Changeover Night 2019

Our Changeover dinner function occurred on Friday 28 June at the Celtic Club.  Over 40 people attended on the night including many guests who were invited as they had assisted us in the “service above self” that our club does so well. 

 

Our MC for the evening was Ray Findley, who did an excellent job of entertaining us with a continuous stream of humor, and kept the meeting moving on schedule.   Pip did an excellent job of presenting Certificates of Appreciation to several of our guests and expressing our gratitude to them for their ongoing support.  David summarised the year’s considerable achievements, and incoming President Peter outlined his goals for the year, details of which are repeated below.    The evening was thoroughly enjoyable and set us on a great footing for the coming year.

 

Outgoing President David Motta stated "This year has been a fantastic year for our Club, we have achieved many firsts.  We have contributed over $47000 cash to charity, in addition to the valuable items we have supplied, held our first FASD clinic, welcomed a team from Alaska, and sent a bright student to NSF, took over the management of the Colin Moore Community Centre and we have done this while having fun and enjoying ourselves.

 

 

By far the largest financial project we have tacked to date is out FASD project.  We launched this project in 2015, and set a fundraising target of $525,000 to run a clinic in Leonora in the goldfields for 2 years.  We worked with our district and have succeeded in raising $420,000 and opened the clinic in April.    Philanthropic grants were received from the Children Orchard Trust, Rotary International and the Stan Perron Foundation, and commercial grants received from a number of mining companies including Glencoe, Gold Fields, and Ashanti.   The first Clinic was held by the PATCHES paediatrics team in Leonora in April. This coincided with the visit of a team of experts from Alaska that Rotary arranged to come.  The clinic examined 6 young people and diagnosed 2 with FASD and 1 with potential FASD. Behavioural programs and advice has been provided and they will be followed up during the next clinic.  The highlight for the year was the visit of a team of 5 FASD experts from Alaska, who have been addressing this issue for over 10 years.  They provided training to health professionals, teachers, Police and youth Justice workers as well as community groups in Perth, Kalgoorlie and Leonora.  Some of our members home hosted our guests, we found them all wonderful people.  We learnt a lot from them, and they gained from us.  Our thanks go to Bruce and Bev Dufty, Dawn Brodie and Brian and Louise Hancock for their commitment to this project.  The work the clinic is doing will make a huge difference to the lives of a number of children in Leonora for decades.

The project we are probably best known for is our Cambodia Hospital Equipment Project, which is now in its 10^th year.  We shipped a further 7 containers to Cambodia this year 6, went to Public hospitals and 1 to a non-government hospital, Nokor Tep, an all-female hospital, bringing the total containers sent to Cambodia to 39. If we count the one we sent to Mongolia, we have shipped 40 full sized containers of hospital equipment over this time.  Included in our last shipment were 4 commercial washing machines and 1 drier, which were donated and reconditioned by Commercial Laundry Solutions with parts donated by Electrolux.  Our thanks go to Michael and Jodie Flowers, the owners of this firm, who are here tonight, who together with Kareen Dunlop went to Cambodia in Feb of this year to install the equipment and instruct staff on how to use them.  Dr. Tim Keenan recently observed that we are probably not aware of how much this project has benefited the people of Cambodia. He stated that a substantial proportion of the equipment in Cambodia’s public hospitals has been provided by Rotary and in particular our club.  Our thanks go to Pip for initiating this project, and for continuing to drive it, and to Vivian for continuing to supply us with equipment. 

 

The other major project that our Club is involved with is the Interplast Project, which is a district project but led by and driven by our own Steve Dixon. Steve recently presented at the Karrinyup Club, who make an annual contribution, and has been following up clubs as the year comes to an end for further donations.  He is expecting to raise $20-$25k by the end of the this year, thanks in part to individual club members who have privately contributed.   Interplast are sending a team of doctors to Myanmar this month.  Thanks Steve for your ongoing work and commitment.

These big projects tend to overshadow the good work done by lots of other smaller projects, which collectively are just as important.  Dawn, Terry and their team have collected over 300 pairs of spectacles and distributed them both locally and internationally.  We have also collected and distributed clothes, shoes, toys, jumpers and beanies to under privileged indigenous children and made donations to the Diabetes 1 Family Centre, the Australian Drought Relief Fund, the Salvation Army and Greenbatch.

 

Our Youth director, Lou, has sent a year 10 student to the RYPEN leadership training camp in May, two year 12 students to the RYLA leadership camp and sent the daughter of one of our previous members to the National Youth Science Forum in Canberra.  This is a highly sought after program for the next generation of our leaders in science.  During the year Alan and Brian finalized our arrangements with the City of Stirling for the lease of the Colin Moore Community Centre and negotiated an agreement with the Gwelup Community Corner Playgroup.  A new website for booking the facility has been set up.  The center returned us an income of over $16,000 for the year, and this is expected to grow.

The Club functions have been well managed this year by Louise Hancock, who arranged a selection of excellent guest speakers and 2 vocational visits, one to the Salvation Army Beacon Centre for the homeless and one to Woodlands Village.  The Sergeant sessions went extremely well with hilarious support from Mike Bando and Ray Findlay in particular.  Our records were faithfully kept and our compliance requirements diligently discharged by our secretary Peter Stewart, and our books meticulously kept by our treasurer Brian Hancock, with Ron Cole standing in on occasions for both tasks.

 

All of you should be tremendously proud of what we all have achieved this year.  Whilst the core of the club is its members, we could not have achieved this without the help of our supporters, many of whom are here tonight as our guests.  Thank you all for the great work we have done this year.  And specifically to our guests, you have been invited here tonight as a gesture of our appreciation for your support, thank you for your contribution.  I owe particular thanks to the support I have received from our team of directors, who have kept the club progressing.  Vice President Alan Cockram, who stepped in for me when I was away, Club Secretary Peter Stewart, Treasurer Brian Hancock, Club Services Director Louise Hancock, International Director Steve Dixon, Community and Vocational Director Dawn Brodie and Terry Jones and Youth Director Lou Marchesani.  Thank you all for your great work and for ensuring the success of the club. Clearly all of these achievements would not have occurred without considerable effort on your part.