News

Gentlemen,

The Staff at OHCC is going to be extremely busy over the next several weeks and has asked that anyone who may need assistance for any reason regarding tournament participation please contact the Men’s Association directly at ohccmga@gmail.com or you may call or text Glenn Hottin at (203) 314-3140.

Thank you for your cooperation and support.

Glenn Hottin, President

Gentlemen,

Please note, we have currently 80+ members who have not paid their dues to date. As a friendly reminder, dues are to be paid by Sunday, March 17, 2024 at the latest. After this date, there will be a $25 late fee charged and you will not be able to participate in any tournaments until your status has been updated to paid in full. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact any board members for assistance.

Kind regards,

Christos Satrazemis
Orange Hills MGA, Secretary

To the Members of the OHCC Men’s Golf Association,

Well Gentlemen, the new season is finally approaching, and I want to thank all of those members who joined us at this year’s Annual Meeting on January 21st. As I always tell our members, this is the one meeting every year that every member should try to attend. Again this year, we had a number of things to address and cover and the input we received from the members who were present was both welcome and valuable as we look to improve your experience again this year.

As reported by our Treasurer, Roger Sliby, the Association is heading into 2024 with a strong financial position which allowed us to keep the dues at $150 again this year. However, as we indicated last year, we changed our process for paying for hole-in-ones by our members. We eliminated the need for members to pay into “HIO Insurance” and instituted a policy of paying a flat $400 for all eligible hole-in- ones recorded by our members during the year and assessing our members to recapture this payment when we collect the annual dues. In 2023, we did have one HIO recorded by Rob Flament, a new member. As a result, we have an assessment of $2.00 per member to reimburse the Association’s account for this payment.

Therefore, your payment for dues for 2024, including this assessment, totals $152. In addition, as we have for the past 17 years, we ask that you remember the First Tee of CT with a small donation when you make your dues payment. You can mail this to the club or drop your payment off at the clubhouse prior to the Board of Governors meeting scheduled for Wednesday, March 6th.

Speaking of the First Tee of CT, we had the good fortune of having several guests from the First Tee program, Mark Moriarty, President of the First Tee of CT, along with Milo Moffett and Aiden Devaney, join us at this year’s meeting. Mark wanted to thank our Association for the partnership over the years and informed us that, to-date, we have contributed just over $10,000 to the First Tee. Milo and Aiden, two young men who have been part of the First Tee program for a number of years, shared with us what the program has meant to them. It was great to hear their stories and their goals of playing at the college level.

We moved through our Committee reports. Mark Karagus presented the Handicap Committee report and again in 2023 we had a very good year as far as members posting scores. We applaud all of you, our members. This year the USGA and GHIN system have introduced a few updates to the score posting rules which were reviewed. For those of you who were not in attendance we suggest visiting the GHIN.com website to review these before this season gets underway. The basic points of these changes will be posted on the bulletin board near the computer for members to see as well.

In addition, we had a number of Local Rule Changes during 2023 that we reviewed again at this meeting. Those rules will be posted on the MGA website as well as a hard copy posted on the bulletin board near the computer.

Our Membership Committee is working hard to find ways to reach out to new members, but as it has always been, the best way to grow our membership is through our current members and the relationships you have with people you know who are not currently members. We hope that the improvements we have made to the experience for our members will translate into an increased interest in membership.

Some of those improvements have been in the way of the Member-Guest Outing returning to the schedule, increased payouts for many of our tournaments and looking for more ways to increase participation in our tournaments throughout the year. The Tournament Committee, with Steve Gettings and Gary Rimler teaming up, is excited about some of the changes they recommended for this year including at least one new, fun tournament format.

I want to welcome Andy Benowitz back onto the Board of Governors this year as our lone new member. Andy spent some time on the Board in the past and had expressed a desire to join the team again. His past experience and renewed enthusiasm will be of great value.

Finally, and I probably should have mentioned this much earlier in this letter but as I said we covered a lot at this meeting, I want to congratulate two members who were nominated and unanimously approved as our newest Honorary Members.

Fred Fawcett has been a member for at least 35 years. During that time Fred served 26 years on the Board of Governors first as an At-Large Member before moving on to VP/Tournament Chair, Rules/CSGA Liaison, President and Past-President. Following his time as President and Past President he returned to the Board as a At-Large Member again and served as our Rules Guru once again.

Dave Belowsky joined the Association in 1991 and during his 32 years he gave 23 years to the Board of Governors. He began as an At-Large Member and then moved to VP/Handicap Chair, President, Past President and then, like Fred, retuned as an At-Large Member to continue his support.

When you see Fred and Dave at the clubhouse this year, say congratulations and thank you. It is this type of service from gentlemen like this that has made this Association what it is, and I am proud to have served with both of them on the Board over the years.

My apologies for the lengthy dialogue, but I think everything presented here is important for you to know. I look forward to seeing all of you again this Season at the course.

Until then I remain,

Glenn Hottin, President
OHCC Men’s Golf Association

Gentlemen,

Let me start by saying thank you to those of you who came out in the cold yesterday to join us for the Annual meeting of our Association. The entire Board appreciates your involvement and input as we constantly strive to make our Association better.

For those of you who were not able to attend, I want to let you know that the dues for the 2024 season remain the same at $150 plus a $2 assessment due to the payout of one hole-in-one during the 2023 season.

Total amount due: $152

Please also keep the First Tee of CT in mind when you make your payment and include whatever amount you can to support this group.

My President’s Letter will be out shortly with more information soon.

Glenn A. Hottin, President
OHCC Men’s Golf Association

Gentlemen,

That time has come again when we begin to look ahead to the coming season. The single, most important issue for us to address in the next few months is determining our Board of Governors for 2024.

In doing so, we respect that this is your Association and as such you have a say in who represents you throughout the season.

If you are interested, or know of a member who may be interested in getting involved with the Board of Governors, please complete a nomination form and return it by the date indicated on the form.

Board Nomination Form

Respectfully.

Nomination Committee
OHCC Men’s Golf Association

Gentlemen,

As some of you may be aware, the Board of Governors has been reviewing several of the Local Rules in an effort to ensure that our Association is providing a fair environment for our members to enjoy the game yet still conform as closely as possible to USGA Rules of Golf.

With the completion of this review, there have been several revisions made to our local rules. In particular, Rules, 4, 8, 10 have been revised and a new Rule #11 has been added.

Full, updated Local and Tournament Rules have been posted to the MGA website as well as in several locations in the clubhouse at OHCC. It is every members responsibility to be aware of what our local rules are and to comply with these rules. Therefore, we recommend that all members consult the MGA website or one of the posted locations to familiarize yourself with these current rules.

Tournament Rules
Local Rules

Respectfully,

Matt Holub
Rules Committee Chairperson

Gentlemen,

The 2023 season has gotten off to a mixed but positive start.

The season opened with a nice turnout for the Two-Man 6-6-6 tournament which gave everyone a chance to knock off some of the rust from the offseason before needing to post any scores.

Unfortunately, the following two weekends saw some less-than cooperative weather for our President’s Cup play but we were able to use the Open Week we had in the schedule over Mother’s Day weekend to allow players to complete their rounds.

Participation in the Member-Member was very good allowing us to make four flights this year which lead to paying prize money to more members.

As always, the Sucker-in-the-Bucket format drew a good turnout as well. This is a fun format that always provides stories to be told of those who find themselves as the “Sucker”!

We closed May this weekend with our Memorial Tournament and I have to say that the turnout for this one was a bit disappointing despite having three days to play. I am not sure if this was due to the change in format this year but I would very much like to hear from some of you who did NOT play as to whether that was in fact the reason.

Additionally, despite the fact that for at least the past 20 years, as far back as I can recall, this tournament has been one that requires a donation from players which generates a contribution to a local charity. However, more than half of you who did play, did not leave make the $20 donation. I realize that the tournament description did not specify this, but come on people really?

We will be reaching out to those who participated and did not make their donation to ask that you please leave that in the locked MGA drawer at the clubhouse when you are there.

Now, as for what is coming up, we have the 5-4-3 Out tournament this coming weekend which is another fun format that gives you the chance to throw out three less-than desirable scores from your card, so no need to stress about that 8 on the 11th hole!

That will be followed by the Classic starting on Father’s Day weekend and then the Nine-a-Man tournament to close out the month.

We are getting into the meat of our season and hope to see more of you signing up and showing your competitive spirit. Good Luck to all.

Regards,

Glenn A. Hottin, President
OHCC Men’s Golf Association

Gentlemen,

Over the past few weeks we have received a greater than usual number of messages asking about dues, emails, etc., which leads me to think that many of you either are not getting emails or are not reading them. So…

1. If you are not receiving email messages from the MGA, it may be that we do not have your correct email address. Please ensure that we have the correct address in our records.

2. If you receive an email from OHCC MGA, please read it. We do not generally send “junk” so if we send you an email it is very likely that is information we fell is important for you to know.

3. If you are not sure if you received an email or cannot find it, you can find notices under the “News” tab on this website.

Regards,

Glenn A. Hottin, President
OHCC Men’s Golf Association