[caption id="attachment_68188" align="aligncenter" width="600" caption="Crusheen's Pat Vaughan in action during the Munster Club Senior Hurling Championship Final. See Kieran Rooney's report on the back page. "]
On Sunday the New York GAA delegates will convene in the Riverdale Steak House to elect a new Chairman of the Big Apple Association. In addition there are contests for the Vice-Chairman's position as well as that of Secretary. During the week I spoke with Liam Birmingham and Brendan O'Sullivan, the two candidates seeking the Chairman's position to get some information on their backgrounds, their views and prospective plans for the Association.
Liam Birmingham is a native of Kildare and he played at all levels with his club Suncroft. On arriving in New York he played with the Cork football club for 12 years and later managed them for 4 years. The Kildare man has a fairly extensive resume at the administrative level. He is a former Chairman of the New York Board plus also served as Secretary for over 13 years. Birmingham has been in the Vice-Chairman's role while also being a delegate to Central Council. In addition he has been the club Chairman as well as being in charge of the New York senior football division. When the Celtic Tiger was at its peak he returned to Kildare and became involved at club and county level, with roles such as delegate, the fixtures committee, overseas development and also acted as liaison with club players and the County Board. Since returning to New York, he has become Secretary again and he has been involved with the reformation of the Kildare club.
Birmingham is very much aware that the NY GAA faces serious challenges in the coming years but he is confident that he can handle these. Foremost among the challenges is developing major funding strategies. Now that the GAA have been granted the lease on the bar and catering facilities he sees great potential to exploit them by turning into them a major revenue generating venture. Indeed according to Birmingham Gaelic Park would once again become the hub in the community by hosting bands, festivals, dances, concerts, benefits ,etc. Though the Finance Committee is in place he would like to see it explore all available sources of funding, particularly at the city, state, Croke Park and the Dept. of Foreign Affairs.
With the Centenary of the NYGAA scheduled for 2014, he would like to see the major redevelopment to coincide with that historic event. The New York GAA has applied to Croke Park that the annual Congress be held here in 2014. Though Birmingham cites the primacy of playing games , he notes that ancillary amenities such as proper playground facilities are essential to enhance the family atmosphere. The role of the Minor Board needs to become more central as Birmingham would like to see much greater communication and cooperation between the two Boards. He would also appoint a Communications Committee as he believes that the GAA has not fully embraced the advent of technology. He noted that we should be using the website to advertise our games and doing our own merchandising online.
With regards to scheduling Birmingham stressed the need for drawing up a master schedule that involves the Senior, Minor and Ladies Boards. He believes the current season is too long as it places a huge financial on clubs. The participation in the Connacht championship needs to be seriously evaluated as we are committed to it for the long term. Hence all the factors involved in putting a competitive team on the field need to be seriously addressed. He noted that the findings form the currently evolving strategic plan need to approved and quickly implemented. While Birmingham has visions that the redevelopment of Gaelic Park will have greater impact in the Irish community, he also acknowledges the great work of the former Chairmen such as Seamus Dooley, John Riordan and Larry McCarthy in making great strides in moving the Association forward. However is confident that he has the experience and the skill to lead the Association on a progressive path.
Brendan O'Sullivan started his sporting career with his native PallasGreen club in County Limerick. Since arriving in the U.S. over a quarter of a century ago he has been actively involved in mentoring, managing, promoting and administering Gaelic games at every level and code. As part of the new wave of emigrants in the 1980s, O'Sullivan quickly saw the need for reviving some older clubs and he set about reestablishing the Limerick hurling club and they went on to win four New York senior hurling championships. Currently O'Sullivan is involved with the Tipperary club in addition to being Chairman of the St. Barnabas club. However in his role as Development Officer of the Minor Board, O'Sullivan has become acutely aware of the perilous nature of the future of hurling in New York.
In recent years he has being the driving force in developing an underage hurling program that continues to grow. This year hurling got another boost as O'Sullivan along with others succeeded in starting a junior hurling competition.
For the last 20 years, Brendan O'Sullivan has been involved in a host of positions at the Senior Board level serving under Presidents from the Jackie Salmon era right down to his current position as Vice-Chairman. Thus he feels that he has the experiences to lead the New York GAA forward during these challenging times. Currently he sees the dwindling attendances and lack of new players coming from Ireland as major challenges that the GAA must tackle aggressively. Now he thinks is the ideal time to have much more interaction between the Senior and Minor Boards so that more players stay involved and progress to play at senior level.
O'Sullivan also thinks that with the proper development of the facilities at Gaelic Park, it would become more attractive for families to spent more time there. Thus he sees the modernized facilities helping to make Gaelic Park a focal point and cultural center in the Irish-American community. He also noted that the GAA has been too isolated from other Irish oriented organizations and hence there is greater need for all the organizations to cooperate and mutually support each other.
O'Sullivan noted that the Ladies football is flourishing at underage level as are their senior games, therefore greater efforts should be made to showcase their games. Gaelic Park was the epicenter of Irish life a few generations ago, and now that the GAA have taken control of the catering facilities, O'Sullivan thinks that with the proper development and management, it can regain much of its former role. However he also astute enough to know that it is ultimately the quality of the games that are critical to increasing the crowds. He wants to restructure the senior football competition so as to make it much more competitive. A top priority would be to address the declining number of football clubs while the development plan in hurling has already has a very positive impact according to O'Sullivan.
In concluding his remarks O'Sullivan noted that he has the track record and the confidence to lead the Association forward to meet the challenges and also grasp the opportunities.
In the other positions to be filled referees Tommy Fahey and Lawrence McGrath go head to head for the Vice-Chairman's spot while the former PRO Joan Henchy and the former Registrar Mary Murphy will battle it out for the Secretary's position. According to the pundits all the contests will be close. The tension will be palpable on Sunday afternoon in the Steakhouse as the ballots are counted and a full quota of delegates is expected.
