BEATRIZ MARINELLO
Beatriz was USCF President from 8/03-8/05, during a time when I was USCF Office Manager (11/03-1/04) and USCF Executive Director (1/04-12/04). In August 2003, on a 4-2 Board vote, she laid off one-third of USCF staff due to a severe financial emergency. I believe that it was the right decision. Beatriz has also done a good job organizing both scholastic and open tournaments. However, I have serious reservations regarding her candidacy for the Executive Board.
At the recent US Amateur Team tournament, Beatriz was one of several people participating in a registration booth which registered USCF members to vote by offering them a cash payoff of $5 each. She was the only candidate to participate in this scheme, and handed out campaign material. This action would be a violation of the law in most governmental elections. Federal statute 42 U.S.C. 1973i (c) states, "Persons must not pay, offer to pay or accept payment for voting, registering to vote, withholding their vote, or voting for or against any candidate in any election." While this statute was probably not intended to apply to chess elections, I can't support a candidate who would be part of such a sleazy effort.
In 2004, Beatriz tried to place the 2006 US Open in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, despite long established policy that the ED and not the President awards this event, Cherry Hill having the tournament only four years before in 2002, and overwhelming evidence that an Illinois bid the ED was about to approve was vastly superior. I believe that her actions relating to this matter were in disregard of the interests of USCF. See the original emails documenting this controversy. Both locations ended up being used (Illinois 2006, New Jersey 2007), and Illinois was far more successful. At the 2005 annual meetings, the delegates expressed unhappiness that the event was due to return to Cherry Hill 2007 with very high hotel rates, and asked the Executive Board to change the location if possible.
On September 10, 2004, President Marinello announced that she was going to apply for the position of USCF Executive Director. The post of ED was not vacant at the time, and there had been no call for applications. Complaints resulted about the propriety of using the office of President to pursue the ED position, and Beatriz withdrew her intention to apply.
Speaking of paying off voters, a name that comes immediately to mind is FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov. Notorious for his support of and friendship with some of the world's most evil dictators, Kirsan abolished parliament and was a dictator himself in the Russian province of Kalmykia, where the publisher of the only opposition newspaper was murdered and Ilyumzhinov's aides confessed to the crime. I'm glad that USCF has always taken the principled position of opposing Ilyumzhinov when he runs for re-election as FIDE President, even though I know we could have obtained favors by supporting him. Beatriz, on the other hand, is an ally of Ilyumzhinov and was elected a Vice President of FIDE by running on his ticket. Like elections for President and Vice President of the United States, in FIDE elections there is only ticket voting, so voting for Beatriz without Ilyumzhinov (or vice versa) was impossible. I was sorry to see an American running on the same ticket as this evil person.
Beatriz says that it is good for USCF to elect people to FIDE posts, but in her case it's more like a FIDE person seeking a USCF post. When FIDE recently enacted registration rules that would have burdened USCF and its affiliates, Beatriz went along and voted yes, though after an outcry in the US she changed her position. When FIDE leaders attacked USCF and other federations that participated in an arbitration hearing seeking to have FIDE follow its own election rules, Beatriz sided with the attackers and said that USCF should apologize. In the June Chess Life, Beatriz says that "The USCF and the other four other federations lost the lawsuit" when it wasn't a lawsuit, it was an arbitration hearing the federations were allowed to initiate under FIDE rules. She says "which resulted in FIDE spending over 1,000,000 Euros in legal fees" without pointing out that most of the 1,000,000 Euros lost by FIDE resulted from their challenge to the court's jursidiction and their appeal of legal compensation, and FIDE lost both of these actions.