Double winners claim Citizen of the Year Award

Casavant and Smith were recognized with the award in large part for the work they did in organizing the World Junior Men’s Softball Championship which was held in P.A. last summer. Casavant gave lots of credit to the community for the overwhelming success of the tournament .

“My god, on that Tuesday night when there’s 5,000 fans and we’ve got every golf cart going and picking up people from every parking lot around, we just were amazed,” he said.

As is the tradition the pair were surprised with the award in an ambush in the Johnny Bower Lobby. After hearing the news that they had been selected for the award both were appreciative and thanked their families for their support.

“There were lots of meetings and lots of time away,” said Smith.

Along with organizing the tournament, which saw teams from all over the world descend on P.A., the two have also been extensively involved in the overall sporting community via coaching and working to organize other events.

“Both of us have been around Prince Albert all our lives, and played all our minor sports in Prince Albert, so just giving back to the community at our ages, giving back to the minor sports, and keeping these events going … that’s huge for us,” Smith said.

The pair were nominated for the award by Ellen Grewcock. She said Casavant and Smith are admirable people because they give back to the community in a number of ways. This includes Smith’s organizing of a youth basketball program and all the work Casavant has done in terms of softball in the city.

“When we look back at what they’ve done beyond 2018, it’s absolutely amazing,” she said.

Besides their own involvement, Grewcock also credited the two for getting their families involved in volunteering and being great ambassadors for the city overall.

“You couldn’t ask for two finer men to go out and put forth a message from our city that everybody’s welcome here,” she said.

The Citizen of the Year Award is sponsored by the Prince Albert Kinsmen Club and the Prince Albert Daily Herald. The two organizations have a committee which looks at the nominations and determines a winner.

Brian Middlebrook, the chairman of the Citizen of the Year for the Kinsmen Club said they had between eight and nine applications for this year.

“It’s always a really difficult decision to make,” he said.

Specifically, what really helped Smith and Casavant was their organizing the softball tournament as that capped off the year nicely.

“That was kind of a no-brainer for us,” he said.

The next step will be a gala which will honour the two winners for their work. Middlebrook said a date for the gala will be decided after they speak with the two winners.

“That’s kind of the idea, to have a special night for them,” he said.

MichaelJoel.Hansen@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @mjhskcdn

by Michael Joel-Hansen

Double winners claim Citizen of the Year Award

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