Greetings from the President, February 2024
Jim Driggers | Published on 2/17/2024
Hello Aqua Tutus,
First, thank you Arnie Warshawsky for your basic underwater photography presentation during the February general meeting. Your primer was thorough and educational. I hope it inspired and helped newer club members who are beginning to experiment with taking pictures underwater.
I'm looking forward to the March general meeting's marine identification presentation by Dave Chervin. Dave is a long-time member of both Aqua Tutus and Reef Check. As a Reef Check diver, he's had to annually demonstrate his ability to identify local marine life to conduct scientific surveys. It's been a few years since Dave gave his last presentation on how to identify the flora and fauna typically found in Northern California, so if you're a newer member of the club--or a memory-challenged member like me who likes reminders of the differences between sheep crabs and kelp crabs--be sure to come to the general meeting on Thursday, March 7th.
Thanks to those who have renewed their membership for 2024. If you haven't yet, be aware your membership expired on January 1, 2024, and you'll lose access to club membership benefits, like the forums and details of club events, on either February 29 or March 1.
As part of the renewal, you'll be asked whether you want to contribute $15 of your club membership fee to Cen-Cal. Some club members have recently asked what is Cen-Cal. Cen-Cal is the abbreviated name of the Central California Council of Diving Clubs, Inc. It's a not-for-profit corporation comprised of volunteers who do--and have done--an amazing amount of work on behalf of divers and water enthusiasts in Central and Northern California. It provides citizen input to California state organizations, such as the Department of Fish and Game, Parks and Recreation, and the Recreational Abalone Advisory Council. Cen-Cal successfully lobbied local governments to have them maintain diver access to popular California beaches, including Monastery Beach, Carmel River Beach, and Lovers Point. Without their efforts, we wouldn't be able to dive from those beaches. I've always contributed to Cen-Cal because I appreciate what they've done and continue to do to support me and others who enjoy being in and on the water. For more information about Cen-Cal, see Carol Rose's article "What is a Cencal?" in our website's News / Articles section or visit Cen-Cal's own website at http://www.cencal.org/.
Like many organizations, Cen-Cal is barely surviving and only remains due to the determination of a handful of volunteers. I hope our club's members will continue supporting it financially and, even better, contribute some of their time to it. As the band Cinderella sang, "Don't know what you got, 'til it's gone."
Finally, thanks to those who came in-person to the February meeting and those who stuck through the audio issues on Zoom. I hope to see more people attend our next general meeting in person. The audio and visual presentation is much better at Round Table Pizza than on Zoom.
Warmly,
Jim Driggers
Club president