Fulling Wins! MiGCSA at GIS 2013

It was a very successful West Coast swing for the MiGCSA at the GIS. On Wednesday the 6th we hosted over 100 members at Busters Beach House right down the bay from the San Diego Convention Center from 8:00 - 11:00. It was great to see so many members and friends old and new. Thank you to our 2012 Industry Partners for supplying the food at this event.

On Thursday afternoon the 2013 GCSAA Annual Meeting was held. This marked the end of a fantastic year as President for Sandy Queen, CGCS and the beginning of a new one for Pat Finlen, CGCS to take the helm. Pat Finlen, CGCS and GCSAA Vice President Keith Ihms, CGCS were both voted in by unanimous vote. The race for Secretary/Treasurer was between Pete Grass, CGCS and John O’Keefe, CGCS the vote was in favor of John O’Keefe, CGCS who will be the new GCSAA Secretary/Treasurer. This was the end of the term for Pete Grass so he was nominated from the floor to run again. Darren Davis, CGCS new director from last year was also up for re-election after his one year term. John was running as a new director against John Walker from Texas and Mark Jordan, CGCS from Ohio. As is usual the two incumbents won their spots handily, Darren had and Pete had had the most votes. So the real race was between John, Mark and John Walker for the remaining open spot. John took had the most votes of the three, Mark took the second most and John Walker ended up with the least in a very close vote for three great candidates. With this John won a board position on his first attempt to the 2013 GCSAA Board of Directors. Congratulations to the new GCSAA Board Members, the Board

2013 GCSAA Director John Fulling, CGCS

and Members of the MiGCSA are very proud to see John representing us at the National level.

New GCSAA President Pat Finlen, CGCS
announces the 2013 GCSAA Board of Directors

MiGCSA at GIS

Hopefully many of our members are gearing up for the GIS next week in San Diego. If you are heading out there are two can't miss events for MiGCSA Members. The first is on Wednesday night at Busters Beach House, just a short walk from the convention center. There are over 70 people already signed up for this event. There will be a cash bar and complimentary appetizers served from 8:00 - 11:00 pm on the 6th. For more information on this event please Click Here to go to the link on our website.

The other event is the GCSAA Annual Meeting and Elections. This year MiGCSA Past President John Fulling, CGCS is running for the National Board of Directors. The meeting is on Thursday, Feb. 7 at 2:30 pm in Ballroom 20A of the San Diego Convention Center. For more information on all of the candidates you can Click Here, come by on Thursday to support John.

2013 Events

The MiGCSA District Committees have been working hard to get the 2013 Event Calender completed. This is always a work in progress and the most up to date information is always available at www.migcsa.org. Some of the venues for 2013 include Pilgrims Run, Arcadia Bluffs, Metamora Golf & Country Club, The Nightmare, The Emerald, and Egypt Valley Country Club. We also have some great education lined up for the Spring Management meetings in late February and early March in Detroit, Grand Rapids and Gaylord. A few highlights for those events are Dr. Frank Wong, Pat Jones, Lyne Tumlinson, Dr. Rob Golembiewski, Dr. Kevin Frank, Dr, Emily Merewitz and many more. You can click on the following link to download the most current 2013 schedule. http://www.migcsa.org/uploads/MiGCSA-2013-Event-Calender.pdf

Of course coming up soon is the 2013 Michigan Turf Conference. If you have not signed up for this event yet you have to get to Lansing. The lineup is second to none, it is the can't miss event of 2013. You can see the entire lineup at www.mtfconference.org and register online as well.

The Michigan Gathering in San Diego will be at Busters Beach House, just steps away from the conference center on Wednesday February 6th from 8:00 - 11:00 pm. Join the MiGCSA for complimentary appetizers in the upstairs Beach Loft with a beautiful view overlooking the San Diego Bay and the Coronado Bay Bridge. This event is not limited to just MiGCSA members, all are welcome. For more information and to pre register for an accurate count please Click Here.

Hopefully we will see everyone at the Turf Conference Kick Off Show at Spartan Stadium on Tuesday January 22nd, the MiGCSA will be at booth #12. Stop by and say hi!

And on a personal note my wife and I had our first child on December 17th at 11:01 pm. Adalyn Grace Ikamas was 7 pounds, 2 ounces and 19 inches long. She was born via emergency C section but everyone is doing great.

Michigan Golf Alliance

Yesterday the Michigan Golf Alliance met at the Michigan PGA Section headquarters in Lansing. The MGA is comprised of representatives from the MiGCSA, PGA, GAM (Golf Association of Michigan), MGCOA (Michigan Golf Course Owners Association), CMAA (Club Managers Association of America), MTF (Michigan Turfgrass Foundation) and the ASGCA (American Society of Golf Course Architects).

The Alliance was formed in 2011 with Kate Moore Executive Director of the MGCOA spearheading the effort. The original concept was to bring the associations that represent golf together to plan the Michigan Golf Legislative Day on the Capitol lawn in June. Since this initial meeting there have been two great years taking golf's message to Lansing legislators with a focus on the economic and environmental impact to the state. The meeting yesterday was intended to plan the event in 2013, but turned into something that will be even bigger.

The current proposal is to replace the Legislative Golf Day with a Michigan Golf Alliance Summit in late May of 2013. This proposal would bring the boards of the MGA partners together for a day of golf and education on one another. The easiest way for me to look at it is a macro version of any golf facility. Everyone at a golf facility is working toward one common goal, to be a profitable successful business. And each person at that property has a role to play in doing that. But if there is not a good clean communication on what each person is doing you can not be as successful as you could if you were aware of everyone's issues and goals. The Superintendent needs to communicate with the Owner, the Pro, the Manager and the players and vice versa.

The goal of the summit is to have a clear definition of what each group is doing to grow the game of golf in Michigan. We all have our roles to play in this, but we all benefit from growing the game. How are we each doing this? Where are there opportunities to help one another with our current objectives? Where are we different and where are we the same? This event will be on a two year rotation with the Legislative golf day to keep a contact with Lansing we will still be inviting key legislators to lunch during the summit. During lunch each group will communicate to all of the attendees what their goals are for golf in Michigan.

This has potential to be a very powerful day for the future of our industry, not just the turf industry but the golf industry that drives all sectors.

The MGA L to R: Eric Rule, MGCOA Lobbyist, Joe Basso, CMAA Representative and GM AT Birmingham C.C., Kevin Helm Michigan PGA Executive Director, David Graham Executive Director of the GAM, Kate Moore MGCOA Executive Director, Tom Schwark MGCOA Government Relations Chairman and Owner of Sycamore Hills Golf Club, and Jada Paisley MGCOA Certified Meeting Planner (not pictured Jay Eccleton, CGCS, MiGCSA President, Becky Schooch, MTF Executive Secretary and Gary Koenes, PGA President)

The 47th Annual Big Event

The Big Event was held on Monday at Birmingham Country Club with host Superintendent Dan Dingman and Assistant Victor Morales-Rios. This is the 47th Big Event and this fundraiser brought in over $7,500 to fund research at MSU with the MTF, and Scholarships for MSU Students and for dependents of MiGCSA member with the Heritage scholarships, and the annul matching of member donations to the Wee One Foundation. This was a first class event that will be very hard to top. Some photos below, and if you would like to see all of the groups and more photos please click here.

Lee Collins, Steve Reban with new MSU Turf Physiologist Emily Merewitz and current MTF President/MiGCSA Past President John Fulling, CGCS

The GAM Team of Doug Hendershot, Director of Course Rating, David Baughman Green Committee Chairman, David Cameron, Green Committee Vice-Chair, and Course Rating chair Jim Evanoff

MTF Executive Director Gordie LaFontaine, Dr. Joe Vargas, John Kirtland and Dr. Thom Nikolai

Fundraising Season

This Monday the MiGCSA will host the 47th Annual Big Event at Birmingham Country Club. This event started with the Border Cities groups and the the Greater Detroit Golf Course Superintendents Association after that. Now this will be the 5th Big Event the MiGCSA has hosted. This event is the last of the three golf fundraisers we host every year. The first is at Arcadia Bluffs in June for the Northern Fundraiser and is the only site we do not rotate because it is such a great venue and we always have great participation. This year the second fundraiser was hosted by MiGCSA Member Ryan Osborn at Wuskowhan Players Club in West Olive, for the traditional Western Golf Day. This year has seen record attendance for our fundraising events with the largest Western Golf Day we have ever had at 116 players.

Now as we round the corner on the final event we get to sit down and decide how to properly disperse the funds. These funds are not used to run the Association at all, and are 100% allocated for the MiGCSA Foundation. This is a separate entity from the Association. The Board uses these funds to pay out Student Scholarships at MSU. To award MiGCSA Member Dependents with the Heritage Scholarships. Last year we used some funds for the MSU Turf Club to get to the Golf Industry Show. But the vast majority goes directly to fund research at MSU through the Michigan Turfgrass Foundation. Last year we were able to donate $25,000 to the MTF. Thank you to all of you that have or are going to participated in the 2012 Fundraisers. There are still spots for 3 foursomes at Birmingham on Monday, so come on out if you can!

Ryan Osborn and MiGCSA President Jay Eccleton, CGCS

State of the Union

I wanted to update everyone on a milestone for the MiGCSA in terms of one of our most important areas, memberships. The largest membership numbers we have ever had were in 2009 when we reached 642 total members, in 2010 we had 635 but as of this time last year the membership had sagged to 567. This was due to the Association not having any direct management for over a year during the transition from Eurich to myself. We simply did not have the ability to process and follow up on membership renewals. So you can see the large drop during the membership renewal from 2010 to 2011.

However success is not measured in where you have been but where you have arrived. As of today, 8/8/2012 we have 637 current MiGCSA members. And with the work of the Membership committee chaired by MiGCSA Secretary/Treasurer Gregg Matthews who are calling our expired members I think we will have the highest membership numbers we have ever had. With these numbers we also have 284 Class A and SM Superintendents in the MiGCSA. This is important because it related to the number of votes we have with the GCSAA, at 284 we are now the second largest chapter in the country behind the Carolina's (which is two states). The Board and I are very happy with this direction, because bottom line this entire thing is for the Members, this is a constant in Board meetings to make sure we are doing everything for the members. So thank you to everyone who has renewed this year. I see no reason why we wont surpass the 2009 high water mark this year, and I think 700 is a real possibility.

In other news on a more personal level my wife Laura and I are expecting our first child this December, 12-12-12 is the due date. We found out we are having a little girl a few weeks ago and were able to get some really cool 3D ultra sound pictures. Everything is progressing along well and she and baby are healthy. Laura and I are really looking forward to having some time together this year for Christmas. She still works at Crystal Mountain and normally that is a very busy week. She and I have never had a Christmas off together since we met, so to have a newborn and some time together as a family will be a very special thing.