THE PRESIDENT'S REPORT 2005-2006

IT HAS been my very great pleasure to serve as President of our club in the 2005-06 Rotary year. It has been a most enjoyable year for me in that I have witnessed our club achieve many remarkable goals for which all members may feel justly proud.

My role as President began on 25 June 2005, at which time I expressed the desire for the club to experience a proper balance between service and social related activities. I believe it is important to always acknowledge that members give of their time and effort in a kind and voluntary way and that good friendship and fellowship as between our members will always shine through to bring about a greater level of success in all our service related activities.

There were many highlights throughout the year and I will not seek to restate details of the many accomplishments which I know will be referred to in my fellow directors' reports. It would, however, be remiss of me not to highlight some of the more remarkable achievements.

Our club membership has now grown to 45 active members and four honorary members. We remain a healthy and vibrant club and I am indebted to Membership Director Dorothy Butterworth for her contributions and tremendous efforts to increase our membership.

Club Service Director, Trevor Styles, provided great service to the club on the many matters encountered throughout the year pertaining to club activities, including our successful venue change and the considerable functions run by our club. Tony Chant and his International Service committee had a memorable year with great successes achieved with the annual wine sales, International Night and airport collections enabling substantial contributions to be made to Rotary International for not only The Rotary Foundation but also the PolioPlus campaign and the KOKI project in Papua New Guinea. Financial assistance for Youth Service was also provided.

Michael Robinson and his Community Service committee again successfully operated our Christmas Art Union at the Hypermarket raising in excess of $9,000 net proceeds. The highlight was undoubtedly the donation of state of the art medical equipment, valued at some $19,000 to the Burns Unit of the Royal Children's Hospital. Our club also maintained its continuing support of NBSILS with a donation of $2,000.

Brian Sadler and his committee were instrumental in providing a number of very worthy Vocational Service Awards during the year and organising a most interesting visit to the Surveyor's Museum. Jeff Shepherd and his team of helpers once again were instrumental in putting together a very successful Citizenship Ceremony for which our club received very favourable publicity. Our Youth Service Director Michael Daubney and his committee worked hard in their endeavours to promote youth service and, once again, our club excelled in participating in the International Youth Exchange Program by hosting Exchange Student Laureline from Belgium. I make special mention of the very substantial contributions made by the host parents namely Michael and Barbara Daubney, Peter and Jenny Johnstone, Philomena Bateman and Ian Lloyd and Tracey Wyatt. I also express great thanks to Brian and Yvonne Sadler for their role as counsellors.

I must also say that John Thompson has done a tremendous job in his role as treasurer. It has always been a great relief to me knowing of the absolute professionalism that he displays in that role. Graham Brighton also provided a wonderful service to the club in his secretarial role.

Our Editor, Bill Farley, continued in fine form with the Aspley Post throughout the year and again I express my sincere appreciation to Bill for the never-ending editorial duties performed by him. Similarly, Tony Winter excelled in his role as Webmaster and I do thank him for the many hours of work he devoted to the task.

It was also most pleasing to see the success of the functions held by Wendy for the ladies associated with our club and particularly the recent Fashion Parade where some $2,200 was raised and donated to the Stroke Association of Queensland.

Throughout the year, I have endeavoured to involve all members in the club's social and service related activities and I thank all members for their respective participation and for the many other tasks undertaken over the course of the year. We shared some memorable times with some of the social activities such as the long weekend to the Bunya Mountains and the week's fishing trip to Fraser Island.

I extend my very best wishes to President-Elect Bruce and his board for the coming Rotary year. I believe that our club is in fine form and that over the course of the past year we have, in some small way, made our world a better place.

As my journey through the Rotary year as President is now at an end, I conclude by saying that it truly has been one of the great experiences of my lifetime. Thank you for the opportunity to have served as President of this great club.

 

Wayne Stanton