Featured Content
Membership Management Best Practices
Sex Offender Screening
National Sex Offender Public Website
West Bend strongly encourages non-profits and community organizations to check all adult members against the National Sex Offender Public Website.
The National Sex Offender Public Website, coordinated by the U.S. Department of Justice, is a cooperative effort between individual jurisdictions hosting public sex offender registries and the federal government. This website is a free search tool that permits a user to submit a national query to obtain information about sex offenders through a number of search options.
While we recognize scanning an entire membership group can daunting, the benefits unquestionably outweigh the extra effort required. We have found the most efficient process of scanning to be:
- Scan all new members as they sign up.
- Scan active members at renewal.
- Randomly scan a manageable group of members every quarter.
Family Watchdog
Family Watchdog is a privately owned website (with banner advertisements) that taps into the National Sex Offender Public Registry. After inserting an address, the website will generate a map of all registered sex offenders in the area.
This extremely helpful tool distinguishes between offenses against children, rape, sexual battery, and other offenses. West Bend encourages all community organizations to actively monitor this mapping program.
Share offender images with employees and encourage them to approach their supervisor if they recognize a questionable person.
Law Enforcement
In most cases, local law enforcement is more than willing to coordinate information with community organizations. West Bend recommends all facilities to make contact with local law enforcement. Request notification whenever a registered offender moves into the community.
Waiver, Release, and Assumption of Risk Form
Every member should sign an approved form that waives and releases the organization from liability for injuries sustained on premises. An authorized parent signature is required for all minor participants.
West Bend has drafted a waiver that meets the strictest state requirements. Contact your agent or a West Bend representative for details and visit our resource on Exculpatory Agreements.
Child Supervision
As is the case with any recreation-oriented business, a typical swim club or fitness center can be a very dangerous place if the proper precautions are not taken. Between playgrounds and pools, slides and saunas, and fitness equipment and free weights, an unsupervised child can get into quite a bit of trouble.
West Bend recommends the following policies as they relate to child supervision:
General Policy
No child under the age of 10 should be left unsupervised in any part of facility. A child younger than 10 years of age should be placed in supervised programming or a child drop-off area. A sibling or other responsible adolescent over the age of 15 may supervise a child between seven and ten years old.
Free Weight and Fitness Area
Access to fitness equipment designed for adults should be restricted to members over the age of fourteen. Members between the ages of 14 and 18 should receive training on fitness equipment prior to access.
Aquatics
Please see supervision recommendations in the Best Practices for Aquatics guide.
Discrimination
Family Memberships
West Bend strongly encourages non-profits and community organizations to institute inclusive and broad membership definitions. Strict definitions of “Family Memberships” should be made more inclusive by allowing all adults that share a home.