Kittanning Pennsylvania was the place to be when August 1st rolled around!
Our largest field ever, 80 anglers representing 40 state federations embarked on the quiet town of Kittanning for what proved to be a test of skills and patience.
Add to that two days of rain that brought the river up 3 additional feet from the previous couple of days and you can imagine the test that our young anglers had.
But when the fog had all cleared on Saturday afternoon Zack Messer from Idaho and Daryk Eckert from Ohio landed on the top spots in their respective age groups.
Congratulations to all of our junior anglers who made the trip and competed in this year’s event. You all represented your state federation very well.
And while the anglers were all out seeking fame and fortune (small fortunes!!) our state youth directors spent the two days working as usual.
At our annual youth director seminars we reviewed all of our existing programs and the current status of each. Most of our discussions centered around what the requirements were for each program and what we as federation members needed to do to ensure that these programs continued to be funded in the future.
One of the newest programs that we unveiled was our Youth Program Grants.
These grants are some what of an experiment designed to help a state grow their TBF Junior program. They are experimental in the fact that they are what we refer to as “Box Grants”. These Box Grants spell out exactly what is required of the successful applicant to do to receive funding for the grant. The grants also have a performance phase which further rewards the state for being successful in their recruiting of new members.
There are two of these Youth Grants available with each having a potential value of $1500 for those who complete all the phases of the requirements.
The Youth Directors were given applications for the grants and we will have a September 14th deadline for having them received in our office.
If anyone has any questions on the Grant Process please feel free to contact me at:
Mark@bassfederation.com for more information.
Until next time, Don’t forget to take a kid fishing today!
Mark Gintert
