2017 AGM Minutes
Minutes of the 45th Annual General Meeting of the WCG (2017)
- Venue
- Johnsonville Scout Hall on August 10th 2017
- Minutes
- taken by Guy Dubuis
- Present
- Arvid Hunze, Guy Dubuis, Macus Lawson, James Lawson, Sam Lawson, Anna Stewart, Nicole Miller, Barry Cullen, Prue Cullen, Simon Davis, Walter Jobstl, Gavin Holden, Chris Cheer, Lance Stewart
- Non-members present
- Shuemei Zhong, David McCarthy, Joe Turner’steele
- Apologies
- John Lewin
Officers reports
- The meeting minutes of the AGM 2016 read and seconded by Walter. There are no open points to raise.
- President's report, gear officer report and librarian report read by Arvid and seconded by Guy. See below.
- Treasurers report read by Anna and seconded by Barry. The main point to raise is that the club lost 6 members last year and we are now 30. See below.
- Arvid proposes to keep subs constant, seconded by Nicole
- Balance sheet, read and seconded by Nicole
- No report from the secretary.
The AGM is declared open at 19h50 by Arvid.
Election of officers
Arvid proposes to step down as president and take the role of treasurer, and Anna will stand as president. Simon steps down from the committee
- Anna nominated by Barry as President, seconded by Nicole and unanimously elected.
- Arvid nominated by Barry as Treasurer, seconded by Nicole and unanimously elected.
- Guy nominated by Barry as Secretary, seconded by Nicole and unanimously elected.
- Arvid accepts to stay as Gear Officer and Librarian, and is unanimously elected.
- Gavin accepts to stay Safety Coordinator, seconded by Walter and is unanimously elected.
- Fuzzy (absent) has accepted to stay SumpThink editor, and is unanimously elected.
- Walter and Rob happy to stay Committee Members, unanimously elected.
- Marcus is nominated as a new Committee Member by Guy, seconded by Arvid and unanimously elected.
Upcoming trips
- Megamania expedition to be organised by Anna, tentative dates are 27th December to 2nd January 2018. This will allow people to combine it with the Bulmer expedition. We need a minimum participation of 10 in order to pay for the helicopter transport. The trip will be open to other clubs, but priority given to WCG members.
- Puketiti trip organised by Anna (9-14 December 2017)
- Honeycomb cave 30 Sept to 1st October with Kerry, organised by Anna o Bulmer 4 to 14th of January
- Waitangi weekend trip to Wakapunaki organised by Arvid
- Easter trip to Paturau, Arvid will organise a trip the week following the Easter WE
either Takaka hill or the Westcoast.
- Christmas BBQ will be organised by Barry
General business
- Chris asked if gear hire could be free. Arvid says we should at least cover the cost of replacement of the gear. Some replacement is scheduled for next month, and Arvid thanks Guy for the donation of a new harness. The hire prices have been simplified and reduced at the last committee meeting.
- Website:
- Simon will continue supporting it as webmaster, but requests club members to take over the contents.
- Barry points out that the club has a full sarex kit, but we are missing Michiephone wire, $600 of the estate of Arthur Norgrove were specifically donated for the replacement of the wire. We should get approx. 1km of wire in a few spools. Arvid will ask Oz for the exact specifications and order it.
- Club night: Arvid has already organised the first few nights to help Anna in her new role as president.
- Next club night Marcus Thomas will present his new book.
- Lance will pull out his slides and show a few pictures of WCG in the early times.
- One club night should focus on Survey training (Disto, Therion training). A possible location would be the tunnels at Wrights Hill. We need to ask for access, but this has been done in the past.
- Lance request a club night to discuss best use of GPS (Handheld and smartphone)
- Introductions to cave photography.
Pru tells us that Arthur had been running such a course at Wrights hill fortress in the past. This is a cave-like location in Wellington that is well suited. It could also be good for survey practice. Arvid announces that there is an upcoming photography course in Waitomo. More details will follow
- Barry, Anna, Arvid and Simon will go together to the bank to add needed signatures for access to the account.
- Discussion if we should create a central register for GPS coordinates of caves. Lance remarks that some caves have been lost in the past because of the absence of such a registry. Simon would be happy to coordinate such a registry. Barry remarked that the management of coordinates is a task for NZSS. It is true that in NZ we are overly protective of our caves. But this has good reasons. This year we lost access PT17 in Makuri, as the farmer no longer want cavers on his property. Thankfully we still have access to Crash and Famous 5. Middle Earth was closed for a while but is now accessible again. An example of a cave that was not enough protected is Cilfton cave in Otago : it is completely destroyed.
- Barry volunteered to write a Carbide lamp history, and Martinborough caving history for Sumpthink.
- Walter asked if anyone has heard of Mike Wood. Pru contacted him recently, but she did not hear back. We need to keep in touch as he has a very large collection of picture of the early times of WCG
- Guy asked about the history of a printed letterhead and WCG logo. Mike Corburne designed the original one. Simon will ask John Millen about more details.
The AGM is declared closed by the president at 20h50.
WCG Presidents report 2017
Another year gone, time travels fast underground.
This was a pretty quiet year in my presidential role, I was more concentrated on keeping the club running than starting new initiatives.
The usual things went well: we always had a club night (some well attended), a Christmas barbecue, a few SRT trainings, some good trips to our patches nearby, a trip to Whakapunake even including a bit exploration (to be repeated next year) and good attendance at NZZS meetings AGM in Waitomo, Paterau and Charleston.
Thanks to all officers, fellow committee members and people who stood up for club night.
Biggest change was probably finding our new club rooms here in Johnsonville, it is a good place and we will hopefully enjoy it for a long time. Thanks again to everybody helping to find these new rooms especially Lance and Marcus.
Also on the positive side we had more new people approaching us as potential new member’s, hopefully some will stay and get involved in the club. There will be more trips in the coming summer around here for newcomers and Anna and me have some plans for larger undertakings in the south in Jan and around Easter, this needs a week but will get you to a lot of or big caves and new areas. Also many thanks to all members running trips and events, that is the essence what keeps the club alive.
Since I am tied up bit more at work and my role in the NZSS and Anna is motivated and has ideas for new initiatives I am happy to step down as president and work more in the background, taking on the role as treasurer. To make my future job easier please pay your subs timely, there is also a constitution change coming up reducing the grace period to end of the year.
I am looking forward to next year good trips club nights discoveries and most of all good fun.
Gear officer and librarian
There was not many use of the club gear apart form one or 2 SRT trips. I expect more usage next year when we have a few SRT trips for new people, who probably doesn’t want to commit to 800 $ gear straight away. Therefore, and because the gear was updated last time 10 years ago the committee decided that we upgrade our SRT gear to make it more beginner friendly and safe. Also, we decided to change the hire to daily rather than weekend base since we have now more day trips than WCG used to have. Last year we also got an old stretcher to practice from HTG (and already tested it) and finally we also got our new shinny rescue gear marked, thanks to Anna and Gavin. Librarian now interest in library last year.
Financial Report for the year ending 31 July 2017
Our club bank account can now be accessed online and now all payments out are made by internet banking with two to authorise. It is linked to the email wcg-treasurer@wcg.org.nz which will be passed onto the next treasurer.
During the year the club decreased its membership by net 6 members with total membership now 30.
We posted a small surplus for the year of $402.06 and put $3000 on term deposit. Our bank account now stands at $1,811.56 having started the year at $4,517.50. I would suggest the next club treasurer continues to put the majority of the clubs funds on term deposit, perhaps a mix of short and long term options.
We had no major expenditure items this year but did provide nibbles and drinks plus giving our farmers some caving calendars.
My recommendation for WCG subs is to hold them at the current level being $20.00 for full membership and $10.00 for adult Family/Partner and free for children of members.
Anna
WCG Treasurer
INCOME AND EXPENDITURE STATEMENT FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 JULY 2017
| Updated 29 09 2016 | ||
| $ | $ | |
| 2017 | 2016 | | |
| Subscriptions WCG | $430.00 | $530.00 |
| Subscriptions NZSS | $855.00 | $1,135.00 |
| Carbide Sales | $0.00 | $0.00 |
| Gear Hire | $70.00 | $90.00 |
| Donations | $55.00 | $0.00 |
| Interest | $0.40 | $0.71 |
| TOTAL INCOME | $1,410.40 | $1,755.71 |
| Less EXPENDITURE | ||
| NZSS Subscriptions & Donations | ($880.00) | $1,170.00 |
| Gear purchases Cave Labelling | $0.00 | $0.00 |
| WCG AGM Nibbles | ($62.16) | $0.00 |
| Courier of Books | $0.00 | $17.00 |
| Calendars for farmers | $54.00 | $76.35 |
| Domain Name | ($28.75) | $28.75 |
| Web Hosting | ( $91.43) | $91.43 |
| TOTAL EXPENSES | ($1,008.34) | $1,383.53 |
| SURPLUS INCOME OVER EXPENDITURE | $402.06 | $372.18 |