08-04-2014, 07:32 PM
On behalf of the Utah Disabled Veterans Fishing Foundation I'd like to thank all of the volunteers and donors from this forum that helped us execute a wonderfully successful event again this year. While it sounds like the fishing was not as good as it has been in years past I can guarantee you that all of the veterans had a great time. I received not a single complaint from any of them and many, many thank you's. They really value this experience with many of them asking the staff at the VA to be put on the list as early as November for next year!
I want you all to understand how much we appreciate each and every one of you volunteering your time and resources to come up there and take a veteran out fishing. It's a big commitment and not something we take lightly. You are all to be commended for that. We tried to express a little bit of that with the thank you letter and gift for each boat captain.
I'd like to call out Trevor Earl (wipermac) and Eric Whitley (whit210) for really stepping it up and taking it to another level getting some great donations for us. Trevor has helped us out for the last several years in the Ogden area. Eric was able to come up with some great glasses from Smith Optics which we were able to give to each veteran and each boat captain. Thank you guys, you really are amazing.
Walt Hutson (rippinlips) came to our rescue and dropped everything at the last minute to come up and cook for us after the National Guard dropped out. Walt really saved the day and did a fantastic job grilling for us.
I'd also like to ask you all to understand that this is really just about getting someone out for an experience that they do not have the opportunity for in everyday life. It's not a competition for biggest or most. We don't call it a tournament and no longer have trophies for biggest or most. This is not a competitive event. It's an opportunity to give back a little or pay it forward, however you want to look at it, to someone that is less fortunate than we are and has made sacrifices for all of us.
The focus of this event shouldn't be on numbers, but more on the overall experience. Every year I and my team try to figure out how we can make this a great experience for the volunteers and the veterans. Every year we try to identify areas we can improve on the make the experience better for everyone. This year seemed to be the smoothest one yet at getting the vets on the boats and out fishing as quickly as possible. We had a great ground staff and they worked hard to execute quickly. They did a great job!
There were 99 vets signed up for the event, unfortunately quite a few did not show up. We also had several boaters that couldn't make it either. In the end it all worked out as we had some available seating on boats and were able to get some of our volunteer staff out for some fishing as well. Now that's what it's all about.
Thank you all for your continued support and I will send out another report when I get the final numbers in the next couple days with a few pics.
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I want you all to understand how much we appreciate each and every one of you volunteering your time and resources to come up there and take a veteran out fishing. It's a big commitment and not something we take lightly. You are all to be commended for that. We tried to express a little bit of that with the thank you letter and gift for each boat captain.
I'd like to call out Trevor Earl (wipermac) and Eric Whitley (whit210) for really stepping it up and taking it to another level getting some great donations for us. Trevor has helped us out for the last several years in the Ogden area. Eric was able to come up with some great glasses from Smith Optics which we were able to give to each veteran and each boat captain. Thank you guys, you really are amazing.
Walt Hutson (rippinlips) came to our rescue and dropped everything at the last minute to come up and cook for us after the National Guard dropped out. Walt really saved the day and did a fantastic job grilling for us.
I'd also like to ask you all to understand that this is really just about getting someone out for an experience that they do not have the opportunity for in everyday life. It's not a competition for biggest or most. We don't call it a tournament and no longer have trophies for biggest or most. This is not a competitive event. It's an opportunity to give back a little or pay it forward, however you want to look at it, to someone that is less fortunate than we are and has made sacrifices for all of us.
The focus of this event shouldn't be on numbers, but more on the overall experience. Every year I and my team try to figure out how we can make this a great experience for the volunteers and the veterans. Every year we try to identify areas we can improve on the make the experience better for everyone. This year seemed to be the smoothest one yet at getting the vets on the boats and out fishing as quickly as possible. We had a great ground staff and they worked hard to execute quickly. They did a great job!
There were 99 vets signed up for the event, unfortunately quite a few did not show up. We also had several boaters that couldn't make it either. In the end it all worked out as we had some available seating on boats and were able to get some of our volunteer staff out for some fishing as well. Now that's what it's all about.
Thank you all for your continued support and I will send out another report when I get the final numbers in the next couple days with a few pics.
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