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God bless these women. I went through a trial and it wasn’t pleasant. I hope their outcome is better than mine. At least, people are more aware and supportive than they were in the ‘60’s.

He’s not a punchline now. He’s a cautionary tale.

I also missed the tongue-in-cheek aspect. Thank you for clearing that up. I hope DCI can focus on more important things than "getting ahead of the story". They need to get ahead of the whole situation - in other words, try to prevent abuse, and prevent the types of dysfunctional systems in which abuse becomes prevalent (i.e. one person controls the corps, BOD does not perform oversight, no P&P in place for harassment, poison pill severance packages). For a more apt analogy, what DCI needs to do is "build a wall". Not a physical wall, but a wall of ethical guidelines that stop predators from entering our activity to begin with. The guidelines currently in place are a start, but we need more specifics to close a few key loopholes. For example: - Instead of merely requiring background checks, spell out what must be done when background checks reveal a record of criminal abuse/harassment. Define which offenses are unacceptable, and provide "border security" by banning new hires with such a record. Define "deportation" policy for suspension/dismissal of current corps admin/staff who commit offenses, either with the corps or elsewhere. - Define policy regarding second chances for past offenders who have completed their sentences, regained suspended teaching licenses, had their records expunged, etc. Preferably, that would mean no second chances - do we want deportees re-entering the activity? But if exceptions are to be made, they should only be for "work that Americans won't do", tasks that have no contact with minors. - Define a minimum size for a BOD (three is not big enough), and a limitation on conflicts of interest between BOD members and corps administration related via family or external business ties. (Maybe not an absolute prohibition, but if the entire BOD sits at your kitchen table every morning, you are not doing it right.) One other thing DCI can do is train corps administrators regarding the whistleblower procedure. There is an understandable concern about misuse of that system. What may seem like "responsible reporting/investigation" to one party may seem like a "witch hunt" to another party. Regardless, the corps director cannot use their authority to interfere with the process (even if their complaint is legitimate), as even the perception of "obstruction of justice" is unacceptable.

with this being the first year without the influence of a certain somebody, i can't help but be extremely excited for hopefully some fresh ideas, whether they be from a musical or a design standpoint! I hope that some details start to come out soon...this is really one of the worst times of year to be a drum corps fan.

I'll share my thoughts on this in 2023.

I think one of the most eye-popping claims in his lawsuit against YEA is that he is demanding pay for unused vacation time. This from a man who consistently REFUSED to take vacations and discussed frequently on his social media how he hated vacations, didn't want to take them, avoided doing it for years, and only reluctantly took some time away near the end. And now he wants to be paid for the time that he adamantly, and publicly, insisted he wasn't going to use. What a piece of work.

sad it came to this yes, but it finally forced drum corps to wake up to these issues we've all discussed to death on here. Sadly sometimes you have to hit rock bottom before you can get back to the top

This I Believe !

I'm glad to see the legal system responding. Up until now it's just been the activity and organization responding. We'll need to let this play out obviously - George

I feel exactly the same. Saw them rehearsing THAT day and the corps was on fire. I knew they’d bust 90 that night and not look back. I think a lot of us can’t wait to see hear and enjoy the 2019 edition.

what they were able to accomplish, on the fly, from late April til the end is amazing. There never seemed to be any danger of them not being 7th early on, but as time went on and more things Cadets history/tradition got added, it gained a little more momentum every day. Then, we got back east and the ick hit the corps, that seemed to light a fire under them. I've been to almost every DCI East/Eastern Classic since it started, and some performances stand out as special. 27th in 80, BD 88, Cavies 93 in the rain, Phantom 08.....and Cadets 18. It was like that week, everything started to click, fueled on by not just the hometown crowd, or fans supporting them because of the mess, but because from the ballad out, that was good old fashioned kick ### Cadets that made everyone love them. I only wonder, if they had been able to have 2 more weeks......

That's because NJ Govs make their money under the table! Fuh-ged-abou-did 😎

Which gives a great example of what can happen when you're not handcuffed.

Somebody did a study once If I recall, it showed that Hop was, by far, the most highly-paid director. I remember discussion at the time focused on the other profit-making entities (primarily USBs) and Hop's responsibilities in "running" them as businesses for justification of his higher pay. Most directors that get paid make fractions of this, and many, very many, get paid little or nothing.

Though some people loved the uniforms, others were less than thrilled, and the uniforms were ordered prior to someone’s departure. So there was one reminder. That being said, as someone who saw Cadets early in the last season and at Allentown and Indy, the changes throughout the season made sense and worked, which was a huge departure from the recent past, so how a complete season without the former director will be interesting to see.

yup. Having the entire planning process without interference will be a good thing.

I fear the Hopocalypse has a way to go before we can be sure the cancer is excised. That said - Slay the dragons. All of them - no matter wherever nor whoever they are. Bad news NEVER gets better with age - & DCI needs to realize this

Had a nice chat recently with a young man who marched C2 in '18, and he basically said the whole situation helped bring them closer together... and they've moved on, focusing on the job at hand for 2019. I would imagine the same applies to the Cadets.

Not direct competitors but holding something of a similar space in consumers' minds, I guess. Zuckerberg also made his executives all switch to Android phones after Apple's Tim Cook criticized how Facebook handled privacy issues. That sounds rather Hopkinsesque to me.

I always love being quoted 5 years later.

you have to assume someone else wrote the contract to consider that

One of my family stories... swear to God, I'm not making this up... involved my mom standing up to Hoffa, basically dressing him down in public... over some issue, back in the day. My dad was a Teamsters member, and Hoffa was king to him and the others at my dad's local. But not to my mom. LOL. My dad was there, and was mortified. Understandably so, given Hoffa's....uhhhh... connections. But Hoffa actually told my mom she was right, he was wrong... and he liked and respected her for speaking up!!! Hey... my mom was a Bayonne gal. Those folks could be a bit feisty. LOL.

Not a lawyer either, but I have a gut feeling that he may indeed be owed unused vacation time and that sort of stuff he theoretically "earned" while employed with YEA. The severance will be the the center of the lawsuit, IMO. I hope the old board did not place YEA at risk by "accepting" his resignation.

25+ years in the daily news business here. It is true that a reporter has no obligation to show a story to a source before it is published. Indeed, it is unethical to do so. (Do you want the mayor approving each story about him/her before it is published?) By extension, reporters are not obligated to reveal all whos, whats, and wheres in a story when asking a source for comment. At the same time, it also is true that a reporter is ethically obligated to inform the source of the whos, whats and wheres in those cases where the whos, whats and wheres are the basis for seeking the response in the first place. If Source A says Source B embezzled $10,000 from his employer, the reporter is obligated to relay to Source B the name of the accuser, the amount being alleged to have been stolen, and the alleged victim -- not only as a matter of fairness, but also as a matter of obtaining a meaningful response. In such a situation, simply asking Source B "what do you think of the (anonymous, unspecified) accusations against you?" would elicit a meaningless response because Source B has no idea what he's being accused of. Similarly, telling Source B only that "Source A says you embezzled money. Any response?" is a failure of the fairness standard and also so vague that any response could be interpreted a thousand ways, which would be (again) unfair to Source B and frustrating to readers. So, in this specific case involving Dan, everything hinges on the specifics. It may be true that they "knew going in that Dan was not going to talk." Yet they still made the call, apparently. That's what serious news organizations, whose company includes the Inquirer, do.

The punch line comes from a two-part video that went viral amongst us DCP denizens maybe three years ago...the one with the two cartoon bears where someone could enter their own dialogue and see the bears move their lips and recite what was entered. The answer for all sorts of questions was, "George Hopkins." Check out 6:35 through 7:12.As for the bad rap part...I think it's because George has been willing to say, write and propose things that many other directors wanted to say, write and propose, but didn't have the guts to do so. George is quite passionate about throwing things out there and seeing what sticks, in the belief that in doing so, things more forward. He got a lot of grief over proposing amplification and then electronics, but those were things many others wanted, but didn't want to stick their necks out. However, those proposals passed and even some who voted "no" at the DCI Rules Congresses were hopeful they would pass, but voted "no" for a variety of reasons...such as to not honk off their fan base. I've written this more than once...If George Hopkins didn't exist, we would have to invent him.