A Message from Event Chair, Jen Minard
September 10, 2009

Hi Team Captains,

Now that summer is officially over, everyone is back to work and back to school. We hope that in between all that time, you have a few moments to give to Relay 2010.

As team captains, we want you to know how valuable you are to us. Through your hard work and dedication, we were able to collect over $566,000 in donations for the 2009 season. We know that we could not achieve that success without you, your team members, family, and friends. For that we want to shout out “THANK YOU”.

You also helped to spread the word about the American Cancer Society's mission which is to eliminate cancer through research, education, advocacy and patient services. Because of your creative ideas to get the word out, we were able to reach more people who were newly diagnosed or had been a survivor but have never heard of Relay. (I know, shocking as it may sound, there are still people in Santa Clarita who have never heard of Relay. We hope to change that.)

Many of you have been with our Relay event since it first started in 1999 at Canyon High School. Being a "Baby" Relay was exciting back then. Over the years, we grew and changed venues from Canyon HS to C.O.C. to Central Park , where we have been for the last 4 years. We want to be able to continue to grow our event while at the same time still hold on to that small town community feeling.

For those who may not have heard, over the summer I moved up to Event Chair for 2010. Joining me is my co-chair, Danika Sanchez.  Danika was the team captain of Motley Crew for several years and was one of the Captain’s Council member.

Together we looked over your feedbacks and statistics to determine where to go with our event this year. We read and listened to what you had to say and we are taking them seriously. We believe that a few new changes/upgrades to our Relay event will help it to continue to grow and be the best it can be. While some of the new changes may seem extreme at first, we ask you to remember the goal of the event and trust that there has been a lot of thought put into these decisions. We are very excited about the results we know we will see and look forward to doing our part, as an event and as a community, to end cancer.

The new changes/upgrades are:

1. Registration fees will be $100 per team until January 31, 2010. Starting February 1, 2010, the fee will increase to $150 per team.

2. We will be at the same location within Central Park as last year. For this year camp-sites will increase in size. Because of the increase in size, every team will be limited to one camp-site.

3. We are having a Camp-Site Selection Contest for the first 20 spots - Spots #1 to 10 go to the 2009 Top Overall Fundraising teams. Spots #11 to 20 go to the 2010 top overall fundraising teams as of May 1st, 2010. (This means that any team not listed in the top ten spots will have a chance to win spots 11 to 20 based on donations turned in by that date.) After that spots #21 and beyond will be based on when team registration fee has been received.

We understand that this is a lot of information to digest. We want you to know that we appreciate the amount of hours you give to this event as team captains and the passion you bring to fighting back against cancer. Therefore if you have any questions and/or concerns, Danika, and I will be happy to answer to your questions. Please contact us at chairs@scvrelay.org with your thoughts.

We know that by making these changes now, we can set the event up for many successful years to come...and hopefully in the near future we will all be Relaying to celebrate the cure that all our efforts have unearthed. Thank you.

Jen Minard
2010 RFL Event Chair
Santa Clarita Valley, California
Celebrate! Remember! Fight Back!