2021 President's Message in Full - Richard Sayer
COVID-19 sort of hit us between the eyes, but let me explain something about leadership. The Northeast division was always the leader in this country and I believe we showed this again this year. We held nearly all our tournaments. Were they perfect… no, but we did it. Awesome!
Big kudos to Frick Park and Skytop especially for their work to get their greens useable from the silly match between Patrick and myself to hosting division tournaments. We proved that sensible guidelines and care can be given to still play the game we love. (Fogged up glasses and all!)
So…. moving forward. We're not sure where COVID will be next year, but let me tell you that I hope we can move in a positive direction one way or another.
Lawn bowls is steeped in tradition, but it is also moving into a new era. Internationally the game is being taken up by younger people and I don't see why we cannot do more in this country to do the same.
But how?....Well we have many young people right now in our division. So much so I have become one of the old guys. Truth is I was at a tournament late in the season and realized I didn't know a single one of the people playing 20 years ago.
This was an eye opener for me. So as the new president I think this is an important part of what we need to do to move forward. We need active young people on the board and learning the ropes.
I would like to establish, or boost the following commitees and get people who want to really participate to take on these ideas and make them something.
1. BowlsNortheast Women's initiative (The name can be changed in the future.) The Northeast division once held the position of being the strength of the AWLBA. Several hall of famers played on our greens and we were the best division for top players. Currently we struggle to get three women to represent us in the National Championships. This is unacceptable and if the great Mary Scott were alive she'd slap us in the puss. (By the way, May was in a car accident and her bowling arm was severely damaged, she learned to play with her other arm and was a champion again! - she's slap us with that arm!) So I want to find a way to recruit more women, invest them in our future and grow our prowess again. We have a heat champion in Michele Arculli, but we need more competition for her to make her even better, or have more great champions. So I want to form a committee of women to promote what we can do. I also want to create one tournament in the NED that is just for women in the next two years that is open throughout the world. Perhaps next year if we can get our ducks in a row. My first thought is to name it after Linda McDougall, one of our great champions who is still with us living in Florida, but I'm open to suggestions.
2. Marketing. I have learned about organizations that produce products for fundraisers. The distribution is handled by them and we set the price for items to get the joey from the sales. I tried this on a small scale personally and it was beyond what I expected. I have many ideas for t-shirts and mugs and think we could raise funds to give to each club for things they need. I have a ton of ideas and this can be shared worldwide and I plan to start a marketing fundraiser over the winter that we adverse heavily vis social media to give us funds for our clubs in the spring to launch membership initiatives.
2a. Marketing. Veronica has taken the lead in revitalizing the brochure and we will continue with this initiative as well as others.
3. Colin has been our games chairman since grog first rolled a stone against Mook in the neanderthal period. Not that I want him to stop, but it is increasingly more apparent we need to grab his brain for running tournaments and spread it around. I want each club to have a certified games chair and each club to have a games committee certified by the division and Bowls USA. I keep saying, if I get hit by a bus tomorrow I want what I do to continue. This is how we insure that.
4. Ryan Hastu had an idea for a committee that explored things outside the box, I will stress this is exactly what we need. We need new ideas to put people on our greens. I will ask him to step this up a notch and come up with ways this can propel us forward with the idea that we need concrete instructions--we are mostly too old to get young people jargin without step by step instructions.
5. Dues etc… For 2021 I'm going to propose each club within the geographical boundaries the NED is affiliated and in good standing. We will do our best to promote membership in Bowls USA to each club, but we will accept all clubs as our own and afford them the chance to play in our tournaments etc…. This is one year effort to recruit and give back to our clubs to show them what we have to offer. I will be looking to touch base with clubs whose memberships are not very knowledgeable of us and achieve a dialogue. This includes Chatauqua NY, the Philadelphia Cricket Club and others. I want to get a comprehensive list reestablished with contacts.
6. Press. I think we need to really hammer home press releases this year and get local media attention. Obviously NYLBC has a great opportunity with all media right there. Lets spend this winter thinking of story angles we can tell. Wh o is the oldest member? Who is the youngest? Can we set up a match between the two if say one is 12 and the other 90? Make it a thing that you sell to the media. Or how aug someone who will be a member of 40 years? why are they and what do they love. Lets find the heart of bowls and tell these stories to local press--they'll eat that sh!t up!
7. coaching and umpires: I want to establish division coaches and more division umpires. We have a national curriculum for coaches we can adapt and or modify. I want this to happen over the winter and I want umpires certified as well.
8. Competition: Though our priority needs to be on membership and clubs, I do think we can bring awareness through international competition. I would like to form a committee to look into what we might be able to offer in terms of an international competition in the future. I don't want to get wrapped up too much on quality of green in initial discussion, but how to create something we can bring people too--we'll work on quality of green as we discover what we want to do.
I would really appreciate members of our clubs to get involved with these committees and to have positive input into the way we conduct business. We have a core of long-serving members who welcome new ideas and leadership, it is the only way we can grow and keep this great game alive.
Please consider getting involved.
I don't want to sound a dire alarm, but it really is time we grow and not stay as status-quo. If we don't we'll be merging with another division or folding entirely. American lawn bowls was born in the north east. wWe were the innovators and we shook it up before the rest of the country took notice. We started the American Lawn Lawn Bowls Association. We started the American Women's Lawn Bowls Association, we were the first to integrated our division as one. We are the leaders of this sport in this country. Lets prove that is still the case.
Richard Sayer
NED President
2020 - 2022
Big kudos to Frick Park and Skytop especially for their work to get their greens useable from the silly match between Patrick and myself to hosting division tournaments. We proved that sensible guidelines and care can be given to still play the game we love. (Fogged up glasses and all!)
So…. moving forward. We're not sure where COVID will be next year, but let me tell you that I hope we can move in a positive direction one way or another.
Lawn bowls is steeped in tradition, but it is also moving into a new era. Internationally the game is being taken up by younger people and I don't see why we cannot do more in this country to do the same.
But how?....Well we have many young people right now in our division. So much so I have become one of the old guys. Truth is I was at a tournament late in the season and realized I didn't know a single one of the people playing 20 years ago.
This was an eye opener for me. So as the new president I think this is an important part of what we need to do to move forward. We need active young people on the board and learning the ropes.
I would like to establish, or boost the following commitees and get people who want to really participate to take on these ideas and make them something.
1. BowlsNortheast Women's initiative (The name can be changed in the future.) The Northeast division once held the position of being the strength of the AWLBA. Several hall of famers played on our greens and we were the best division for top players. Currently we struggle to get three women to represent us in the National Championships. This is unacceptable and if the great Mary Scott were alive she'd slap us in the puss. (By the way, May was in a car accident and her bowling arm was severely damaged, she learned to play with her other arm and was a champion again! - she's slap us with that arm!) So I want to find a way to recruit more women, invest them in our future and grow our prowess again. We have a heat champion in Michele Arculli, but we need more competition for her to make her even better, or have more great champions. So I want to form a committee of women to promote what we can do. I also want to create one tournament in the NED that is just for women in the next two years that is open throughout the world. Perhaps next year if we can get our ducks in a row. My first thought is to name it after Linda McDougall, one of our great champions who is still with us living in Florida, but I'm open to suggestions.
2. Marketing. I have learned about organizations that produce products for fundraisers. The distribution is handled by them and we set the price for items to get the joey from the sales. I tried this on a small scale personally and it was beyond what I expected. I have many ideas for t-shirts and mugs and think we could raise funds to give to each club for things they need. I have a ton of ideas and this can be shared worldwide and I plan to start a marketing fundraiser over the winter that we adverse heavily vis social media to give us funds for our clubs in the spring to launch membership initiatives.
2a. Marketing. Veronica has taken the lead in revitalizing the brochure and we will continue with this initiative as well as others.
3. Colin has been our games chairman since grog first rolled a stone against Mook in the neanderthal period. Not that I want him to stop, but it is increasingly more apparent we need to grab his brain for running tournaments and spread it around. I want each club to have a certified games chair and each club to have a games committee certified by the division and Bowls USA. I keep saying, if I get hit by a bus tomorrow I want what I do to continue. This is how we insure that.
4. Ryan Hastu had an idea for a committee that explored things outside the box, I will stress this is exactly what we need. We need new ideas to put people on our greens. I will ask him to step this up a notch and come up with ways this can propel us forward with the idea that we need concrete instructions--we are mostly too old to get young people jargin without step by step instructions.
5. Dues etc… For 2021 I'm going to propose each club within the geographical boundaries the NED is affiliated and in good standing. We will do our best to promote membership in Bowls USA to each club, but we will accept all clubs as our own and afford them the chance to play in our tournaments etc…. This is one year effort to recruit and give back to our clubs to show them what we have to offer. I will be looking to touch base with clubs whose memberships are not very knowledgeable of us and achieve a dialogue. This includes Chatauqua NY, the Philadelphia Cricket Club and others. I want to get a comprehensive list reestablished with contacts.
6. Press. I think we need to really hammer home press releases this year and get local media attention. Obviously NYLBC has a great opportunity with all media right there. Lets spend this winter thinking of story angles we can tell. Wh o is the oldest member? Who is the youngest? Can we set up a match between the two if say one is 12 and the other 90? Make it a thing that you sell to the media. Or how aug someone who will be a member of 40 years? why are they and what do they love. Lets find the heart of bowls and tell these stories to local press--they'll eat that sh!t up!
7. coaching and umpires: I want to establish division coaches and more division umpires. We have a national curriculum for coaches we can adapt and or modify. I want this to happen over the winter and I want umpires certified as well.
8. Competition: Though our priority needs to be on membership and clubs, I do think we can bring awareness through international competition. I would like to form a committee to look into what we might be able to offer in terms of an international competition in the future. I don't want to get wrapped up too much on quality of green in initial discussion, but how to create something we can bring people too--we'll work on quality of green as we discover what we want to do.
I would really appreciate members of our clubs to get involved with these committees and to have positive input into the way we conduct business. We have a core of long-serving members who welcome new ideas and leadership, it is the only way we can grow and keep this great game alive.
Please consider getting involved.
I don't want to sound a dire alarm, but it really is time we grow and not stay as status-quo. If we don't we'll be merging with another division or folding entirely. American lawn bowls was born in the north east. wWe were the innovators and we shook it up before the rest of the country took notice. We started the American Lawn Lawn Bowls Association. We started the American Women's Lawn Bowls Association, we were the first to integrated our division as one. We are the leaders of this sport in this country. Lets prove that is still the case.
Richard Sayer
NED President
2020 - 2022
