February 18, 2026

Call to order – Al – 8:00 PM CST

Roll Call – Michael

• Meeting Attendance – 2025 _ 2026 Season – Council.pdf and Conflict of Interest statements 
• Reminder on time management
  • Periodic announcement of running time 
  • Off topic items tabled to end of call

Approval of past SCC minutes – Michael

• Last Meeting Minutes: SCC 26 1 21 Agenda and Minutes – USA Club Rugby
  • Motion: __RMR___. Second: __MidWest___. Approved

Chairs’/Officers’ Reports

Quick introduction – Nish Nereyeth (Strategic Growth Consultant)

• Contact him at strategy@usaclub.rugby 

Guest Speaker – Scott Lawrence

• Presentation 

Secretary – Michael

• Tracking action Items here Action Item Tracker and Website here Website Issue Tracker
  • Completed items are there. Just filtered out
• Club Competition Recaps
  • MD1 – Men’s Division 1 – January 2026 Recap – USA Club Rugby
  • MD2 – Men’s Division 2 – January 2026 Recap – USA Club Rugby
  • MD3 – Men’s Division 3 – January 2026 Recap – USA Club Rugby
  • WD1 – Women’s Division 1 – January 2026 Recap – USA Club Rugby
  • WD2 – Women’s Division 2 – January 2026 Recap – USA Club Rugby

Admin – Nicole

• NDA signing status
  • NDA Tracker
  • 4 – Nikki, Callie, Michael, Keenan
• Refund processing
  • 4 since ExCo (11 since last SCC meeting)
  • Refund policy USA Club Rugby Refund Policy  
• Web Contact form responses
  • 1 since ExCo
• Outstanding Club Pays Invoices
  • USAR/RX has provided a partial solution to allow GUs better control
    • GU configuration of Club or Player Pays Registration  
  • Note: Club Pays Invoice Policy 
  • List of outstanding invoices 
  • With Wilmington on track for June/July, we are caught up
• Other
  • Action Item from EXCO 26 01 05: Contact all GU presidents and request permission to turn off club pays invoices for all clubs in their GU. Remind them that outstanding Club Pays Invoices will be their responsibility
    • TBD: Hawaii, Mid-America (Rowdies failed invoice now complete)
    • Response needed: Georgia, Southwest

USAR Liaison – Elaine

• 2026 Jan SCC Report.png
• RX update: The “summer only” club check box is up and running. Unions can add this designation where appropriate and include it in compliance reporting.
• How-to guide on tournament operation incoming

15’s Comp – David McPhail

• Proposed SCC Promotion Policy 
  • SCC to review before potential vote next SCC

7’s Comp – David Fee

• Nothing to Report

Eligibility – Tam

• Nothing to Report

Treasurer – Tim

• January SFP
• January SA by Class
• January SA by Class YTD
• Budget to come

Discipline – Megan

• Current open cases:
  • (2) grievances
  • (3) Regulation 18 Investigations
• 2026 Trainings:
  • In-Person Community Judicial Officer (CJO) Courses – TBD
  • Quarterly CJO & CC Meetings (March, June, September & December)
• Working on disciplinary assignments for Super Regionals
  • Northern: May 2-3, 2026  (Chicago Blaze Complex – Chicago, IL) – Assigned
  • Atlantic: May 2–3, 2026 (Niagara University Campus – Niagara Falls, NY) – Assigned
  • Pacific: April 24–26, 2026 (Location: ???) – Need location information for Assignment
  • Gulf Coast: April 25th, 2026 (Rugby Ranch- Austin, Texas) – Assigned
• Request: Can we get a social media post and updated information on our website for the 2026 Super Regional dates and locations? (Nothing has been posted yet – the website still shows 2025 information.)
  • Action Item: McPhail to get info to Jeremy via web tracker

Governance – KJ

• Elections upcoming in March to take seat in May
  • Action Item: KJ to get Board Rep job description up to date
  • Action Item: Michael N to post the 3 job descriptions for nominations
• Action Item: KJ to follow up with 15s and 7s on committee member policies 

DEI – Robert

• Committee meeting on updated athlete safety policy
• In-progress inclusivity documents for clubs

Vice Chair – Wes

• No Report

USAR Director – Rick

• • January 22 Board Meeting
    • Chair’s report
      • Meeting with World Rugby leadership about RWC and Grow the Game funding
      • WR Pie continues to get smaller – Projection: 5m pounds this calendar year
    • CEO Report
      • Final interviews for operations manager position
      • NZ/SA match sanctions not concluded
      • Grow the game budget for this calendar year – $1.35 – $300k club targeted for club growth
    • Governance/policy
      • Adopted Athlete Safety (“Transgender”) policy as required by federal/USOPC requirements – carefully defined complaint management
      • Policy to be released soon
    • Finance/Risk – see attached PPT deck
      • Board – 260122 Finance Presentation.pdf
    • Man’s National Team report – Guest Speaker
      • “Be a disruptor, Set the Stage, Build momentum to 2031”
      • August to October match schedule
      • Fixed player contracts

• Vertical Integration

• • A goal must be vertically integrated development programming – clubs and development entities that include, or work closely with, youth, high schools and colleges
  • Club rugby not always viewed as player/coach/referee development
  • Member registration remains a challenge for members participating across councils
  • All Pathways must include both HP and Life Long participation

USAR Referee and Laws Committee (RLC) – David Chapman

• The RLC is having elections for a new Chair. 
  • The call for nominations began on February 3 and will go until March 3. The election process (using a ranked choice voting system) will take place from March 4 to March 15.
  • The RLC wants to install recurring meetings again when the new RLC Chair is selected.
  • Until the elections are completed, Olivia Rogers will continue as the RLC Chair for SCC communications and planning.
• Discussed the voluntary 12-replacement policy with the Chair of the RLC’s Laws Working Group; there are no issues as written under current Law and GMG. Forwarded to David McPhail for review by the 15s Committee. The general purpose is to have this as a resource available at usaclub.rugby for others to implement optionally, as Capital, EPRU, and perhaps others have done.

Chair report – Al

• Community agreement update incoming
• Al to share compliance report
  • We need to get these sorted out

New Business

• MD4/WD3 eligibility 
  • These are non NCS with Eligibility and Discipline being managed by the GUs participating 
• Competitions TORs
  • Al’s history of the TORs
  • SCC review and share thoughts with Nicole for ExCo 

Adjourned

• Motion: _RMR_. Second: __Capital__
  • Meeting adjourned at 9:50 PM CST