Creepy is a polite term for it. Someone said he also got removed from the mandatory Sex Offense Listings. He is no longer required to register. Absolute garbage.
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Today brings another email from AFE:
Athletes for Equity in Sport, (AES 501 ©6), is responding to the most recent ruling issued by the U.S. Center for SafeSport, regarding permanent ineligibility status of Bob McDonald, 73, husband of U.S. Technical Advisor of Dressage and Chef d’Equipe, Debbie McDonald. Regardless of what has been said, Bob McDonald was not given a hearing before being announced permanently ineligible.
Athletes for Equity in Sport remains dedicated to and focused on our mission of equity for all participants in the U.S. Center for SafeSport, USOPC, and NGB reporting process.
We continue to address the urgent issue: Reform U.S. Center for SafeSport operational procedures.
We need your help! For more information, to become a member, donor, or volunteer, please visit www.Athletesforequity.org.
Diane Carney
President
Athletes for Equity in Sport
www.AthletesforEquity.org
Related Articles:
[U]U.S. Center of SafeSport Issues Permanent Ban on Bob McDonald, Husband of US Dressage Technical Advisor – PS Dressage
Bob McDonald Requests Independent Arbitration For U.S. Center of SafeSport - PS Dressage[/U]
I want to add that everyone who is mad about people being sanctioned by SafeSport without “publicly verified facts” really should spend more time investigating how our criminal justice system actually works in real life and spend some energy on that, especially on forced plea bargains and on people sometimes held in prison for years without trial or bail.
That’s one of the reasons this whole AES et al action just feels so insular and petty and lacking self-awareness to me, even beyond the much larger problem that they don’t seem to care at all about past or future victims or the safety of young or up and coming athletes. The other is that the only people they issue press releases about are the Big Names, never about the little people who get sanctions, and never about athletes who left the sport because they didn’t feel safe.
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Especially when there are so many more options in the area. It’s not like RCF is the only game in town, not by a long shot. There are lots of barns that provide better horse care and instruction from instructors/trainers without a sex offense on their record.
It’s not a secret in horse circles around the area, so the only parents who might not know are those completely new to horses. There’s a lot of parents that see no issue with leaving their daughters unattended at the barn. I honestly don’t know what they’re thinking.
The fact that he can smooth talk a mother should give you an idea of what he’s capable of with a younger female.
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admit that you are a know-nothing bully
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I’ve talked to some of my parents that have kids active in other sports (baseball, soccer, football), since I was curious about this. None of them were aware of any Safesport training or restrictions in the other sports. I can’t tell if they just don’t notice, or if the youth sports are so far removed from the national governing bodies there’s no connection, or if it’s because not all popular kids sports are Olympic sports. I tried to figure out the soccer, since it’s the most popular in our area and is an Olympic sport. Our local soccer league that everyone’s kid joins here doesn’t have anything apparent on its website, and the coaches don’t require licensing by their national governing body before a certain level. I would be surprised if many parents new to or outside the horse industry (and the gymnastics, probably) had any idea they were meant to be checking a Safesport list.
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another literary genius
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I wonder if using the word ‘hearing’ is the key here. There is no formal ‘hearing’ at this point. Now if they said, 'Bob was never allowed to present any evidence." that would be different.
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I think the biggest difference is youth sports have had this kind of over sight for a lot longer. Most sports are connected through the schools and towns as well. The coaches are volunteer parents or the teachers themselves.
This is the first time the horse world has had any kind of oversight with teeth. That is probably the reason for parents not being as well versed. Like anything else, what are the chances of little Suzy or little Joey playing beyond high school or travel teams?
And let’s face it, when something bad is said about a trainer or barn many people think the person speaking the warning is just bitter. We also are a lot smaller at the lower levels too.
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No, but the basic protocols have been in place for a long time. An adult is never alone with a child. Communications are always to a group or include a parent. When coaches are approved, they’re fingerprinted and run through the various databases. Parents don’t have to check independently because there are clubs and leagues that already take on that responsibility
Our local youth league website has an incident report form (for good and bad behavior) and a page with the SafeSport law.
If your soccer league is a member of one of the two national youth soccer organizations, they are following the law.
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I’m sure they are following protocols, my point is that your average parent, even one with experience in other sports, is not conditioned to look up Safesport lists when choosing a coach or trainer. Particularly if their kid is joining the sport on a grass roots or local association level.
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Because the protection and grievance avenues provided by Safe Sport have been in place for average kids playing sports LONG before Safe Sport. For the more common sports, Safe Sport is geared to the more elite levels. For equestrian sports, they are seeing this at all levels for the first time.
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Right, they don’t need to. The association is doing that work for them.
Equestrian is unusual in that facilities and coaching aren’t usually tied to some umbrella organization, whether local or national. To teach professionally or volunteer in pretty much any other sport or youth activity, you can’t even start until they fingerprint and train you.
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I think that it IS key that they’re saying there was no formal hearing. He probably was able to submit evidence and statements, but that in itself is not a hearing.
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So what? Do you think they don’t speak with the respondent or allow them to present any evidence they have during the investigation process? The claimants don’t get a “formal hearing” either. That doesn’t mean they didn’t get to state their case or present evidence to the investigator.
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Today’s AES email:
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[TD=“align: left”]INTERESTED IN LEARNING ABOUT OUR GOALS?
Athletes for Equity in Sport remains dedicated to our mission of reviewing and reforming the operational procedures of the U.S. Center for SafeSport in order to improve safety and equity for all participants. Do you have any questions about our nonprofit? [/TD]
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[TD=“align: left”]I feel it is important to have an organization like SafeSport to protect victims of abuse in the sports. How does SafeSport work and can their platform be unfair?
We agree! Abuse in sport is unacceptable and establishing protocols to protect minors and advocating for safety in sport is essential. To take a step in the right direction the U.S. Center for SafeSport opened its doors in Denver, Colorado, in March 2017, and became a federally authorized organization under the Protecting Young Victims from Sexual Abuse and Safe Sport Authorization Act of 2017 (which became Public Law No: 115-126 on February 14, 2018).
However, SafeSport is a new organization with broad authority and we believe it is important for Congress to conduct oversight to ensure SafeSport is effectively achieving its mission and treating all those under its jurisdiction fairly and equitably. If stakeholders subject to SafeSport jurisdiction don’t have confidence in SafeSport to fairly and competently fulfill its mission, that undermines the ability of SafeSport to achieve the objectives Congress intended which is to improve safety for athletes.
We are confident that SafeSport can operate in manner that protects athletes and treats all of those who are participants in the SafeSport resolution process fairly. AES is committed to working with both SafeSport and Congress to achieve that goal. [/TD]
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[TD=“align: left”]The changes Athletes For Equity In Sport seek are to ensure a better process for both the person making a charge and the person being named in a charge. We want SafeSport to implement more appropriate safeguards and establish impartial procedures in their investigations that will enable SafeSport to achieve the objectives Congress intended.
What sports are represented by Athletes for Equity in Sport?
Athletes for Equity in Sport currently consists of U.S. Olympic and Paralympian female and male athletes, trainers, managers and enthusiasts from the sports of cycling, figure skating, fencing, wrestling, gymnastics, boxing and the equestrian disciplines. The AES mission is to ensure any person involved in the SafeSport reporting and resolution process is afforded participation in a timely, equitable, and confidential manner. If you have engaged SafeSport or been the subject of a SafeSport investigation, we would welcome hearing from you about your experience and whether you believe the process was fair and equitable.
How do you utilize donations?
SafeSport passed with bipartisan congressional support and we are dedicated in taking it a step further by recognizing ways the organization can improve. Our goal is to address issues with SafeSport in order to help improve processes SafeSport policies were built on. In order to do so, we hired an expert team of business professionals, attorneys and congressional lobbying experts to raise awareness and bring forward questions on how SafeSport can execute integral changes. SafeSport receives more than 200 reports of sexual misconduct or abuse in U.S. Olympic & Paralympic sports per month and changes need to be put in place so the organization can better cope with the scope of the reports and implement positive change to better protect athletes. Thank you to the gracious donors who stepped up to support AES' mission as it has afforded us the opportunity to make a difference.[/TD]
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“The changes Athletes For Equity In Sport seek are to ensure a better process for both the person making a charge and the person being named in a charge. We want SafeSport to implement more appropriate safeguards and establish impartial procedures in their investigations that will enable SafeSport to achieve the objectives Congress intended.”
We can’t tell you how they aren’t doing this, though, because it’s a secret. I mean, other than their obviously unfair treatment of elderly sexual predators. UnFaiR!!!
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Still no information on the non-profit status. 
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How donation dollars are spent: “We hire a bunch of people to write letters to Congress and tweet the President.”
That is how that reads.
When an organization gets non-profit status, don’t they need to have a more specific, line by line break down of how funds are spent?
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Funny you mention that, because when I got the email I realized I hadn’t seen anything about that recently. So, I went back through all my AES emails, and the last mention of it I see is all the way back in January: "*nonprofit corporation applying for tax-exempt status as a 501©(6) organization".
No mention of it since. I have no idea how long it takes to be approved/rejected so maybe they’re still waiting, but seems weird they wouldn’t keep putting that disclaimer in the emails if it’s undecided. I searched the IRS site but they don’t come up, although there’s a note that the site has been delayed in updating.
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