For those of you who don’t know our Rec director is Richard Martin. Richard is a great person who cares for the kids in the three rivers community. Richard has been our Rec Director for almost a year and has improved the program tremendously. Richard has knowledge and skills in several areas of sports.

Richard is paid for 20 hours per week and has worked several hours over that since he took over. Every hour that he works over that 20 hours he does not get paid for, but he does not complain at all about doing it. He does it because it is for our kids and that is what matters to him, not the money.

I have been around sports all my life participating in recreational sports as a child and now as an adult coaching several different sports. I have never seen anyone with the type of dedication that Richard shows to this community and its children.

I would like for our community to take the time to realize what an asset we have in Richard. He is always thinking about ways to help raise money to help off set the rec department budget and to be fiscally responsible with the budget that he has to work with. He is working on his own time on the fields and such to make sure that they would be ready for our children to play on.

Unfortunately there are some parents who can’t see past their own competiveness to be able to let their children learn and enjoy the games in this early stage of their sports careers.

We all know that there have been several incidents across the United States that have resulted in some horrific results, due to the competiveness of the parents not the kids involved in the sports.

Example would be a baseball game where an umpire called a child out on strikes. After the game that umpire was gunned down by the parent of the child that was called out on strikes. I know that this an extreme example of things that can happen, but it is real and does happen.

I myself have seen the cool headedness and the compassion that Richard Martin has for our kids and this community. I would challenge anyone to come forward and let this community know what a great Rec Director that we have.

In closing I would ask that we come together to do what we have to do to keep Richard Martin as our Rec Director .