President’s Report 2017
It is with pleasure that I hand down my Presidents Report for 2016/17 reflecting on the work that was done in 2016 and the early part of this year.
The last twelve months have been very busy for our club and without the willingness of a small band of volunteers on the course, in administration and the bar area we would really struggle to keep this golf club going. I would like to acknowledge some of the work that has taken place during 2016/17.
The course is looking in an excellent condition and we have received some great comments from visitors and recently from the Tasmanian Senior Ladies who played here in February. This is only due to our course volunteers in Ossie Woodiwiss, Les Plumbridge, Gary Ritchie, Warren West, Keith Fox, Bill Turner, Garry Cross, Leigh Darcy, Peter Florrisen, and Paul Bolton who have maintained our course during a period of extremely wet weather and now dry weather. During 2016 there were 5 months where we recorded the highest monthly rainfall reading since records were kept. We are lucky that a number of these members have a lot of mechanical skills and they have saved us a lot of labour costs in conducting on-site maintenance, sharpening reels and servicing our equipment.
Early in the year we reviewed our course machinery and we decided to purchase another mower to support the work performed by 72 inch Kubota. After reviewing the various types and brands of mowers we purchased a Toro 7200 Ground Master Diesel mower which has been a real asset to our fleet and has become the workhorse cutting not only the rough but also the fairways.
The major course project over the last 12 months was the construction of the dam (water hazard) on the 4th fairway. Although this project may have not had 100% support from day one, I believe it has gathered support once members have seen the finished product and the 4th hole will be the feature hole on our course in years to come. It will also solve the continual problem we have had over many years with the wet area in front of the 4th green. I would like to thank Geoton for the work they performed in the design, construction and consultation to gain construction approval from the George Town Council and Bell Bay Aluminium. I must also mention Terry Street for his time in co-ordinating the work.
Our Annual Tournament was again successful due to the hard work put in by Terry Street and his small team of Ben Bishop, Robbie Johns, Kurt Davies, Ossie Woodiwiss, Paul Bolton and Merv Walton. I would also like to thank Elly and our Ladies who provide lunch at our annual tournament, also to Annette Bryan and Pam Ritchie for assisting us at the Veteran’s Tournament this year. The Golf Club also thanks the donors for the Annual and the Veteran’s Tournaments. We had the largest number of sponsors that I can recall. These are too numerous to mention, however they are listed on our notice board in the clubrooms. I would like to thank Kurt for the effort and time to seek out a number of excellent donations.
As mentioned in my report last year the vets numbers continue to fall and this trend has continued through 2016 and into 2017 with now a smaller numbers travelling to NE events as well as the various vets tournaments around the north. This reduction in numbers of veteran golfers is occurring across most golf clubs in Tasmania. I would like to acknowledge the work Terry Street and his small band do in organising the NE vet’s days. I would also like to acknowledge and thank our ladies for providing meals for the NE Vets., in particular Annette Bryan, Carol Cassidy and Pam Ritchie.
Last year we had a number of events at the club and that is reflected in the increase in bar trade. I would like to thank Peter Florrisen for all the work he does behind the bar and to David for assisting Peter from time to time and for his work in the Secretary/Treasurer role.
In thanking people I would like to take this opportunity to thank Robbie Johns for maintaining our Golf Link / handicap system. Almost an automated system like those of our major courses as Robbie updates them before we have our presentations that day. Also, my thanks to Alex Dustan who looks after our website and updates the results each week.
The club would like to thank Tamar Cakes who have come on board in 2016 and sponsored the three rounds and final of the Winter Cup. They are sponsoring the event again this year.
Late last year Bell Bay Aluminium as an apprentice project replaced all our clubhouse downlights lights inside and out with LED’s. Switchboard modifications and general upgrades were also done at a cost of $5,000. These modifications will also have a financial impact on us though ongoing power savings for the club. I would like to acknowledge and thank Bell Bay Aluminium for the work and potential savings they have passed onto us.
This year we have entered two Pennant teams which are playing in Div. 2 and Div. 8. It is great to see our lower handicappers playing in a challenging Division. We wish the both teams every success. I would like to thank Robbie Johns and Jason Davidson for the work they have done in organising and captaining the teams. This year our teams will look smarter as we will be wearing GTGC team pennant shirts and I would like to thank Miles Baker for his wonderful sponsorship of our team shirts.
Recently the George Town Golf Club Ladies have advised us that they have set aside $7,000 for specific projects. These are, painting and adjusting some of the cupboards in the ladies toilets, new sinks and taps in the men’s toilets, updating the seating around the course. Any money left over would go towards a replacement greens mower which will be our next purchase at some time. We will commence on the work within the clubhouse in coming months while the repairing and replacing of seats will take place during winter.
I would like this opportunity to congratulate all the Club Champions.
In closing I would like to again thank all those members who helped in anyway during 2016 to make this great and enjoyable club to play golf at.
I would also like to thank all the members of the Board for the work they do during the year and for giving up their time to run our Golf Club. .
Steve Pryer
March 2017
