I just noticed that Pan American Judo Confederation (PJC) fees will be charged at the 2009 U.S. Open in San Jose. The PJC, through a coup d’etat supported by the IJF, is replacing the PJU as the ruling body for the Americas. Competitors get to donate $20, while coaches, referees, and officials are stuck with $30.  This is being done this year because the Open is “an official sanctioned PJC circuit event.” I suspect that we are once again trying to improve attendance at the Open, but in the past, being on the official PJU circuit did next to nothing to improve attendance. My guess is that it won’t do a darn thing for us this year. I hope I am utterly wrong though.

So what do we get for this membership? Beats me! Information was hard to get from the PJU since the web site was almost never updated.   Unlike the EJU’s mechanism to report the results of their tournaments, results for major PJU tournaments were hard to come by. And then there was, still is actually, that pesky little language problem: too much Spanish and not enough English on the site. Will there be any changes with the PJC? I hope so but I’m not holding my breath.

The PJC membership fee is a tax that we should not blindly accept. I don’t mind paying and supporting organizations that actually do something positive for the  Judo community. Maybe USA Judo can tell us what benefit(s) we derive from this tax because I just don’t see it.