[Dprglist] Robo-Columbus question + remote venue submit for approval

Fri May 21 21:26:16 PDT 2021

Hi Guys,

Will do on my part to work with the school district to get approval.

I assume I don’t need a formal signed document giving the ok?

If needed, please let me know so I can work with them to get something signed…..

Yes I do understand both Karim’s and your comments on clarifications on what was meant in the rules.

I will keep you informed on what happens with approval and if I get the go-ahead I will resubmit my request for DPRG to qualify\approve my chosen venue as suitable for contest use.

Regards and see\talk with you soon, 

Donna

From: Doug Paradis <paradug at gmail.com> 
Sent: Friday, May 21, 2021 10:44 AM
To: Karim Virani <pondersome64 at gmail.com>
Cc: Donna Smith <dsmith164 at yahoo.com>; secretary at dprg.org; Carl Ott <carl.ott.jr at gmail.com>; Carl Ott via DPRGlist <dprglist at lists.dprg.org>
Subject: Re: [Dprglist] Robo-Columbus question + remote venue submit for approval

Donna,

       I am sorry for the delay in answering your question, however I have been struggling on how to respond appropriately. I want to thank Karim for articulating some of the issues. 

       The guidelines were meant to provide information on what would be necessary for a remote contestant to participate in RoboColumbus. As Karim mentioned DPRG's site approval is simply an acknowledgement that the site is suitable to meet the requirements of the contest. 

       The burden of obtaining the right to run the contest on a location is solely the responsibility of the remote contestant. DPRG cannot and does not accept liability for the misuse of a site or for accidents on the site, that is the responsibility of the remote contestant. The guideline's statement “The competitor needs to get permission from the owner or responsible authority of the location to run their robot.”, was meant to convey that permission to use the remote site was the responsibility of the contestant, not DPRG. Also, that permission was necessary to provide protection for everyone involved. 

      I agree with Karim, that the guidelines will need some adjustment to make this clearer.   I will take another pass on the guidelines document and post it in the next day or two.

     Donna, I suggest that you ask if it is ok for you and some friends to run your robot(s) on school grounds during a Saturday. The answer would clarify the situation for all and remove stress from you.

Regards,

Doug P.

On Thu, May 20, 2021 at 12:01 PM Karim Virani <pondersome64 at gmail.com <mailto:pondersome64 at gmail.com> > wrote:

Hey Donna,

As an expressly non-official member, lemme take a crack at some feedback.

I think you've asked the question in a way that can only be answered with a denial of the request. You are asking the club to "approve" a remote site they have no real knowledge about other than location. I don't see how the club can approve a site when you are reticent to get approval from the owner.

But the question itself might need to be reconsidered. Maybe I haven't found the most updated guidelines, but the document I'm reading does not say anything about owner permission. I do remember Doug recently talking about effectively having the goodwill of the owner/manager of the site, before, during and after usage. 

What the rules do say is that you have to notify the club secretary with the location so it can be reviewed "for suitability" . I take this to mean it is suitable from a standpoint of being a site the judges would consider to be likely in-line with the competition rules. I don't take it as an approval of a competitor's right to use the site, since they have no authority to grant such. So "approval" here means, yes, the judges will accept the videos from that location as a submitted entry in the event. In no way are they granting you the right to use that site for your intended purpose.

Doug and Carl,

Maybe it would help to clarify a little bit on the guidelines page that approval is meant only in the sense of suitability as a course containing the terrain/feature requirements of the contest, and that by submitting an entry, a contestant attests they have the appropriate permissions and good will of the site owners or managers for their use of the site.

You might even want to go as far as inserting hold-harmless language into whatever tool you are using for contest registration.

Just my tuppence,

Karim

On Wed, May 19, 2021 at 12:11 PM Donna Smith via DPRGlist <dprglist at lists.dprg.org <mailto:dprglist at lists.dprg.org> > wrote:

Doug, was not sure if you seen my resend of this info - so created fresh email.....

----------------------------------------

Hi Guys,

Today I reread the clarified \ remote entry rules and I have a question plus I want to pass on the data for my chosen venue (to get it approved).

Question:

I see I have to get permission of the owner to use the site; I certainly understand why and what on this, but this rule causes a bit of a concern-for-use on my part.

Let me explain – the site I want to use is in my local public school district system. I checked on their website to see who\where I would apply for such permission.

I did locate such info but the site indicates that “any rentals of school property are currently suspended due to COVID”. Note, the school is functioning currently in a hybrid format with kids attending some days per week in addition teachers\staff being there 5 days per week – so they are not in shutdown.

I know their process and what I’d be asking the school district is not a traditional event rental – after all it would just be for myself, my robot and gear and my judge\assistant.

There is also the very likely need I would have to pay a fee to do this ‘rental’ – something I really don’t want to do for this type of event.

The reason I know the process and fee is that I have worked with rental of this venue back in 2017 when I worked to get this access for a summer run of Robo-Magellan; so I know the people involved.

In theory, since I would be accessing the school grounds on a Saturday, they would never even know about my being there unless I contact them about it; and start “rolling a ball of yarn” on this.

So rolling back to the start of my question – what I would love to do for ease (and potential rental fee) let alone being told that I can’t rent the grounds due to the COVID suspension – I would prefer not to have to get owner (school district) permission.

Would that be possible in this case?

Chosen venue (one described above) to get approval on:

Google Maps link - https://goo.gl/maps/oUaB99ztPbt8vE3j6

Lat\Long coords = 47.3803627, -122.2814262

Physical address = 24629 42nd Ave. S. Kent, WA 98032

Thanks guys and I look forward to your decision, Donna

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