Rick Graef - Commodore
Hi fellow Eagle Creekers,
I am honored to be serving my second term as Commodore for the 2023 season. Our club has been built by the volunteer activities of our membership over the previous fifty-four years. I expect this season to be no different. Your committee chairs, officers, and board have planned an exciting season. I encourage you to reach out to our committee chairs and get involved. If you expressed an interest in volunteering in a specific area, you will be contacted soon. In order to incentivize even more volunteer commitment, we have raised our hourly volunteer work credit to $15/hour, so there is no excuse not to join in, get involved, and make new friends.
This season we have instituted a new system where all watercraft on our property pay a “storage fee” whether stored on land or in a slip (you already paid this in your 2023 dues) . This was adopted in an effort to eliminate the “free” boat storage that led to a derelict boat issue at our club. Along with this change, our Harbormaster will be implementing assigned dry parking storage. This requires the marking of all of the boat parking spots on our grounds. This process will take some time to implement, so if you are a dry parked boat owner, I would ask for your patience as we fine tune what is best for our space. The Harbor master will be needing volunteers to assist with this work so watch for the opportunities (come out and earn some work credits). If you are a wet slip boat owner, this means that your boat needs to be in the water and its trailer moved to the upper trailer field by the end of May.
Several of the future long-term projects on the horizon include dock repair/replacement, re-roofing the upper shelter, ramp repair, seawall repair, automatic gate for club access, and possible additional enclosed space (either partially enclosing upper shelter or building additional enclosed space).
Hope to see you all at our spring work party (get your work credits here) on April 15th at 8 AM.
Sail Fast
Richard Graef
ECSC Commodore 2023
Perry Cameron
Dear Sailing Club Members, I am thrilled to welcome all of you to the 2023 season at our sailing club! As the membership chairman, I am excited to see so many familiar faces and to welcome new members who are joining us for the first time this year.
As of this writing, we have a total of 256 active memberships, which is a testament to the vibrant community we have built at our club. Our members come from all walks of life, but we share a common passion for sailing and a love for the water.
After a long winter, we are excited to get back to doing what we love and to reconnect with our sailing community. We have a great season planned with a full schedule of races, regattas, and social events. We are looking forward to seeing you all out on the water and enjoying the camaraderie of our sailing club.
For our new members, we will be hosting two new member orientations on Sat. June 17th and Sat. Aug 5th at 1:00 at the upper shelter. These orientations will help you get acquainted with our club and answer any questions you may have.
As we start this new season, I encourage all members to be welcoming to our new members and to help them feel at home in our sailing community. Our club is built on a foundation of inclusivity and support, and we are all here to learn, grow, and enjoy the sport of sailing.
Thank you for being part of our sailing club, and I wish you all a fantastic 2023 season!
Sincerely, Perry Cameron Membership Chairman
Racing - John Kohne
Racers and Non-Races
The frost is very slowly melting from the racing off-season as your long hibernation begins to end, but many of your colleagues have forgone the winter sleeping to put together an exciting racing program for you this summer. By the first race on Wednesday April 19th there will have been 4 Winter Race Meetings and two PRO Group meetings. We had great turnout of 30+ members at the Winter meetings and nearly full attendance at the PRO meetings.
As a result of these meetings, we have made some new decisions regarding the coming race season.
As you can tell our plate is full this year, full of FUN. Don’t miss out on this year’s racing program whether you are an experienced racer or want to try it our for the first time. See you on the water !!
John Kohne
Nancy Goff
EJ Williams / Vice Commodore / Ship Store
A big shout out to Michael Denney for taking over Publicity Chair starting this year. I enjoyed putting together the Telltales and updating the website over the last 3 years, but I know that it is in good hands going forward with Michael (he's more of a techie than I am!).
As many of you know already, Rick Graef has tapped me to be Vice Commodore this year which, in turn, means that I get the reins to the ECSC kingdom come 2024. I'm excited to learn from and work with Rick this year, and I will do my best to help the club thrive over the next two years.
Top-of-mind items for me right now include:
1) Updating our front entrance gate. Eagle Creek Parks seems to be onboard with the project. Next step is making a contact at DNR to get them onboard.
2) Hosting the Alex Rust Regatta (ARR!) presented by Chasing Bubbles Foundation This is on June 17th. More details to come. It will be a fun day of kayaking, paddle board races, and pursuit-style sailing races (like the Hornback)
3) Improving ECSC's volunteering. Looking at new forms of communicating volunteer opportunities.
4) Working with ECSC Officers on a new lease with the Parks Dept. This is going well.
5) Continue Ki's phenomenal efforts toward club beautification and grounds improvement.
I wish I could attend the Spring Work Part on April 15th but I will be helping Purdue run their electric go-kart race that day. So I hope to convince Bill to do a 2nd work party later that I'll help run.
See you guys soon!
EJ Williams
Vice Commodore