Sport Northland held their 2016 AGM recently, ending another very successful year for Northland’s regional sports trust.

As has been the norm for the board in the recent past, an election for new trustees was held (meaning there were more nominees than positions available). Sport Northland’s constitution stipulates that six of the board be elected by ‘members’ of the organisation – members being those regional sport and/or recreation organisations (that have an interest in the success of Sport Northland), as well as the existing trustees.

The six elected trustees serve three year terms, meaning that two come up for re-election every year. This year the two trustees retiring by rotation were Chairman Chris Biddles and Deputy Chairman Annie Mortimer. While Chris put himself forward for re-election for another term, Annie made the decision not to re-stand.

Chris was successfully re-elected while the new trustee elected to replace Annie was Arriane Christie.

Arriane is a passionate sports fan who is also on the Hockey Northland board and is a fanatical Taniwha rugby supporter. She has an Economics degree from the University of Canterbury and works for NZME in Whangarei. She will bring a youthful voice around the organisation’s board table.

Northland Councils all appoint a Councillor to Sport Northland’s board, and after the recent local body elections both Willow-Jean Prime (Far North District Council) and Libby Jones (Kaipara District Council) were appointed.

Willow-Jean is well known in the mid-north area as an established Councillor, while Libby is part of a brand new group of Councillors recently elected in Kaipara – she is also a member of the Northland District Health Board, and both are expected to add value to the Sport Northland board.

Leaving the board this year has been appointed trustees Richard Booth (Kaipara District Council), Mate Radich (Far North District Council), John Bain (Northland Regional Council) and Nick Chamberlain.

All contributed much to the organisation in their time on the board, with Nick especially giving fantastic service over a period of 14 years.

Immediate past Chairman Richie Guy was re-elected as the new patron. Richie was on the board for over 20 years and so continues his long association with Sport Northland. He is a former All Black and was last year inducted as the region’s 26^th Legend of Northland Sport.

The Chairman and Chief Executive’s reports highlighted many successes for the organisation during the 2015/16 year, which was also a frustrating one for the trust with the loss of some Sport NZ funding and delays to the resulting investment contract.

However, it was reported that the implementation of the organisation’s 2015-20 strategic plan is back on track after a recent recruitment process was completed. More on this in next week’s article.