This comes after the sports awards for the 2015 calendar year was held in November 2016, nearly a 12-month wait due to a lack of nominees and awareness. The hall-of-fame and local administration categories at the awards were excluded for the lack of nominees.

“It got a bit hard due to lack of nominees for the past couple of years. People think you can nominate only if the chances of winning are high. But the nominations are also about building recognition across the community,” vice president David O’Brien said.

He said the delay to award sports achievements, meant they had lost “a bit of impetus”. While the annual sports awards night has occurred for a number of years, the sports council would like to improve its reach earlier.

“We’d like to gather opinions from the community about how to make sports better, about how we can showcase sporting achievements more and tap into some broader community events. There may be opportunities at events like the show, where there’s a lot of people and it’s held in March,” he said.

The sports council is also calling for membership expansion.

O’Brien said only a small number of sporting organisations are regular members during the past 3–4 years.

“You only have to read the paper to see the many sports being played in the year.”

O’Brien said he believed most sports clubs in the region shared similar concerns.

“We're in same boat, dealing with things like finances. But it may also be other things like administration. It’s important we get together to tackle our challenges and use each other’s skills and combined efforts. It may not be a net benefit to one group at a time, but it may flow on and turn into reciprocal help,” he said.

To learn how you can contribute and provide ideas about improving sports awards, sports council and any other initiatives related to sports in the Yass Valley region, please contact sports council vice president David O’Brien: