Nine district members and 2 district associations have signed another petition for a SGM of the ASA. 

Recognizing that the governance of the Alberta Soccer Association is undergoing a prolonged period of great turmoil and crisis, the undersigned members of the Alberta Soccer Association (the "Association") seek a clean slate of board members at the upcoming AGM scheduled for January 22, 2011. To this end, the undersigned members believe it is in the best interest of the association that the board calls a public, open Special General Meeting. Therefore those members, whose signatures appear below, request a Special General Meeting of the Association to be called by the Board of Directors of the association in accordance with Article 8(2) of the Bylaws of the Alberta Soccer Association (the "Bylaws") to conduct the following business:

The petition seeks to bring forward resolutions to have the meeting chaired by an independent individual, to remove 7 directors from the ASA Board, to amend the Bylaws to prohibit Directors from sitting as a Director or Officer of an Active or Associate member of the association.

This is a move in the right direction. A clean slate is what we in the soccer community need before we will ever be able to address the sport related issues we face.

So this is a good time to reflect on the role of the director, the board and the membership that elects them.

The board is given the responsibility to provide direction and leadership to the organization and govern the organizations affairs on behalf of the membership. In an organization with voting members the board acts on behalf of, and is subordinate to, the organization's full assembly, which usually chooses the members of the board. ¹  Directors and officers have a relationship of trust with the members of the organization, and it is from this trust relationship that certain important legal duties arise.²  Directors owe what is called a 'fiduciary duty' to the organization. It is 'fiduciary' because the obligation to act in the best interests of the organization, at its core, is an obligation of loyalty, honesty and good faith. ³  

The common thread running through the above references is the issue of trust and loyalty. The trust between the membership and the board as a whole; and the duty of loyalty required of the individual directors.

For anyone who has taken the time to read through the forums and comment sections whenever the subject of the 'Alberta Soccer Dispute' is discussed it is pretty obvious that trust is something that has become increasingly rare. Looking to Wikipedia, one of the elements of trust is the reasonable expectation (confidence) of the trustor that the trustee will behave in a way beneficial to the trustor.⁴ I do not think we are there at the moment.

Until the underlying issue of trust, or its lack thereof, is addressed we as a soccer community are not going to move forward. Hopefully an SGM that effectively is a reset followed by an AGM to elect all new directors will help get us back on track.

Added - 2010.12.07 - Member petition for SGM

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1 - Wikipedia, Board of Directors, para 3
2 - Rachel Corbett, Centre for Sport and Law May 2002, Legal Liability and Risk Management: A Handbook for Directors, pg 2
3 - Institute On Governance, Strengthening Board Governance, point 11
4 - Wikipedia, Trust, para 4