Yacht Clubs of Maryland

Yacht Clubs of Maryland – A Great First Year

We hope your club will join us for more!

Focus:

·  All Maryland all the time. Officers, Board, Committee chairs, and volunteers together provided hundreds of hours of service on behalf of Maryland yacht clubs and local issues of interest.

Social Events (All well received with member clubs requesting to make annual events):

·  Yacht Club Golf Tournament at Rocky Point Course in Essex, MD – Raised over $2000 for YCM operation – No other yacht club event like this one!

·  Christmas Party at Laurel Race Track – Unique outing honoring Maryland’s historic thoroughbred horse racing heritage – race named after YCM – Santa couldn’t resist joining in.

·  Commodore’s Night Out – winds up the Ball Season and kicks off the Boating Season with something a little different.

·  All Yacht Clubs Raft Out – This years theme is “Crabby”- we hope in coming years to grow this into a giant “raft circle” of boats.

·  Next year we are thinking of adding an All Clubs Cruise to the Queen of the DRYL Contest and Party in Philadelphia.

Communication:

·  Alternating Monthly Board and General Membership meetings where members of any member club can come and talk with the Board and other yacht club members about whatever they like. Regular notice of charitable events and upcoming club activities.

·  System of club Representatives and Alternates attend meetings and provide link back to their home club.

·  Web Site full of information of interest to member clubs, new material and new link categories being added all the time based in input from member clubs. Also a great source for Legislative Alerts and Updates.

·  All club Fleet Captain’s meeting to exchange information, plan, and coordinate club events around the Bay for the upcoming year. Detailed and useful meeting report provided.

·  Monthly newsletter with news, stories, advice, and schedule of upcoming events and. Regular features include “Salty Sam” gossip column and “Protocol Matters”. Cited by CCC Commodore Dennis Discher as one of the best newsletters he has seen. Thanks Dennis!

·  Published list of member club officers and club contact information.

Legislation and Regulation:

·  Close cooperation with the CBYCA to address Maryland issues and to provide rapid strong quality responses where needed. Assisted the CBYCA Maryland Legislative Director. Joined with CBYCA to provide written and oral testimony on bills before the Maryland legislative committees.

·  Contacted legislators on bills of concern to boaters. Highlights include strong boater response to an absurd life jacket bill, which was killed in committee.

·  Established a network of local volunteers with expertise and contacts.

·  Addressed club concerns about dredge spoil deposit area on the Patapsco River. YCM volunteer obtained a tour of the facilities, a written response, and discussed concerns with State Senator Jimeno.

·  Facilitated strong club response and interaction on proposed Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) storage facilities, terminal, and pipeline. Attended community meetings and testified at Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) hearing.

·  Filed Yacht Clubs of Maryland Position Paper with FERC on the LNG proposal.