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| Tom on the left, his birding buddy Dave C on the right |
For the past couple of years the president of the Ocean State Bird Club has been Tom Younkin. Tom moved to the Chicago area a couple of months ago and decided to step down. He has been back and forth to the Rhode Island area a few times the last few months so he has been around. He has run board meeting remotely. Despite doing a very good job, even from across the country, he decided the right thing to do was step down. He sent a resignation email to the members last week.
Tom will be very much missed and it is all of our loss that he is leaving us. Tom was only a board member for one year when he became president. No one else really wanted the job and he stepped up. During the year that he was a board member, we were still experiencing COVID. So there really wasn't much to do. When he became president, he did not have the luxury of seeing how the club ran during normal times. He really went in cold. I remember thinking it would be really hard for him to attempt to run the club without the benefit of seeing how a president would run it had it been pre=COVID.
Well, it turned out, better him than me. From our very first meeting putting our agenda together he nailed it. He was a leader right from the beginning. Without any real experience he took charge and as things started going back to normal so did the club.
It is actually very easy to sit hear and write down Tom's list of accomplishments and contributions to not only the club but also to the Rhode Island birding community. From the beginning Tom wanted to give back. He lead a binocular drive. We passed the word and ended up having about forty binoculars donated, some new, that went to kids in urban communities. While the club got the credit for this, this project was Tom's baby from the beginning and he deserves all the credit in the world.
The next year, we followed up the binocular drive with a field book drive. Though I don't know the exact number, we collected a large amount of field guides and they were donated to youth also. Like the binoculars, these field guides were donated to individual kids. They were not donated to classrooms where they would collect dust fifty one weeks a year. Instead they are in the hands of kids that can use them everyday. Who knows, one or more of those kids will grow up to become Rhode Island's next great birder.
Tom was instrumental in getting Noah Stryker as a guest speaker in 2022. Tom did all of the hands on work. He contacted Noah, handled the behind the scenes planning, and even had Noah stay at his place. The day was a success. Noah went birding with twenty members in the morning then did an excellent presentation at RIC where over seventy members came to see him.
His other grandiose plan that he made happen was the RI Cup. The RI Cup is a one day big day competition. Each species is awarded a point value, common birds are a one and mega-rarities are a five. At the end of the day teams meet to have their score tallied. Tom had wanted to have a competition like this for a while. He had the trophy made. This time he did have a committee to help him, but he was the committee chair and did the most work.
These are just some of the things that Tom has done that both bird club members and community members have benefited from. Behind the scenes there has been that much more. Tom's enthusiasm has been infectious. He is always trying to grow the club. He always wants to get the word out about us. His motto is he wants the cost of membership to be the best money you spend all year. On top of everything else, Tom has lead many member only walks.
Tom did such a great job that none of us would have challenged him to be the next president. He had our full support. While it is a huge loss for the club that Tom has stepped down, we are very lucky to have had him run the club the last couple of years. His accomplishments such as starting the RI Cup will be felt by members for years to come. Thank you Tom!