Last meeting’s two minute talk by Stephen about the dogs that are being trained to detect illness in people, was very interesting. If it helps one person with early detection this has got to be a great.
On Thursday night Jim, Rob, Stephen and myself met up with the Balclutha Rotary Club, and four from the Taieri Rotary Club, to cook a BBQ for them after they had a guided tour of McLay Boats. Thanks, Steve - It was a good night and it was lucky that Jim doubled the meat order as all the food was clean up.
Guest speaker on the 11th October will be ORC Harbourmaster, Steve Rushbrook, and it sounds like he has had an interesting career.
So, keep the wind in your face, be safe and look out to others that may need help.
A large group of Milton Rotary Club members, partners, friends and special guests met at the Milton Country Club on Monday 6 July for the annual change-over meeting where we celebrated the year that had been and looked forward to the year ahead. Outgoing President Jackie Muir handed over the chains of office to incoming President Stephen Woodhouse.
Special guests for the evening included immediate past District Governor Tania Lowery and Phil Atkinson, Milton Fire Brigade representatives, Robbie Phillips and Alan & Lorraine Tapp.
Our evening was catered by Kelly and her team and, as usual, was an excellent meal.
Milton Fire Brigade Chief, Robbie Phillips, was the guest speaker at changeover night. He thanked the Rotary Club for a donation of $1500 made last month. The Milton Fire Brigade is 118 years old and Robbie gave us an interesting run down of the history of the brigade in Milton.
Early appliances were a brand new 1955 S Bedford, which has been restored and bought back by the fire brigade, and a TK Bedford - an open back truck. In 1974, the Fire Board built a new Fire Station in Milton at a cost of $80k. There were 50-60 calls per year, mostly fires. All the members were male and generally within walking distance of the station.
Late in the 70s more car accidents were occurring and specialist equipment such as a rescue bag, can opener and sledge hammers had to be purchased. Rotary and Lions later helped with the funding of a jaws for life and other specialist equipment.
The Milton Fire Brigade station was upgraded 4 to 5 years ago. There are now four large electric doors and heating is kept on to dry the uniforms (not like the old days!). There are two new appliances which can carry 2000L of water and a large amount of Class A foam.
The rescue equipment the brigade now carry is as good as any brigade in New Zealand. The training for firefighters is now much more intense and specialised than previously.
In Milton there are 24 members and they now cover 120 calls per year, 20% of which are fire related, 35% accidents, 10 % medical and the rest false alarms. Sometimes the brigade is very short on crew numbers due to a combination of shift work and members working out of town. The fire brigade is an essential service and often during Covid-19 there were only 5 members available.
Robbie expressed his thanks to the local employers for allowing their employees to leave when called on for an emergency.
Jenny Scott gave a vote of thanks to Robbie for sharing the information with us and for what he does for our community.
On Monday evening, past Milton Fire Chief, Alan Tapp was presented with a Paul Harris Fellow for his services to the Volunteer Fire Brigade and the community. Alan had almost 50 years with the local fire brigade. During that time he was involved with teams that won many Otago Southland competitions. Alan was on the regional competition panel for 6 years and the New Zealand competition panel for 6 years. He was the Fire Chief of the Milton Brigade for 18 years.
Jenny Scott thanked Alan for his years of commitment and presented the award to him on behalf of the club. She talked of memories of numerous family gatherings where Uncle Alan had to leave in a hurry to attend a fire, taking whichever car was at the front.
Alan thanked the club for the honour. His reason for joining the brigade was “for the community.”
Congratulations to Alan for being awarded the Paul Harris Fellow - a well-deserved recognition to go along with his Queen’s Service Medal.
Our trusty team of auctioneer,Tiff, and handy sidekick, Kerry, auctioned off a range of items left over from late last year. A total of XXX was raised. Phil Atkinson walked away happily with a bottle of Tiff’s home brew for a mere $35 - he seemed pretty happy.
Janine Dunlop reported on the 2019/20 tramping season. It was an interesting season with flooding early in the season and with covid-19. Seven trips had to be cancelled and 159 people refunded. Fifteen trips, involving 280 people, went ahead - all trips were very successful with many people returning from previous years. Janine announced that the tramping club were donating $50k to the Rotary Club and $50 to the Otago Youth Adventure Trust. This was an outstanding effort for a disrupted season.
Stephen Woodhouse, president of the OYAT, reported on the work of trust and the camps - Berwick, Tautuku and Sutton. Business was going along very well this year then along came covd. Business literally stopped overnight. They did manage to continue to employ all the staff, some ended up doing some maintenance work. Numerous projects have been completed at the camps over the break. It is expected to be mid-August to September before the camps start again.
The Trust has created a new position - Operations Manager and Steve Prescott (ex DCC) has been appointed to the position, starting at the end of August. The role involves overseeing the camp wardens and providing coordination between the camps. The Operations Manager will be involved in promotions of the OYAT facilities and will put in place a good structure around maintenance and operation of facilities.
Although there has been no income since lockdown, grants from the Otago Community Trust and the Tramping Club have meant they are in a sound financial situation.
Jackie reported on a year which was like no other in terms of a Rotary year. She did confirm that as a club we donated $69,000 in the past financial year, the majority of which has gone to our local community.
Jackie thanked her team of Directors for their support for the year and wished Stephen all the best for the year ahead.
As our new President, Stephen thanked Jackie for her work in leading the club over the past year. He shared with us the International theme for the new Rotary year - Rotary Opens Opportunities.
Oceania - 100 years of Rotary this year.
The Rotary Club of Milton was first accepted by Rotary International on 10 July 1947 - 73 years ago, and was formerly chartered the following year.
Stephen believes that covid-19 will lead to new challenges in our community we need to be thinking about. Our first club meeting for the 2020/21 year will be a time of strategising.
We thank Stephen for taking on the role of club president and look forward to working under his leadership this year.
Rotary Balclutha and Milton clubs are hosting a ‘Meet the Candidates’ community meeting prior to September’s NZ election – ‘save the date’ for Thursday 13 August. Venue Balclutha Town & Country Club.
Working Bee - St Mary's School garden - Saturday 1 August 9.00am
On Monday evening, past Milton Fire Chief, Alan Tapp was presented with a Paul Harris Fellow for his services to the Volunteer Fire Brigade and the community. Alan had almost 50 years with the local fire brigade. During that time he was involved with teams that won many Otago Southland competitions. Alan was on the regional competition panel for 6 years and the New Zealand competition panel for 6 years. He was the Fire Chief of the Milton Brigade for 18 years.
