Saturday evening, Sept. 28, marked a special anniversary for the Ladysmith Kinsmen Club. It was the local organization’s 67th annual installation of officers. The third oldest Kinsmen Club on Vancouver Island hosted some special guests as well as spouses at a dinner and entertainment while recognizing their new slate of officers for the 2019/2010 Kin year.
James R. Delcourt was installed, for his second term, as club president while Darrin Ball was sworn in as vice-president. Chris Saunders took the oath of office as secretary, Mike Richardson was installed as treasurer and Kevin Pugh took the oath as registrar. The two directors sworn in are Marc Grills and Steve Dinsmore. Duck Paterson will assume the duties for risk management.
In his outgoing remarks, Delcourt thanked the club members for all their work this past year especially in their work in supporting the local food bank, to which they donated over $4,500. He also was proud of the Kinsmen’s support of a large number of youth teams and organizations.
As incoming president, Delcourt said he’s looking forward to hopefully starting the downtown washrooms later this fall, but the club needs to ramp up their fundraising efforts.
As part of the evening awards were handed out to some club members. The annual “rookie of the year” , as voted on by the membership, award was won by Marc Grills. The “president’s award” was won by two Kin this year. Dave Dunn and Steve Dinsmore were both honoured by the out-going president. The annual “chicken wings” trophy was won by Kevin Pugh and the “blooper” award went to Kin Mike Traer. The “kinsmen of the year” trophy was received by James Delcourt.
The Kinsmen Club meets on the second and fourth Wednesdays of each month at 7pm at the Festival of Lights building next to the cememtary.