Dear fellow referees,

We had another successful US Open!  Thanks to all of you for making it one of the most successful as far as participation of the referees. As I am sure you noticed we had plenty of referees in each ring giving us a little more flexibility so that we were not overworked because of a shortage of referees. On behalf of our chairman, Mr. Cleve Baxter and the referee committee, I would like to thank you all for your participation and hard work to make this tournament one of the most successful. Clearly the quality of the referees is improving even with the WKF changes that we had to implement which could have led to a lot of confusion applying them for the first time, still the quality was noticeable.

As we all agree this is due to the hard work of our referee committee under the leadership of our chairman, Mr. Cleve Baxter which I am extremely proud to be a member of. The current referee committee has been one of the most successful of the NKF, we all can see this evidenced by the increasing number of members in the referee core as posted on the USA-NKF website.

The referee committee has had discussions regarding the betterment of the tournament and the participation of the referees. A few other ideas discussed concerned ways to attract more international referees (European WKF) to the US Open which can be a factor in attracting international competitors from the European and South American countries but these will have to wait until after the elections coming up and the installation of the new board.

I want to take this opportunity to encourage all our referees to continue their hard work and training to sharpen their skills and abilities to become the best referee they can be, you can use this website to assist you with your goal. If you need assistance, please do not hesitate to contact me.  I will remind you that we are one of the top countries in the world in producing WKF referees, so this legacy can continue, our goal must be to become number one in that category. This will directly affect the development of our athletes and competitors internationally.

Please keep yourself updated on the upcoming elections, you can find the information on the website www.usankf.org. There are different positions that need to be filled; one of those is the referee director position.  I would like to encourage all of you to stay tuned to find out who the two nominees for this position will be, you can vote for one to represent you on the Board of Directors. These times are very exciting for all of us as USA-NKF members since we have an opportunity to help select the new board members and finish the job we started 2 years ago. Please make sure you vote for the person that you believe in.  According to Albert Einstein the definition of insanity is when you do the same thing expecting a different result.  It’s time for a change. Let’s all work together for the betterment of our federation and bring the changes necessary. Remember none of us is better than all of us.

Alex Miladi
WKF Karate Referee
USANKF Referee Director
USANKF Referee Committee Member