Paul Hanson, promotor of the Western Canadian Open, has released the following statement regarding the UPA's statement on Friday...
This statement that 'Paul Hanson' is unable to meet his financial promises to the UPA, is misleading in that it misses the point.
Great White Billiards decided to disassociate the Western Canadian Open 9-Ball Championships due to the extremely low registration from the UPA membership.
At the time of the decision to back off of the UPA Sanctioning, GWB had 8 members signed up and paid, including at least two who would have been signed up without the sanctioning.
It was not an issue of being 'unable to meet...promises' but rather an issue of recognizing the reality that at the time none of the marquis players would commit to participating for various reasons. There was even an instance of a marquis player requesting guaranteed appearance funding to attend.
This failure to gain commitments from the top players in turn caused a domino affect in the sponsorship program, resulting in GWB deciding that rather than burning bridges with valid potential sponsors (ie: telling them untruths to gain their funding), the company would back off for this year and regroup for next year.
This decision included reducing the tournament added monies, which had been upped to $20USD ($28K Cdn) directly at the requirement of the UPA. GWB decided that the additional obligation of the 18K was not warranted as the entries from that organization did not come in.
It was never our intent to discredit the UPA itself, as we believe that the organization is founded on positive values and it's mission is valid. It seems apparent, however, that the membership of the UPA does not support the mission, as they did not enter this event.
The event will go on as it did last year, independently.
