with the postponed Finals of the North American Pairs on January 10th and then
moves immediately to 6 1/2 days of gold point events and fun at the Hilton Rye Town. Following Rye, the GNT Finals will
be at the Methodist Church in White Plains. Check our web site (http://www.bridge-district3.org) for new Conditions of Contest that we think will be more
fun. Most of the event will take place in only 2 sessions on Saturday. Then on to Saratoga Springs, followed by our
Secaucus Regional. And then..........................

Our NY NABC is only 7 months away. It's time to make your plans to play. The tentative schedule of events can be found
on the NABC web site. You can get there by going to:www.bridge-district3.org and then clicking on the NY NABC Logo.
Plans include arrangements for reduced rate parking; 2 nights of Shows, the first Saturday and the second Friday, produced
and directed by Augie Boehm and featuring a medley of great original songs; even one written by none other than Alan
Truscott. You won't want to miss this great production!; daily food snacks; a great registration gift; fun section tops;
wonderful playing conditions and the whole of New York City to visit and dine in. Save the dates July 8-18. Volunteer to
help us and play in the Greatest NABC of Them All!!!

Thanks to Al Levy for a great year as president of the ACBL and welcome to Bruce Reeve. Bruce's motto is: This Is The Year
Of The Volunteer. and for sure it is............this year and every year is the year of the volunteer. Without the work of the
dedicated volunteers this ACBL, this District and our Units would not be able to function. Special thanks to the 18 members
of our District Board who make all our District events popular: From Unit 140: Steve Arshan, Steve Maltzman; Alex Allen.
Eli Schneider. From Unit 106: Jerry Goodman, Glenda Calkins, Harris Schenker (who has just moved away). Unit 188:
Mimi Bieber. Steve Surasky, Peter Kalat. Unit 186: MaryAnn Klopfenstein, Carol Sondheimer. Unit 115: Fran & Gene Leary.
Unit 236: Jon Green, Norm Rubin. Unit 156: Babette or Michael Rogers, Joan Clark. Without these dedicated folks, our
events would not be as great as they are. Please thank them when you see them at the tables.

Please, if you have any questions, suggestions or criticisms, feel free to contact me by e-mail at: joanandron@att.net or
by phone at: 914-948-0841. Both Ron and I wish you and yours a very happy, healthy, and peaceful New Year. We hope
that you will play more bridge than last year and of course earn more MP's.

Joan Gerard, District Director

July 4, 2003

Independence Day is a good time to reflect on our good fortune, not only in thereal world but in our fantasy land of bridge. I’ll let all our political analysts keepyou updated on the world conditions and I’ll try to fill you in on the bridge world happenings.
I hope you are enjoying our new large Bridge Bulletin. While I know there arestill things to be improved, I think the look is a major accomplishment. It is a bit disappointing to me that the Board of Directors was told that the cost ofdoing this would be the same or less than the old one but, as often happens,this is not the case.

Both Al Levy, our president and Jay Baum, our CEO are putting a greater emphasis on recruiting youth members .Jim Mahaffey from Florida and Nick Nickel from New York and North Carolina have donated $50,000 each to create a Scholarship Fund for Juniors who teach bridge and are attending colleges and universities. The scholarship grant that they receive goes directly to the school. Take a look at the Junior page on the ACBL web site to see all the activities we have for youth

IT’S JUST ABOUT A YEAR AWAY – OUR NABC IN NEW YOUR CITY!

Believe it or not I was around for the last one which was the summer of ’74. Dick Hewitt, District 3’s former District Director was Chairman of that Nationals and Ira Zippert, the former District Director from New York was the Treasurer. I was a “hostess” in charge of hospitality along with Dick’s deceased wife and my dear friend, Shirley. The site was the New York Hilton and the Sheraton directly across the street. Please forgive my wandering with this bit of nostalgia.

Well, 30 years later we are here again in the greatest city in North America!! Back at the New York Hilton… now the NABC will be all under one roof. The Hilton has built an Exhibit Center right in the hotel in addition to all their ballroom space. We have the beginnings of a great volunteer staff and are planning exciting hospitality for all 10 days of the tournament.

Check our NY NABC web site which can be reached with just a click by going onto the District 3 site: www.bridge-district 3.org. Later this year, in the Fall, we are planning Sectionally- Rated Black Point games at the clubs to promote the upcoming NABC. We’re going to need loads of help. Please plan to volunteer for a couple of hours at one of the desks…..Registration; Pairing; Hospitality. And start thinking about staying home next summer and playing in the greatest NABC of them all….. The New York NABC – July 8-18th.

District 3 rounds out its bridge activities for the year with our Secaucus Regional in August; our Fall Regional in Kerhonkson and the Finals of the NAOP’s on December 6th. Watch your own Newsletters for updates from my Board meetings in Long Beach and my trip to the World Junior Team Championships in Paris as well as my meetings with the World Bridge Federation during the Bermuda Bowl/Venice Cup in Monte Carlo. I hope you feel as I do, that bridge is alive and well and remains the greatest leisure time activity for everyone.

Please feel free to contact me by e-mail at: joanandron@att.net or by that old fashioned method… the phone: 914-948-0841. Hope to see you soon.

Joan Gerard, District Director.

August, 2002

It's time to catch you up on news from District 3 and from out there in
ACBL Land. First, let me thank Arnie Bergen for setting up our web site and being our web master for more than two years. All good things come to an end and now we welcome Steve Maltzman from our Central Jersey unit as our web master. Steve has designed this brand new, good looking site and we are all grateful that he has agreed to take over this thankless task.

Most recent actions taken by the Board of Directors in Washington include:
Effective 1/1/04, Directors will take over the handling of appeals. A panel of directors will make the initial decision at the table and then if the player wants to appeal, the case will be taken to a different panel of TD's in consultation with some expert players. There are many experts in favor of this "let the players play and the directors referee the game" and just as many experts opposed. Those that are opposed feel in large that directors can surely handle the Law but when it comes to judgment at bridge that should be left to the players to determine. I am very emphatically on side of maintaining committees
of players. I do feel ,however, that there is much room for improvement and hope- fully in the next 18 months, much tweaking of this plan will take place.

District 3 has pledged $5000 to BridgeAtSchools. This group is an
organization dedicated to using the game of bridge to make a positive difference in the education and development of children and youth. They are starting pilot programs in many schools to quantify bridge's
comprehensive contribution to math, critical thinking and social skills.
There will be a pilot program in unit 140 this fall and hopefully another one in unit 106 in the very near future.
It takes a lot of money to develop this program and to get bridge into the curriculum and into after school programs. Hopefully there will be grants from corporations and donations from units, districts and individuals. If Bridge is to survive, we must have the youth involved!

Watch for your January , '03 Bridge Bulletin.Our new Bulletin will be the size of Time magazine and will include Play Bridge magazine.... the magazine that our new players love. Expect great articles..... we think everyone will love the new design... maybe we
will even get a few advertisers.

A few things have been modified in the MasterPoint Plan. Most of them simply clean up problems...... the District-wide Charity games will now give points for overall winners
as will the ACBL-wide and the International Fund games; Flight A section awards will be increased by 10% for stand-alone Flight A events; when multiple sections are combined, there will be an increase in the awards given to be more in line with the single section
awards... in other words, a less steep award scale will be used.

Bridge in District 3 is alive and well. Our membership is at around 6800 members.... an increase over the last few years. Our Regionals are growing. We think we plan great tournaments for you. Hope to see many of you October 12th at our NAOP Finals in Mahwah, New Jersey and then in Kerhonkson October 14-20th at our Fall
Regional. Masterpoints are there for the taking. Come and get them! Hope to see all of you over the next few months.

Joan Gerard, District Director

2001
has ended and with the end, we hope we can put behind us the tragic events of September 11th. We can all be proud of the support that bridge players around the world gave to the people of New York and Washington, DC. The prayers and thoughts of our friends around the world were and are with us as we struggle to rebuild.

Jesse Reisman, from Unit 106 , gave us the idea of having a District-Wide Charity Game for the victims of September 11th and Jerry Goodman and I organized the event. As you can read on this site 14 clubs participated and District 3 matched the $6.00 per table fee and together with our clubs we made a contribution just short of $3000 to the Firefighters 9/11 Fund - something we can all be proud of. Thanks to all the clubs who participated and all the players who came out to play.

Most of you were aware that David Silber who had been our CEO resigned this past July. I was a member of the Search Committee and am pleased to tell you that we have hired a new CEO who is now on the job! Jay Baum, just retired as head of the Convention & Visitors Bureau in Omaha, Nebraska with twenty years experience in all aspects of meeting planning, promotion, publicity, dealing with Boards of Directors, dealing with the public, etc. He and his wife are both avid bridge players as well as an administrator of the game. I think we have chosen a great man to put bridge back on the map!

District 3 Regionals in 2001 were all successful. Each one of our tournaments were up in attendance so our hard working volunteers thank all of you for your support. All seven units in this District received a larger amount of money from the District than had been anticipated at the beginning of the year. That is what this District does. It returns the profits of our Regionals back to the units so that they can do more for the players in the units.

I hope that everyone will play a lot of bridge this year. It is probably the best and least expensive form of entertainment. Check this web site, your unit newsletters, the ACBL Bulletin for all District 3 events. I can be reached by e-mail at: joanand ron@worldnet.att.net and would love to hear from you with compliments, problems or suggestions.

Both Ron and I wish you a year of peace, happiness and health and of course a lot of masterpoints. Hope to see you soon and often.

June, 2001

To date our membership is growing. June marks the 9th consecutive month of small increases. Total membership in the ACBL is now 167,474, 0.4% greater than last year at this time. District 3's membership increase is slightly better than that.... way to go unit boards.... keep up the good work!

District 3 runs four Regionals a year... a NAOP District Finals and a GNT District Finals. How have we done so far?

Well, the Hilton Rye Town was a big success - approximately 2200 tables in play - most people went home happy...... Saratoga Springs Regional..... big success. Over 900 tables of bridge in play, and a 25% increase over last year, due mostly to a change to June instead of March. Lots of happy people and we hope to see even more of you next year. It's a great location!

The GNTs were held in April in White Plains and were a big disappointment. Flight A which was open to players with 0-5000 MPs had only four teams and three out of the four teams had an average of less than 3000 MPs ... what happened to all you players with 3000 to 5000 MPs? Why weren't you there trying to be a District Champion? And Flight B was open to players with up to 2000 MPs instead of 1500. That should have made a lot of people happy who had to play in Flight A before and instead we had about the same number of tables. The saddest of all was our Championship Flight. One team showed up to play on May 19th and that team was, of course, declared the winner! The MP awards in this event are fabulous. Flight C winners get 25% Gold and 75% red at 60% Regional rating. Flight B gets all Gold at 85% Regional rating and Flight A of course gets all Gold but at 100% Regional rating. Why anyone would want to miss the MP giveaway is beyond me. We're hoping for a better attendance next year.

Two more Regionals this year in District 3... Secaucus, New Jersey August 13-19 and Kerhonkson, New York in October. Both are good sites with good schedules planned. Increase your MPs and your fun by joining us at both of these locations.

I can be reached by e-mail at: joanandron @worldnet.att.net. I would be more than happy to answer any of your questions. Look forward to seeing you at the bridge tables.
Joan Gerard, District Director:

January 2001

I think many of you have seen this headline in your unit newsletters over the last 15 years and I hope many of you have read my articles because I try to keep you updated on the happenings in the ACBL and the rest of the Bridge World.

2001 has some good news and some not so good news as far as bridge is concerned. Good..... we have seemingly turned the corner and our membership has started to grow at a very slow rate but it is on the upswing. Not So Good - our dues has gone up and costs to units and districts have gone up.Good.... ACBL is on line on the e-bridge site; www.e-bridgemaster.com. Play bridge the whole month of January free on this site. Then join through the ACBL for $99 and you will get your membership in the ACBL extended for one additional year. Starting very soon, there will be ACBL sanctioned bridge tournaments run by the ACBL on this site. Not So Good - there will be reduced subsidies for 2nd place winners in the NAOP's - all flights and 49'er Pairs Winners will receive a 50% reduction in Bridge Bucks for prizes. Good..... During October Club Appreciation Month, clubs will be entitled to run a Swiss team game that will be sectionally rated and will pay 5% of all MPs earned as gold. Everybody pans for Gold and gets some!

District News...... Milt Steinfeld from our Central Jersey Unit - a 35 year volunteer for District 3 has just retired from the District Board of Directors. He served as our Vice President for more than 15 years; has been Tournament Coordinator; Pairing Chairman, Recorder and represented District 3 until now as an arbitrator in disputes concerning Regional and Sectional conflicts. This District is going to miss Milt's guidance and dedication to say nothing of his hard work. Thanks Milt for all you have done for bridge!

We're off and running with beginning plans for our 2004 summer NABC at the Hilton Hotel in New York. Jerry Goodman has been appointed co-chairman with Billy Rosenbaum of New York City. Steve Surasky has agreed to be Chief Financial Officer. This is Steve's 2nd time as Treasurer of our NABCs. He was Treasurer for the Atlantic City NABC and Jerry was one of our Chairmen then also. We've started a Logo Contest (see this web- site for details) and hope to have our banner flying this summer at the New York Regional and of course in Secaucus in August. I hope that I will see many of you at our Regionals, Grand National Teams in April and other events throughout the year. Please contact me with your constructive criticisms, joyous comments or any other thoughts you might have. I welcome suggestions. Happy Hunting for MPs.

Joan Gerard, District Director:

I hope you all had a fun and safe New Year's eve and I wish each of you a happy and healthy New Year..... and of course lots and lots of MPs at all of District 3 Regionals. I'll be in Bermuda at the World Championships during the Rye Town Hilton (the first Rye Regional I have ever missed) but I hope to see many of you in Saratoga Springs March 20-26. There will be no snow!

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