USA Equestrian announced today that it has confirmed with committee leadership that virtually all committee meetings at the Annual Convention in Charlotte, NC, beginning January 9, will be open at least in part to all Federation members in attendance.

According to Executive Director Lori Rawls, some concerns had been expressed by members that too many of the meetings scheduled appeared to be closed meetings. "As has been the case for many years," she said, "all meetings of the Board of Directors and general sessions to discuss rule change proposals will be completely open. However, many committee meetings may be closed at the option of the committee, for private discussion, as had always been the case. We have taken the added step this year of contacting all committee chairs, to be sure that a significant portion of the committee meetings held will be open to the membership for auditing, and almost all of them indicated that was their original expectation. All chairmen will be expected to notify staff of the portion of the meeting which will be open, so that members in attendance can plan accordingly."

While most committees are leaning to opening all or most of their meetings to auditors, some concerns were expressed over confidentiality, and keeping conduct of the meetings organized. In particular, committees which take up personnel, compensation, legal matters, confidential evaluations, or pending disputes, may require a portion of the meeting to be closed. However, any auditors in attendance at such meetings will be advised of the reasons which make a closed meeting necessary, prior to its closing.

Should any member wish information about a specific committee meeting, a list of committees and liaisons will be published in the near future on the USA Equestrian website, at www.equestrian.org. The staff liaison is the contact person for additional information.

For more information, please contact Sarah Holt, Public Relations on (859) 225 6974 or via email at sholt@equestrian.org. USA Equestrian press releases are available on our web site - http://www.equestrian.org/ .

USA Equestrian Inc., as the National Equestrian Federation of the U.S., is the regulatory body for the Olympic and World Championship sports of dressage, driving, endurance, eventing, reining, show jumping, and vaulting, as well as 19 other breeds and disciplines of equestrian competition. As the country's largest multi-breed organization, the Federation has over 80,000 members and recognizes more than 2,800 competitions nationwide each year. It governs all aspects of competition, including educating and licensing all judges, stewards, and technical delegates who officiate at these shows.