In coming weeks you will receive a ballot for election of officers for the Washington State Council of FFI. Please fill out the ballot and return it. The officers aim to keep the state Council on track and growing and your vote helps them meet those goals.
In addition, two council officers were appointed to new positions to fill the terms of departing directors. JoAnn Allison is retiring as Treasure after many years supporting her husband’s fly fishing career. John Roskopf will take over the position from JoAnn after July 1. Also, Jim Maus has taken over as Treasure for the national office of Fly Fishers International. To dedicate more time to that he is turning over his role as VP Communications for the state council to newsletter editor Steve Jones.
The Candidates
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PresidentBill Wheeler had been fly fishing about 10 years when he moved to Washington. At first he thought his eyesight was going bad because he couldn’t see his fly when he cast. It turned out that his eyesight was fine, his cast-ing was bad. So he started on a journey to become a FFI Master Certi-fied Casting Instructor (MCI). He has had the opportunity to teach casting at national and re-gional FFI fairs and various club and private venues. Bill is Past President of the Overlake Fly Fishing Club, edited the club newsletter and was VP Education for the club. Currently he can see his fly, he just wishes that more fish would see it. |
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Vice President for Conservation EastGilbert Biles is a member of The Wenatchee Valley Fly Fishers and The Regional Fisheries En-hancement Program. Born and raised in Maryland on the Chesa-peake Bay, Gil moved to Washing-ton in 1954. He has fished all his life and started fly fishing in his teens. He loves to fly fish and tie flies and he has taught kids fly tying, rod building, boat building, fly fishing |
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Vice President for Conservation WestJack Whitney was given his grandmother’s bamboo fly rod as a kid. Soon after on a family camping trip he found a stream loaded with hungry 4″ trout that he couldn’t keep off his fly. Jack says, “I had never had so much fun and the big fish hooked that morning was me.” Jack has fly fished in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Baja, Honduras and the Pacific Islands. He retired in 2001 from a career in sales, small business, engineering and manufacturing and lives in Hockinson. |
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DirectorMike Clancy retired in 2000 and joined the Puget Sound Fly Fishers in Tacoma where he says has “absolutely enjoyed our sport and relationships I have made from that day on.” In 2003 Mike joined the board of the Washington State Council of FFI where he has served as the Secretary, Vice President West and presently the Government Affairs Chairman.Since 2009 Mike has volunteered with the NW Youth Conservation and Fly Fishing Academy and in 2010 became co-director. The Academy is a youth education pro-ject of the Washington Chapter of Trout Unlimited and made possible with the help and support of WSCFFI. |
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DirectorDon Simonson was born and raised on Ca-mano Island in Puget Sound. He lived in Seattle during a 32-year career with IBM. He has been a member of the Washington Fly Fishing Club. for more than 40 years serving in most of the officer and chair positions including presi-dent in 1994. Don is a Master Certi-fied Casting Instructor and a mem-ber of the FFI Casting Board of Governors. He has served as a Di-rector at large on the state council of FFI for several years and taken responsibility for the council’s fly-casting education efforts throughout the state. |