Author: wpadmin

Youth summer programs capacity and guidelines have been updated as follows:

Registration

• Partners registering together no longer need to be a part of the same household
• We strongly recommend that partners be people with whom they already have regular contact with

Program Limits

• All single-handed programs increase capacity to 6
• All Double-handed programs increase capacity to 10 or 5 420’s

Distancing Requirements

• 2-meter distancing must be maintained while on Old Mill Boathouse Property
• 2-meter distancing encouraged on land outside of Old Mill Boathouse Property and on the docks especially amongst sailors not sailing in the same boat
• Coach boats may be used to transport participants to the dock. (one person at a time for participants of a dingle-handed program, 2 people at a time for participants of a double-handed program
• Volunteers may accompany coaches on the coach boats without being required to distance

Safety Procedures

• Boats and gear may be used by different people and groups throughout a given week
• Boats will be sprayed down with disinfectant solution after use and in between participants

by Chris Thorne

Musa Fortin presented the 2021 sailing program plan to the executive and membership at our last general meeting. We will be rolling out programs at reduced capacity and as health conditions improve new programs will introduced to meet demand. Participants can expect program fees may increase by as much as 15% compared to 2019 reflecting higher coach to sailor ratios and increased health costs.

Summer Youth Programs

Summer programs will start first week of July and run through to the end of August. The sailing program will be comprised of Juniors, Girl Power Sailing, Opti Bronze, CANSail 1/2 (formally Summer Fun), CANSail 3, and Cansail 4/5. The half day Wet Feet program will not be run but Juniors will now accommodate sailors as young as 5 years. Programs will use single handed boats: Lasers (4.7 and Radial rigs) and Optis, but if health restrictions relax we may consider running double handed 420 programs. We will run 3 concurrent sailing programs each day with a possible evening session. Some sail programs will now include a minimum weight requirement.

School and Scout Programs

We will accept school and scout programs bookings for May and June; however, organizers should be aware the programs would require use of double handed boats which do not currently meet social distancing requirements.

Youth Race Team

Rocky Point Sailing will run a Spring and Fall session with training beginning on Sunday May 2nd. Currently there are no BC circuit races scheduled.

Adult Programs

A limited adult program is planned for Summer and Fall. Current guidelines would limit us to two boats and four participants which must be of the same private residence.

Private Lessons

The general meeting had no specific discussion of private lesson. A private lesson maybe considered in situations where participants are of the same private household.

by Chris Thorne

At Rocky Point Sailing our executive has discussed offering a more diverse youth program and return of adult sailing, but until there is more clarity with respect to the COVID-19 pandemic we are going to withhold posting our 2021 registration for another month.

BC Sailing currently recommends that youth program groups be limited to no more than 50 people (including coaches), physical distancing to 3 meters at all times, single handed sailing only unless both sailors live in the same private residence, and no sailing regattas.

Under those guidelines our offering maybe similar to that which we ran last year. However, if the health situation improves we have discussed running an after school program starting in May, a complete youth summer program starting in July, and an adult program in August. There is a good chance that regardless of the pandemic outcome, double handed sailing for youth and adults will require sailors to live in the same private residence. The executive has also discussed adjustments to program fees to offset reduced program capacities and additional health safety costs.

Our membership offerings will also be affected by the pandemic, but we hope to see a return the Thursday night club races starting in May. The keelboat members are planning to locate a keelboat in Desolation Sound for summer cruising. At this time we have limited capacity to run private lessons or orient new dinghy members.

Please contact us or comment if you have specific questions and I’ll see they are brought to attention at our next general meeting which is scheduled for March 16th.

James Anderson (RPSA Commodore) has written an article for the Sport Information Resource Centre describing how we navigated the COVID-19 experience and rolled out programs for the 2020 season.

https://sirc.ca/blog/covid19-community-sport-perspective/

On behalf of the executive and membership I want to extend our sincere appreciation for our coaches and staff – Zach, Cam, Joe, Andy, Victoria, Caja and Musa – for their dedication, enthusiasm, patience and expertise. They should be very proud of what they accomplished. Feedback from parents has been very positive.

A very special thank you to Musa and Caja. Musa executed our COVID-19 health and safety policies, collaborated with coaches to develop modified summer programs and managed the day-to-day operations. Caja surveyed members and past program participants to learn what RPSA was doing well, how we can improve, and what our community wants in terms of future programming. 

Lastly, I want to thank our volunteers and keelboat skippers. In March, RPSA’s future was uncertain. Thanks to a dedicated group we were able to band together to accomplish RPSA’s core mission and keep coaches employed and run diverse sailing program.

Jimmy
Commodore, RPSA

Yesterday we got a shout out from a local city Councillor on Facebook.

An immense thank you to all the volunteers that helped us mitigate the impacts of COVID-19 and to Musa Fortin and all the coaches who have done a fantastic job getting our programs running safely.

To our community,

It is with deep sadness we must cancel regular scheduled summer sailing programs such as Summer Fun, Junior Sailing, Wet Feet and Can Sail 3, 4 and 5 due to COVID-19 and for the safety of our program participants, their families and our instructors.  Our volunteer training and July session of Opti-Bronze are proceeding as planned.

RPSA will be issuing full refunds to impacted summer program registrants. Please allow 5-10 business days for refunds to be processed.

This was an incredibly difficult decision made after lengthy discussions and in consultation with community stakeholders. The health and safety of our participants, instructors and community is paramount.

We are assessing whether we can run smaller programs in mid-July or August using one-person boats to ensure physical distancing and safety protocols can be effectively maintained. More details will be available late June.

We sincerely thank you for supporting our community sport organization and hope to see you next year or sooner.

Dear members and friends,

RPSA is suspending all operations until May 1st to do our part in lowering the risk to the community as much as possible. We are continuning to monitor the situation and as of now, all programs scheduled after May 1st will proceed as usual.

We are sending positive vibes to our community during these challenging times.

Thank you for an incredible 2019 sailing season.