The Saint Charles, IL club (Thursday night meetings) will not meet on 3/20 or 3/27 as the park district buildings are cancelling meetings. April is still up in the air.
The Arcadia, California Chess Club is closed until April 6.
The MetroWest Chess Club ended its March tournament early (this past Tuesday, after round two of five) and canceled its April tournament. We are, of course, monitoring the situation but have no word yet about the May tournament.
Closure goes through the end of April. May is still up in the air.
The Wachusett Chess Club at Fitchburg State University in Massachusetts suspended play on Wednesday, March 18, after the governor of the state, Charlie Baker, issued a ban on all meetings anywhere in the Bay State of 25 or more people. The ban is still in effect to at least May 4.
May was lost. June was lost. July 9 is the tentative re-opening. Closure will be at 10 PM instead of 11 PM to allow the park district to do the required additional clean up afterwards. Opening will be at 6 PM instead of 7 PM.
Masks will be required. Sanitizing clocks, pieces and boards will be required. Gloves will be recommended. Social distancing between boards will be required. Social distancing across the board is being discussed.
IL will finally allow gatherings less than 50 people. Full reopening will require (1) a vaccine or (2) highly effective treatment widely available or (3) the elimination of any new cases over a sustained period. Personally, I don’t anticipate #3 unless #1 occurs.
Even if #1 occurs (vaccine), #3 (new cases) will still happen. Most vaccines aren’t 100% preventative (if any are.)
Closed again to follow the governor’s mitigations.
My comment was pointing out that #3 was not a realistic hope without #1. New cases will happen unless the entire world can eradicate a disease but localized near-eradication can occur if vaccines are effective enough (think measles in 2000 in the US).
I hope and pray that there is a rebirth after Covid19 for most of these clubs. Club closings for whatever reason is a major reason for a lack of chess offerings in many areas (esp rural) in our nation. I do feel for those who had to travel from Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, etc, to my various clubs in the North Texas area because
there were so few events in their home areas.
It will take time post covid19 to fill these voids. Perhaps an idea (not new) would be a restarting club, new club
incentive in greatly reduced us chess adult memberships, temporary affiliate fee waivers in areas voided by chess,
etc. I do believe that US chess must be very aggressive in our approach to rebuilding our club and membership base
post covid19.
I would agree, but I would also hope that support continues to be offered in the area of online ratings and that support be offered to virtual clubs as well. In my instance, our club having gone virtual saves me at least 40 minutes in travel time and attendant gas costs as well. Our club was already not meeting physically before Covid and Covid gave us our current virtual revival.
It’s not that I want to see OTB go away, either, but I am finding that it’s more important to have a local group of people that I know and can see over Discord than it is to be sitting across the physical board from them - at least on a weekly basis.
Closed again to follow the governor’s mitigations.
Open again this week as we are back to the freedom of tier one mitigations. Masks still required.