DiscNW Community Bulletin Boards

Hello bearded guy.

For most of us in the Seattle, the UPA is a little bit of an afterthought.  I've played about 30 tournaments the last 3 years, and never would have had to join the UPA except for sectionals.

The Washington/BC section only had 6 teams at co-ed sectionals this year.   A huge part of the reason is the $40 UPA dues.   Having to pay the $40 dues for one tournament really sucks. 

Probably not something that you can change.

-Dan

Bunny: If I was in your region I would certainly vote for you. Cya in January

Dan: That is certainly a very reasonable concern. You're touching on two things really: 1) How should the UPA interact with large disc organization that provide many of the same services to their local constituents that the UPA would like to provide and 2) (very related to 1) Different people get a different 'value' to joining the UPA. For some people the membership fee seems like a small amount to pay for all the UPA tournaments they attend, and then there are a bunch of people just like you that play in one or two a year and it seems like way too much. I have not been a part of any board meetings, but would imagine this issue is one that is discussed all the time. The UPA does do its best to try and have variable rates for joining, and there are now discount rates ($11 and $22) for new members, for the rest of the year, if it's the first time the join. I know this doesn't apply to you since you've played before, but there is some effort to have a variable join rate. Also, for some events there is the option of the one-time-event fee ($5).

I think one possible solution is exactly what frisbeejohnson brought up -- "It seems to me that local orgs like discnw could work with the UPA to make membership in their org cover UPA as well." I think that is definitely something that should be explored. It certainly covers several locations with large leagues. I'm involved with BUDA out here on the east coast and on top of reducing the cost, some kind of combined insurance coverage would reduce paperwork, something I know LOTS of people would LOVE

I'm on the board of directors at DiscNW, and I believe that we've been fairly clear that we'd like to see some type of joint membership.  To date though, the UPA hasn't been able to effectively engage with us on the topic.  I think it's also true that they move a bit slower than local ulti organizations like ours.

If this topic is important to you, I would recommend sending an email to UPA headquarters.  It may very well be that the first joint memberships will come through the youth circuit.