National Senior Games, coming to Birmingham in June, need volunteers

The National Senior Games, a competition for athletes ages 50 and over, will celebrate its 30th anniversary in Birmingham from June 2-15, with over 10,000 competitors taking part in 19 sports at a dozen venues.

But the Magic City cannot successfully host the event, which is expected to have an economic impact of about $35 million, without volunteers -- lots of them.

The games will require about 3,000 local volunteers in a wide variety of roles, according to Michael McGreevey, director of event operations at Birmingham sports promotion firm Knight Eady and head of the games’ local organizing committee.

“We still need a lot of folks… but the response from the community has been great so far,” McGreevey told Iron City Ink recently.

McGreevey and the other organizers are seeking to raise awareness in the Birmingham metro area that the games -- and those thousands of athletes -- are on their way.

“I think our biggest challenge so far is educating folks that this thing is coming,” McGreevey said. “When people hear how many athletes are coming and why they are coming, I think they will be more than willing to donate some of their time to help.”

The National Senior Games Association web site makes it easy for volunteers to sign up and also to pick assignments that are convenient for them, according to McGreevey.

“It's a fully automated system where they can choose and say, ‘I’m available this day, and I’m in this part of town, and I’d like to volunteer,’ and they can basically drill down all their options to a detailed level of what they want to do and for how long,” McGreevey said.

The games will involve 19 sports at about a dozen venues. Several of the venues, including the BJCC, Birmingham Crossplex, Highland Park Golf Course and the UAB Recreation Center, are in the city.

There are also competitions being held at such facilities as Samford University, The Hoover Met, Oak Mountain State Park and the Liberty Park Sports Complex in Vestavia.

For more information -- including a complete list of venues, competitions and special events -- go to nsga.com.

To register, call 225-706-5101 go to nsga.com/volunteer.