Burlington Oldtimers Slo-Pitch

2021 BOSL Season
Date: Mon Mar 29, 2021 2:00 pm
Topic: Burlington Oldtimers Slo-Pitch News


Greetings BOSL Members,

I hope everyone is doing well and continuing to keep safe. I have heard from a few members that have already received their first vaccinations. This is great news. I’m sure many of you are interested in an update on where we stand for the 2021 season. The City of Burlington finally reached out to all of the sports leagues yesterday to start the conversation about park permits. As everyone might expect,play on the City parks is strictly forbidden without permits.

What do we know so far?

  • The City will only be granting park permits in 2 month increments, so only May & June will be allocated at this time
  • The next block of permits (July & August) will be assessed closer to June and allocation will depend on the conditions at that time
  • Currently Burlington is in the Red/Control health measures which means:

  • We can be completely shutdown if the status moves to Grey
  • COVID protocols similar to last summer will have to be used
  • Game attendance will be limited to 25 players total per game
  • Tournament permits will not be given at this time


What does this mean for BOSL?

  • As of today it looks like we will be starting May 3rd and be playing a regular schedule at our regular diamonds
  • Monday & Wednesdays @ Nelson, Tuesday & Thursdays @ Millcroft, Nelson and Sherwood
  • We have made the request to find another park for Tuesday and Thursday to try and eliminate Monday & Wednesday - we’ll see how that plays out but we’re not expecting a positive outcome
  • We have roughly 27 players who will not be returning from the draft rosters of 2020 but our waitlist has enough players to cover this
  • Our Membership committee will be working diligently over the next couple of weeks to fill vacant positions
  • Unfortunately we’ve had a few captains withdraw so this will be our first priority to fill
  • The Board of Directors will dust off the COVID protocols from last season’s Fall Ball and make some adjustments before we submit them to the City – Just to share with everyone, we had zero COVID cases during play last year


What’s next for you?

Make sure you are in contact with your captains because information is going to be coming frequently and they are the conduit for the Board of Directors
If you took a refund last year and you intend to play this year, you have until Friday April 16th to pay your fees for 2021 – the best way to pay is to e-transfer your fees to treasurer@bosl.ca
If you did not take a refund for 2020, you do not have to do anything with respect to fees
Register and pay for your individual membership with Slo-Pitch Ontario (more to come on this)


Some further Announcements:

Due to the uncertainty of the conditions for the next few months, the Board has decided to cancel the following:
  • Season Opening Stag
  • Mid Season Tournament
  • August Fund Raising Tournament (formerly Beat the Board)
  • BOSL Golf Tournament


We will wait until we have more information to make a decision on the Year End Tournament, Year End Banquet and Fall Ball


Slo Pitch Ontario Membership

In the past, our league would register with Slo Pitch Ontario (SPO) each year. SPO offered many benefits to the leagues in Ontario but the largest benefit was the insurance coverage that came with it. The SPO League Membership was not cheap but it was worth every penny to have everyone covered should there be an injury or incident. This also covered tournament play.
As of this year, SPO has changed its model and moved from League Memberships to Individual Memberships. In the past, when we registered as a league, every member of the BOSL had an individual membership. You may have not known this but one of the BOSL Board Members had the task to submit and register every BOSL player with SPO. As of 2021, we are not allowed to do this anymore on your behalf. So what does this mean for you?

  • Every single player will need to register with SPO individually – If you played with BOSL in 2019 you should have received an e-mail from them already. Your username would have been your e-mail that we had on file at that time.
  • The league cannot pay your membership fee for you any longer, like we did in the past. You will need to pay your own membership fee which is $15 per year.
  • If you would like more information on what you get for your membership fees you can go to https://slopitch.org/node/235
  • SPO Membership is mandatory for league participation in the BOSL. If you do not register and pay your membership fee you run the risk of not being allowed to play and not being properly insured, should an unfortunate incident occur.


This is a lot to take in but that’s everything we have so far. The Board will be meeting a couple of times over the next few weeks and information will be funneled through captains.

I hope everyone stays safe and looking forward to seeing all of you soon.


Scott Sinclair
BOSL President





This article comes from Burlington Oldtimers Slo-Pitch
https://www.bosl.ca

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