Geraldton Guardian Mid West Sports Awards 2024: Welcome from Mid West Sports Federation chair Mike Bowley

We’re hosting the Geraldton Guardian Mid West Sports Awards this year at the Wintersun Hotel, which is where we began this journey in 1972 — when the venue was known as the “Walkabout”. We’ve come a long way and a lot has changed, but the Mid West Sports Federation’s commitment to our members is as strong as ever. We’ve hosted six professional development workshops this year, with support from the Department of Local Government, Sport and Cultural Industries. These sessions were well-attended and helped clubs and associations with attracting and keeping volunteers, showing them how to use social media to advantage, creating safe environments for participants, gaining grants and effective club management. Our focus remains building a solid future for sport and recreation, and we have developed a project to provide strategic planning support to associations in the next year or so. We hope to release more information about this soon. We saw some significant changes in 2024 with our project officer Kelly Eastough resuming her full-time role with Bendigo Bank. We’re extremely grateful to Kelly for her commitment over the last five years, but even more thankful that she has seen value in the federation and joined us a voluntary board member. We welcomed Craig Maluish as our new project officer in October. Craig is an avid ultra-marathon runner, and we’re really excited about the new skills and enthusiasm he brings to the federation. Please reach out to Craig and make him feel welcome. Our biggest success this year was securing funding from the Bendigo Community Bank to enable us to employ our project officer for the next year. This support has been a game-changer for the federation, and we are extremely grateful to the Bendigo Bank for showing such faith in us. We hope to continue a long and fruitful relationship with the Bendigo Bank, who also sponsor our team-of-the-year award. The federation needs people to continue our mission. If you love sport in the Mid West and want to make a difference across the industry, please put your hand up. Our AGM will be on December 16 and we have vacancies for people passionate about sport. Deep and genuine thanks to all the sponsors who have made these awards possible. Congratulations and good luck to all nominees!