Quote:
Originally Posted by Angler Paul
I am the JCAA president and I agree that we should have an alternate date in the event of bad weather. However, I still have only one vote on the board and on our fluke tournament committee. In addition to safety reasons, I want everyone to have a nice day on the water, catching fish and enjoying the competition. It is also the second year in a row that our tournament was held during a bad nor'easter. This is perhaps our biggest fundraiser and I know that we lost thousands of dollars in entrance fees because many people waited until the last minute to join and based there decision on the weather forecast. For the record record, I waited until almost mid-nightmidnight until I made my decision not to fish the tournament. (You could sign up until midnight the night before the tournament) . I would also like to point out that the weather forecasts have been wrong most of the time which makes our decision a tough one. It is hard to reschedule a tournament of this magnitude and we try hard not to interfere with the other major tournaments as well. Regardless though, I intend to push for an alternate date for next year's tournament. Lastly I am amazed by the quality of fish that were weighed in and I would like to thank everyone who participated. Congratulations to all the winners!
Paul Haertel
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Paul,
First I appreciate you taking the time and making the effort to comment on the issues being raised in this post and on behalf of the JCAA. Many would avoid doing that so thanks for engaging in the discussion. Many tournaments have alternate weather dates so it is possible to schedule it accordingly. I'm sure it would create logistical issues but those issues should be dealt with as opposed to having anglers who contribute to your cause lose their entry fee by not fishing or worse risk their own safety by making a bad decision to sail which many including myself did yesterday. Not wanting to interfere with other major tournaments is just another way of saying the club doesn't want to lose revenue or entry fees by competing with other tournaments scheduled on the same day, it's not a matter of respect.
The reality is the JCAA or any organization running a fishing tournament ultimately has a fiduciary responsibility to the people who sign up to not put them in harm's way. The fact that you yourself decided to NOT fish the tournament due to weather yet not cancel the tournament is insane. As I said in my earlier post, it is a simple matter of money over safety. An alternate date, regardless of the scheduling difficulties involved, should be mandatory in all these tournaments and the absence of means the officials running the tournament want everyone's patronage and cash but have no regard for their safety. I would hope your counterparts get it right prospectively and make the necessary changes next year otherwise I for one will not be signing up for this tournament. As you said, this is now two years in a row and I would have thought the tournament would have learned from last year's experience but obviously that's not the case. Maybe it'll take a $50 million gross negligence lawsuit against the JCAA and tournament officials for them to show some regard for angler's safety during the running of their tournaments.
Dakota
