Kāwhia Boating & Angling Club's 2022-2023 Club of the Year award from the New Zealand Sport Fishing Council. Photo / Jesse Wood
Kāwhia Boating & Angling Club's 2022-2023 Club of the Year award from the New Zealand Sport Fishing Council. Photo / Jesse Wood
The New Zealand Sport Fishing Council has presented the Kāwhia Boating & Angling Club with the 2022-23 Club of the Year award.
Kāwhia Boating & Angling Club took the prize over all New Zealand Sport Fishing Council-affiliated clubs.
“Thanks for the invitation to attend, it was great to be able to acknowledge all the hard work from Kāwhia Boating & Angling Club over the past year, tight lines and best of luck for the upcoming season!” commented New Zealand Sport Fishing Council chief executive Mike Plant on a Facebook post.
Club secretary Kim Tautari-Scott said they won the award because of their community spirit.
“It just means everything to us, we’re only a little club. It wasn’t only just for the fishing. If we can be a community-focused club, if that’s what it means for us to win this, then we’ve won. This award isn’t just for us, it’s for our community,” Tautari-Scott said.
“About half of us are semi-new to the committee for the last two years. Our predecessors had done such a fantastic job and that’s what we want to do, just carry on their wonderful work.”
The committee is made up of people who live in Hamilton, Te Awamutu, Kāwhia, Ōpārau and Te Kūiti — “we don’t all live there, but our heart and soul belongs there”.
Kāwhia Boating & Angling Club receives its Club of the Year award from the New Zealand Sport Fishing Council. From left: Charlie Smart (club commodore), Cecil Hickman and Doug Taucher (Kāwhia delegates to NZSFC), and Mike Plant (chief executive, NZSFC).
The sports club was a community centre doubling as the RSA, a wedding, birthday, event and a medical educational venue. These groups had nowhere to go.
Kāwhia Boating & Angling Club has since given the use of its facilities while the community waits for the sports club to reopen.
It was all about backing their locals and working together with other Kāwhia agencies.
“We’ve also got this wonderful caterer, Dallas, who is a young local. She lives and breathes Kāwhia. For her being involved and starting her own business, it’s really neat to see. We want to help our community as much as we can,” Tautari-Scott said.
“We only want to make Kāwhia the best little town it can be.”
Tautari-Scott said after Covid the club thought membership numbers would drop but it had been the opposite.
“We’ve only grown, because people are looking for a club that all of the family can be involved in.”
This year, the club had 36 juniors competing in the youth nationals fishing competition. They were, of course, backed by their parents and the club members.
“We got third overall. It’s our up-and-coming juniors that we want to keep this club going for. We’re only part of the legacy,” Tautari-Scott says.
“It’s a committee and community effort, it doesn’t take one person to make a great club. It’s about drawing on everybody’s expertise to continue growing our club.”
