On Sunday, November 10th, 2019 we will be having our Sportsperson of the Year Dinner. This year the dinner will be held at the beautiful Martell’s Water’s Edge, 125 Bayview Ave., Bayville, NJ from 4-8 pm. Tickets again this year are $80 per person and $650 for a table of 10. To reserve your tickets, call Dan Miller at (609) 641-7821 or email Dan at blueangray@comcast.net.
As of this writing I am not sure if we are doing a buffet style dinner or a sit-down dinner, but, please, we MUST give a head count one month prior to the dinner, so please call or email Dan and let him know whether or not you or your club is attending and how many will be attending.
At this time we are not sure who the guest speaker is going to be. And, as usual, we will be having a Chinese auction, silent auction and plenty of door prizes.
We are now accepting nominations for this year’s sportsperson of the year. If you want to nominate someone, please submit a bio of approximately 250 words. You can email your nomination to me at pturi72@gmail.com or you can present your nomination at the September General Membership Meeting on September 24th. We will be voting for our sportsperson of the year at this meeting.
I am also in need of door prizes and Chinese Auction and Silent Auction prizes. If you have something to donate, please contact me at (609) 709-9215 or email me at pturi72@gmail.com. It would help if each of our member clubs donated a prize or solicited the bait and tackle shops that its members support.
And remember, bring your significant other. I always have prizes for the ladies too!
At the present time we have two nominations for sportsperson-of-the-year. Below are the two nominations.
The Berkeley Striper Club nominates John A. Tiedemann for the JCAA Sportsperson-of-the-Year award.
John is the Assistant Dean at Monmouth University’s School of Science and Director of the Marine and Environmental Biology and Policy Program. Since 1978, John’s career has been dedicated to protecting marine habitats and water quality. He has helped identify sources of marine pollution and developed best practices for the management of marine fisheries, watersheds and coastal zones. John also works with Stripers Forever to protect striped bass and to restore the species.
In addition to his work as a researcher, scientist and educator, John is an avid angler and waterman who has been recognized with appointments to the Fisheries Conservation Foundation Board of Directors, the Advisory Committee to the NJ Sea Grant Consortium, the Coastal and Estuarine Research Federation Education Sub-committee and various other organizations.
You may see John on the beach fishing or with Monmouth University students collecting striper data and biological specimens and tagging released fish. John has introduced his students to fishing and helped them to catch their first striper.
In 2015, 1,000 striped bass posters were distributed to every bait and tackle shop and marina in NJ. John helped develop and distribute those posters along with 10,000 copies of the Striped Bass Catch and Release length/weight cards available for free at shows, club meetings, and other events.
John presented at the American Fisheries Society 2018 Annual Meeting and 2019 Jersey Shore Surfcasters Surf Day.
John’s work is built into his daily life and his continuous work to protect the marine environment makes him worthy of this award.
The Salt Water Anglers of Bergen County nominates Mr. Tim Dillingham for JCAA’s Sportsperon-of-the-Year Award.
Tim Dillingham, Executive Director of the American Littoral Society, led a team of individuals representing the business community, recreational anglers and various environmental organizations to develop the language that would eventually be accepted by the legislature of New Jersey and recently signed on May 3, 2019 by Governor Murphy as the Public Beach Access law.
To address the ongoing problems of access to our beaches, Senator Bob Smith, head of the Senate’s Environmental Committee, convened a task force in 2016 to develop provisions for a new Public Trust Doctrine that would codify and strengthen our state’s obligation to provide access to its beaches and waterways. Tim led this task force, with its competing interest groups, to eventually arrive at language that would be acceptable for our legislators to approve and our governor to sign. It took approximately three years for Tim to accomplish this very difficult task.
Even with the passage of this bill, it will take time and effort to ensure that the provisions of this bill receive the follow-up and enforcement that are needed to achieve its goal of providing the access that we all are seeking. Tim is actively heading up this effort in conjunction with representatives from various fishing organizations and environmentalists.
Tim’s tenacity in developing consensus with the various stakeholders to get the new Access Law passed in spite of frustrating delays and disappointments needs to be recognized by our recreational community through JCAA’s prestigious Sportsperson of the Year Award.
