Barbara De Maro has been fired

Executive Assistant Barbara De Maro, the number two man at the USCF, was summarily fired Thursday morning. No notice. No severance pay. Just "leave now". She has worked at the office for 19 years, under five Executive Directors. She has worked many nights and weekends. She worked until the wee hours during the meetings in St. Paul as she usually does during the Opens. She put together the Dallas Elementary Championship, again working innumerable extra hours. She worked with the Chess Trust and had the confidence and respect of all those on that board. Chairman Harold Dondis is resigning in protest.

Was it because she knew too much about the workings of the office, the financials and the Trust and spoke up when she observed the inaccuracies and cover-ups?

She has been an extremely hard worker, loyal, pleasant and kind to everyone, discreet, fair and dedicated. How can Executive Director De Feis treat her this way? Who ordered this action? Is it the new group in power: Doyle, Lawrence, Redman and Warren?

Steve Doyle did nothing to conceal his dislike for Barbara. I don't doubt that if he has some say she would be fired, although she would have been fired sooner than this.

It is extremely important that we find out who made the decision to fire her, and why. Is this the result of the new board majority following the expiration of the term of Garrett Scott?

I agree that George DeFeis needs to have the latitude to run the office as he sees fit.

What concerns me is that the new Redman-Warren board took power on Monday, August 14 and on Thursday, August 24, Barbara DeMaro was fired.

Since the new Executive Board has the power to fire DeFeis, they could easily have ordered-directed-suggested that he fire Barbara DeMaro.

However, I am not blaming Steve Doyle. If it had been up to Steve Doyle, Barbara would have been fired on Monday August 14.

Sam Sloan


Here are links:
Sam Sloan's Chess Page

My Home Page


Contact address - please send e-mail to the following address: Sloan@ishipress.com