As I’m sure most of you are aware, the Covid-19 pandemic is not likely to be going away any time soon. The pandemic and accompanying health restrictions mean our bridge club will not be open anytime in the near future. We can only hope and pray that it ends sooner rather than later.

The club itself is in good financial shape due to two major factors:

Soul Sanctuary has treated us very fairly. They agreed to the bridge club paying a storage fee for our equipment rather than the full rent. With little income the rent would have made us insolvent within months.

The Unit, Ambassador, & Lorraine’s bridge clubs have set up Virtual games on BBO which has resulted in a positive bottom line.

When able to resume in-person play at Soul Sanctuary, we have secured a 5 year lease. The lease has several built in protections to cover the unexpected. It can be terminated by either party with 6 months written notice, protecting the Unit if play does not return to a level which covers the expenses. Soul Sanctuary has agreed to only charge a storage fee rather than the agreed rent as long as we are unable to have live games.

Special thanks to Marsha Kimelman for organizing the Unit virtual games, and to all the directors and volunteers who work hard to make them successful. These games are keeping the Unit in the black.

To those players who have been supporting the virtual games, thank you for your support.

I look forward to seeing you all across the table from me at Soul Sanctuary in the not too distant future.

President

Douglas L Fisher