President Ian’s Vision For The Coming Year
28th June 2011
Madam Mayor, Honoured Guests, Fellow Rotarians, Ladies and Gentlemen
I suppose all new Presidents quote the hackneyed phrase “What a hard act to follow”; well it is only too true. John and other Presidents have come to the job with much greater experience in Rotary, than I have. I am certainly daunted by taking over from John and I come forward as your President with great trepidation. I know that to follow John will be very difficult. I only hope I can rise to the challenge and be worthy as your President.
Thank you John for your leadership over the past Rotary year. There is no doubt that you have moved the Club forward and in particular you have recognised there was a need to review our processes and procedures. A good start has been made on this but there is still much more work to do. Your guidance to take this forward within the rules and regulations of Rotary and achieve a degree of informality in their execution has been exemplary and maintained fellowship.
I do hope you have enjoyed your Presidential year and the time you have given to being our President has not kept you, for to long away from your first love – Golf.
What of this coming year? Let me start by thanking all Committee Chairmen who have agreed to serve for a further year. This has been a considerable help to me. I also welcome those who are chairing a Committee for the first time. I am sure the members of your committee will offer you their full support. I am aware of some of your programme and look forward to seeing your full plans.
We will be continuing to support important and caring organisations including The Countess of Brecknock Hospice, Andover Young Carers, Hampshire Air Ambulance and other local Charities.
Our Charity Dinner and Golf Day will be our major fund raising events. I would also like to see another Rotary Production if our Thespians can create yet another Rotary mystery. Those who participated enjoyed themselves and many of us and our friends were entertained. We will also be seen at one of the local supermarkets at Christmas and at Thruxton in the summer shaking our buckets even if it is raining. Seeing us out there is a reminder to the public that we are around. We will have to make it clear who we are collecting for.
We will continue to support the International causes we are involved in as well as responding, with the publics help, to any disasters that seem to occur only too frequently.
Another priority function is our liaison with our Secondary Schools including organising the highly successful and ever popular competitions, Youth Speaks, Young Chef and more recently Young Photographer. They offer inspiration to all as well as those competing. We should attempt to open the entry to those schools who do not presently participate.
We see increasing our membership as a priority. Our membership committee will be following up prospective members who expressed an interest at our Open Evening last year. We would hope that all members will also make every effort to attract friends and neighbours who are likeminded and who may wish to join us.
We will continue our support of Rotary’s own charity –“The Rotary Foundation” which does so much good. For many years we have taken part in and made a major contribution to the Group Study Exchange programme. This year we will stand back and allow other clubs to take the lead. We will of course give every assistance to the visiting students and help where possible. We will continue to give our full support to the Rotary and Bill Gates Challenge Project for the world wide eradication of Polio. We are now so close to the beating this terrible and devastating disease. I only wish The World Health Organisation along with Mr Gates would publicly give us the credit we deserve for all the efforts Rotary has made. Our club has already achieved our target for contributions to this programme.
We are proposing to send a number of students on the District Youth Leadership Award scheme as we have done over the last few years. John Ray who was such a driving force behind RYLA and developed it to its present size has decided to step down. We will be looking for another member of the club to become involved.
Arcadia, the John Ray and John Barlow duo, continue with their programme of entertaining both Rotary Clubs and other organisations around our District and further afield. We have managed to secure a booking for our Christmas Party despite their very full diary.
I am sure that Nigel will continue to organise our sporting challenges and our Boule training sessions at the Clatford Arms which are now a major social event for both Rotarians and wives. I also hope the Community Committee will continue with Peters work in organising trips to local industries and other social events.
I would like to welcome Mick Mundy President Elect of our daughter club Andover Anton. I very much hope we can develop a relationship between our two clubs to give assistance to each other when we are both looking for additional resources. I also welcome Mary Armstrong President of Andover Inner Wheel and her ladies who always show boundless enthusiasm. We will continue to give you our full support.
Ladies and Gentleman, thank you for listening. I look forward to serving the Club to the best of my abilities. John I hope you can now get down to improving you handicap at golf but I am sure you will not be neglecting the Club. We need your expertise and guidance.
