Bird Key Yacht Club welcomes new commodore

A new era has begun at the Bird Key Yacht Club, but the goings-on of the club won’t change all that much under its new leader.

Commodore Dave Thomas has taken office at the head of the club’s board after working up from the Board of Governors to rear admiral to vice admiral. He’ll serve a yearlong term and aside from growing activities to support members year-round, he plans to focus on returning to normal as vaccinations increase among members. Thomas will lead the charge to create a master plan for the club’s growth over the next decade, including looking into what needs to be updated in the building. 

“If we have another upset like COVID, or a downturn in the economy, or something like that, we are insulated from that,” Thomas said. “So I don't see any huge building projects, or anything that I can put my name on and say, ‘Your commodore built this.’ That's not my goal this year.”

Thomas comes to the position with a background in medicine, law and education, which he concedes doesn’t position him to be commodore as well as his six-year stint in the Florida House of Representatives. That was all trying to get people to agree with each other enough, which he said is largely the commodore’s role, too. 

“He builds consensus so that he can lead, and that’s getting people to invest themselves,” Thomas said of the job. “We're very fortunate in this club, we have a tremendous number of volunteers. And as Walt Disney once said, ‘Nobody does anything alone.’ It's all a team effort. And that's true in this club.”

Thomas is proud of the club’s membership growth, which is actually at an all-time high at about 330 members, up from the mid-pandemic low of 265. The goal is to not let it grow so large that you lose the sense of familiarity with members in a smaller club. 

“Traditionally, yacht clubs have membership from other members bringing people in,” Thomas said. “But (here), people hear about the kinds of things we do and literally walk in off the street.”

Mary Reiling, a member who coordinates music at events, said that familiarity contributes to members feeling more comfortable with starting to see each other again. Though the club’s demographic trends older, the social calendar didn’t drop off too much once the club reopened after the initial shock of COVID-19.

“I think you trust the Smiths maybe more than hundreds of people who, frankly, are unknown to many of the members when it gets so big,” Reiling said. “You know a greater percentage and you kind of know the way they're living their lives through the pandemic.”

The motto “Anchored in friendship” is near and dear to members, and employees made sure that stayed at the forefront of their approach. Social committee member Carolyn Bruder appreciated that club employees sold groceries to members and included a roll of toilet paper with every bottle of wine — useful, lighthearted things to keep everyone in each other’s thoughts. 

“We all had our pods, but when we finally got to the point of taking that milestone when we opened the club … they found that people came out in droves,” Bruder said. “Once we got through the Fourth of July, we found that people were more than willing to come out.”

Bruder, along with Reiling, Trudy Barry, Marshall Fernandez and a host of club staff have kept the social calendar mostly intact throughout the pandemic with lunches and holiday parties. A dramatic revamp of HEPA filters and air ducts to keep clean air circulating also helped with the feelings of safety. As the club fully comes out of the pandemic, Thomas just has his sights set on shoring up defenses and keeping the rudder steady. 

“You can either let it defeat you, or learn from it,” Thomas said. “We elected to learn from it.”