Dolson to Resign as ICA President; Buklis Selected To Follow

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It is with a bit of sadness, and also with a bit of excitement, that I must offer my resignation as ICA President, effective April 22nd, the date of my move to Indianapolis, Indiana. It's sad because I've spent 7 years as ICA Treasurer and almost 3½ years as ICA President, and I would prefer not to leave an organization I firmly believe does great work for chess in Illinois. I'm excited because of where we'll be going and what we'll be doing in Indiana.

I've been retired since 2012, and my wife, Marsha, unexpectedly retired from her teaching position last May, which caused us to review where we wanted to spend our retirement years. It wasn't a difficult decision because both of our kids and grandkids live in Indianapolis. We bought a lot in June and started building a house in August. It's been ready for us to move in since mid-January, and we pushed the move back to get through what turned out to be a mild winter. So, on April 22nd, we'll become Indiana residents, full-time grandparents, and I'll resign from the ICA Presidency.

I'm thrilled to say that the ICA Board has acted to select current ICA Secretary, Bill Buklis, to succeed me as ICA President. Many of you know Bill from his activity as a Chicago-area chess parent, tournament organizer, and tournament director. He's been on the ICA Board for about a year as Secretary. He's served in several capacities during that time, including as Webmaster for the ICA website, as a member of the ICA Web Policy Committee, as assistant TD at the Illinois Open, Illinois Blitz, and Illinois K-8 state championship tournaments, and, with the sad passing of Sevan Muradian in February, has volunteered as TD and FIDE Arbiter at the upcoming Illinois Youth Invitational tournaments to determine the Illinois representatives to the Denker, Girls Invitational, and Barber national championship tournaments. Bill is an excellent choice to lead the ICA forward.

I want to say thank you to those who have supported the ICA and me in my efforts as ICA Treasurer and President. I've met many wonderful chess organizers, tournament directors, coaches, teachers, and adult and scholastic chess players in my 10½ years with the ICA, and I expect to return with some frequency to continue playing chess in Illinois. Illinois is a very diverse state, and it's good to see that the game of chess can bring very diverse people together in such a positive way.

And with that, I'll say “until we meet again.”