ACBL Unit 240 Board Meeting

The ACBL Unit 240 Board will meet at 11:00 a.m. on Saturday, October 3rd, at WPSC, prior to our regular Saturday bridge game. Lunch will be at noon.  Expect a 12:30 p.m. start to our club championship game.

So, What Does the Unit 240 Board Actually Do?

You may have heard the term Unit 240 Board tossed around and wondered, “Okay, but what exactly do these people do?” Well, quite a bit—as it turns out, there is more to running duplicate bridge than shuffling cards and arguing about the bidding.

Unit 240 of the American Contract Bridge League (ACBL) oversees and supports duplicate bridge activities throughout Brevard and Indian River Counties, as well as Orange, Osceola and Seminole Counties in the Orlando metropolitan area.

One of the biggest things the Unit does each year is organize the Orlando Regional Tournament, held during the first week of January. Traditionally one of Florida’s largest tournaments, the Regional brings players from throughout the state—and beyond—to compete for those ever-important MasterPoints while enjoying the opportunity to see old friends and make new ones.

The Unit also works with local bridge clubs that want to host Sectional Tournaments, helping them secure preferred dates on District 9’s Florida tournament calendar. In other words, someone has to make sure all those tournaments fit on the calendar without everyone trying to hold their event on the same weekend.

Beyond tournaments, the Unit supports local clubs through Sectional Tournaments at Clubs (STaCs) and other special events. These give members additional opportunities to earn MasterPoints—including the coveted colored points—and get one step closer to their next ranking or, for the truly dedicated, that elusive Life Master designation.

The Unit Board is made up of representatives from the counties it serves. Each county is allotted a number of Board members based on the number of ACBL members in that county. Currently, Brevard County is represented by Pam Page and Anna-Lynn Wagner.

The Unit’s current officers include Cabot Jaffee, Jr., from the Orlando area, who serves as President. Pieter VanBennekom, a member of both the Vero Beach Bridge Club and the Wickham Park Senior Center bridge club in Melbourne, serves as Secretary. John Moschella, who also serves as President of District 9 Florida, is the Unit Treasurer.

So, while the Board may not be sitting at the table with you when you are trying to decide whether to bid three no-trump or take a questionable finesse, its work behind the scenes helps make those games—and the larger tournaments and special events—possible.

In short, Unit 240 is there to promote, support and grow duplicate bridge in our part of Florida. And yes, somebody really does have to deal with all the details. Otherwise, we’d just have five counties full of bridge players complaining that there aren’t enough tournaments, the dates are wrong, and “Who thought this was a good idea?”