An Equestrian Canada Status Report

you're listening to an article from horse sport.com. an equestrian canada status report by: horse sport staff. ec hosted their agm last month and have recently posted their annual report and financial report. many may not be aware of all the information that was provided, so horse sport has combed through it all to provide this concise report. voters. ec’s annual general meeting was held september 19th where the executive gave an update on the finances and general direction of the organization. this is the meeting where ec’s 27 voting members approve the finances and by-law amendments, though just 18 of the voters attended. financial statements. ec reported an overall loss of $729,689, the largest in their history, by far. the one bright spot is that their revenue has returned to pre-pandemic revenue levels collecting $6.535 million, but the bad news is that their expenses have also increased. advertisement scroll to continue with content one of the largest expense increases was to staff salaries which went up 27% ($692,858), though half of this cost is offset by a decrease in professional and contractor services. in addition, $770,500 was spent on high performance cost for the world equestrian games in denmark last year. to pay for the loss, ec withdrew money from their investments which the board has agreed to replenish with $150,000 every year for the next five years. where they are going to find the funds to do that, however, is questionable since the organization has now lost over $1.2 million since 2015. the annual report does note that they got a grant to hire a fundraising consultancy firm which has conducted a full fundraising analysis and submitted its suggestions. it’s worth noting that the investments used to fund the loss come in large part from the levies paid by the competitors of each discipline. recall that the levies were originally created to give each sport a means of raising money for their respective high performance and domestic programs independent of ec’s revenue sources. these funds were managed by each discipline committee so they could fund their teams and the programs they felt were necessary to support their sport. ec has changed this practice and now ec staff directly manage the funds with some input from the committees. in addition, the balance of these funds used to be reported as restricted funds in ec’s financial statements, though a change in accounting practice means that ec no longer reports on the balances of these restricted funds in their financial statements. when the balances of the restricted funds were last reported in ec’s 2018 financial statements, however, jump had about 60% of the balance with $1.2 million, dressage $164,294, eventing had $99,534, with the rest of the funds in other non-olympic disciplines. as the levies collected to fund their participation at team events is insufficient, athletes from each of the disciplines have resorted to fundraising for themselves. ptsos. during the agm, it was explained that ec has struck a new deal with the provincial and territorial sport organizations (ptsos). for more than 10 years, the ptsos have remitted 10% of the fees they collect to ec but that has been changed to a flat fee of $2.50/member. as a result, ec is down about 20% in membership fee revenue, but they do finally have a new contract with the ptsos as the last one had expired march 31, 2020. to further support the ptsos, ec launched three grants worth $140k: national education fund (ensures that ptsos have resources to deliver nccp coach certification to reach goal of all coaches licensed and nccp certified by 2025); national emergency response fund (for ptsos to support equestrian communities facing environmental and biosecurity disasters); national sport development fund (granting to ptsos for developing nationwide sport development initiatives). by-law changes. ec had proposed by-law changes at the 2021 agm but they were ultimately removed from the agenda when it appeared they were likely not to be approved. there had been several changes proposed, but the biggest stumbling block was the proposal to increase the number of voting members. to determine how best to address its governance issues, ec hired a governance expert who suggested making changes in a two-step approach. this year was the first step and introduced new by-laws required to bring ec in compliance with new requirements from the canadian olympic committee and sport canada. this year’s by-law changes, though necessary, were not controversial and were unanimously approved. the second phase to be presented at next year’s agm that will be more interesting. this will be the phase where they may introduce an updated governance plan including changes to the membership structure. recall that since 2015 ec has only had 27 voting members who represent sport, provinces, and industry associations and vote on the board, by-laws, and approve the financials. strategic plan. this is the first year of ec’s 2022-2025 strategic plan. as detailed below, their plan has three pillars each of which are to be achieved through various objectives and key results. ec has also provided a brief note on the status of the 17 key results, which notes that 11 of them have financial and/or staffing limitations which may prevent the result from being achieved. pillar 1: building a strong foundation. objective 1: modernize and redesign membership, competition, and licensing structures focused on increased value. key result: implement a developmentally appropriate equestrian sport pathway with simplified competition and licensing structures by dec 31, 2025. key result: review and refine jumping and para-dressage gmp and metrics by dec 31, 2023, eventing and dressage by dec 31, 2024 and annually by dec 31 thereafter. status: key results are presently on target. future considerations will be financial and organizational capacity to complete by 2025 (or extend to 2030). objective 2: develop relevant and beneficial products and services for canadian equestrians. key result: research experienced value of existing ec products, develop recommendations and test prototypes by oct 1, 2024. status: none at this time. objective is not targeted to be prioritized until 2024. objective 3: grow revenue by 30% ($2m). key result: sales lead brought on by dec 1, 2023 to lead corporate/grant portfolio that achieves $1.2m/a by dec 31, 2030. key result: generate $500k/a in general donations by dec 31, 2030. status: fundraising report indicates our targets are aggressive and may not be achievable in the short-term. objective 4: simplify governance structure and implement risk management practices. key result: implement new governance structure (coc funded governance review) by oct 1, 2024. status: objective is on track. concern for plan b should phase 1 not be approved at the 2023agm. (editor’s note: phase 1 was approved). pillar 2: investing in the future. streamlining programs and services that develop leaders, participants, athletes, horses, and the teams that support them. objective 1: automate operational processes and invest in industry and sport intelligence. key result: reduce manual operational processes by 50% by dec 1, 2024. key result: complete the economic and socio economic equine industry study to provide post-covid insights into the state and health of the canadian equine and equestrian sector by aug 31, 2023. status: objective is on track. concern for budget constraints depending on the scope of the technology audit recommendations. objective 2: support learning and development of equestrian leaders across disciplines, activities, and experiences. key result: license 2500 coaches by dec 31, 2025. key result: close the gap of coach developer workforce by educating and updating 50 coach developers nationwide (emphasis on quality delivery, training of leaders)by dec 31, 2023. key result: recruit and train 50 nextgen u50 officials by dec 31, 2025. key result: achieve annual retention kpis for staff and volunteers in 2023, 2024 and 2025 and increase access to learning and development, and satisfaction for staff and volunteers annually. key result: certify 10 nccp competition development coaches annually. status: objective is on track. no significant variances identified at this time. objective 3: provide developmentally appropriate training and competition for participants through the sport pathway. key result: update developmentally appropriate curriculum from fundamentals (rookie riders) to train to compete (ltrd) by dec 31, 2024. status: key results for developmentally appropriate curriculum require funding which has been applied for but not confirmed. key result: implement ec-owned championships with rankings for 4 disciplines by dec 31, 2025. status: capacity and resources to support organizer development key results are insufficient. key result: increase number of ec organizers by 5% by dec 31, 2025. key result: increase the number of fei eventing, dressage and paradressage competitions held on canadian soil by dec 31, 2025. status: capacity and resources to support organizer development key results are insufficient. objective 4: optimize supports to human and equine high performance and nextgen athletes. key result: 20% of nextgen athletes progress to the high performance program by dec 31, 2023 then annually to 2025. key result: attain $1m/a in each olympic discipline ($3m/a combined)for high performance teams by dec 31, 2027. status: financial limitations will impact delivery on key results. key result: finish 1 team top 5 and 1 individual top 4 at paris 2024 games by aug 31, 2024. status: financial limitations will impact delivery on key results. key result: 3 teams qualified for the olympics and 1 team qualified for the paralympics 2024 by nov 31, 2023. status: financial limitations will impact delivery on key results. pillar 3: serving the community. enhancing service quality and inclusive participant experiences that increase customer satisfaction and the equestrian social license to operate. objective 1: improve standards, innovate, and deliver excellent customer service to equestrians, donors, organizers, and partners. key result: implement a system to measure customer satisfaction by dec 31, 2023. key result: improve customer satisfaction by 5% annually by dec 31, 2025. status: staff are at capacity with day-to-day customer service, resulting in key results timeline delays. objective 2: lead initiatives and implement processes that increase diversity, protect participants, and support inclusion. key result: key result: 100% slhs comply with safe sport training requirements for fhee/ca and osic by april 1, 2023 and achievement of annual renewal requirements in 2024 and 2025. key result: achieve annual growth of 10% in racial and physical impairment diversity of staff/volunteer (governance) by dec 31, 2025. status: current edi and safe sport key results are meeting expectations, remainder are planned as future activities. key result: increase access to equestrian activities in canada for a diverse population of participants targeting 500 new participants each year by dec 31, 2025. key result: complete 1 accessibility initiative (improve compensating aids process) to increase the number of people with impairments that are able to participate in the sport by dec 31, 2025. status: current edi and safe sport key results are meeting expectations, remainder are planned as future activities. objective 3: safeguard, educate, and advocate for active equine health and welfare in sport and industry. key result: address 5 horse health and welfare concerns jeopardizing social licence by dec 31, 2025. status: key results within this objective focus on the ceip, equine care program due to limited financial resources. key result: implement a robust awards and recognition strategy for internal and external awards with 1 external significant award. key result: deliver equitable representation of all disciplines in marketing and communications annually starting in 2023. key result: increase social media following by 10% by dec 31, 2025. status: objective success may be impacted due to community acceptance given historical awards planning philosophy. you can watch the video of the agm here which also includes links to all of the annual reports. &&>