A serious examination needs to be made into how national associations and federations are administered in Barbados, says sporting icon Kathy Harper-Hall.
A veteran sports administrator for the past six decades, Harper-Hall who has served with distinction on the executives of netball, boxing and track and field, said Barbados was too heavily dependent on volunteerism to run sports in the island.
“A lot of national associations end up being run by one or two people because the rest of people don’t have the time or energy and some, not even the expertise on what needs to be done,” Harper-Hall told Barbados TODAY.
“There are so many things that would happen for sport in this country if we would just decide that we are going to put away personal feelings. There are so many reasons why things don’t happen. So, we have to take a serious look at what we do and how we do it and why we do it and what do we expect that we are going to get from it.
“We can’t build champions without proper facilities, without proper equipment, without coaches being trained properly. The cricket association, athletic association and the football association go out of their way to get their coaches trained. They have the resources to do that. The associations that don’t have that, it is left up to these people to find their own way,” she said.
As someone who strongly believes in structure, Harper- Hall said Barbados needed to get the sporting landscape far more structured.
“If we have a national policy about what is to happen or what not to happen, or say to each association these are the guidelines we are giving you, and this is what we will recognise, then all associations, anybody who wants to get anywhere, will have to abide by those rules.
“There are no guidelines laid down by anybody to say these are the standards that should be set. So, each association does its own thing and then the people in the associations interpret it their own way. And then depending on who is in charge, they will tell you this one is picking on them. Or you don’t like them,” Harper- Hall explained.
She added: “But there are a lot of people in this world that do not like structure. For me as a person, I believe in structure and I get a lot of stick for that because I’m too strict.”
She noted Barbados was not making the type of strides it should as it related to sports development. Harper-Hall was of the view that Barbados was yet to see sports as a business.
“I don’t know how much progress we are making quite frankly because I still don’t think that we as a people, or the powers that be, have taken sports in the light that it should be taken.
“We are still seeing sport as sport. Seeing sport as fun for just recreation and when one or two people blossom out, we take them and do something with them. But we are not building a foundation and if you don’t lay a foundation your superstructure is going to crumble. I do not see us laying the foundation at a national level. Individual groups have tried.
“For instance, almost every national organisation and association in Barbados and there are several about 60 or so, of that 60, at least 90 percent of those operate as volunteers. And the way sport is going now it cannot be run exclusively by volunteers,” the veteran administrator said.
Harper-Hall added: “I am secretary-general of the Barbados Boxing Association and there are times when the work of the boxing association is 24/7. We have to communicate with the international body, the continental body, the Olympic Association, the National Sports Council, your members, schools.
“Therefore, when all of this communication is pouring in on you, when you get them you have to respond to them. There are times when you get them, you not only have to respond but take action.
“A person who has a full-time job and family to go home to, fix dinner and do other things cannot do this job voluntarily. It has to be somebody who you are going to pay to do it, who doesn’t have to go to work anywhere else and works on what you have to get done,” she explained.
“Some associations don’t have all that work boxing has. But what is wrong with putting two or three of those smaller ones together and employing somebody to help do the work for them.
“There are still a lot of associations in Barbados right now operating out of somebody’s car boot. Or a corner in their house. There are no facilities, no structure. Sports is a business. You can’t run a business from the boot of your car,” Harper-Hall stressed.
(morissalindsay@barbadostoday.bb)
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