COMMODORE’S REPORT

It doesn’t seem that long ago that I sat down to pen (or type actually) my last Commodore’s Report for the December edition of Compass. December started off busy and it hasn’t really slackened off.

We had our Club Christmas party in early December which was a huge success. The food served by our galley was outstanding! A couple of days later those Members with children and grandchildren enjoyed an afternoon with Santa at the kids Christmas party. The festivities didn’t stop as we approached the Big Day! On Christmas Eve we enjoyed another fantastic night of celebration with the Christmas Eve buffet and again the galley provided excellent selections for all Members’ tastes. New Year’s Eve was the next big night of celebration where many members went to “Paris”.

Also during December we had a Special General Meeting to bring our Members up to date on our Q Jetty progress, the engineer’s report on the complete HYC jetty structures and our financial position.

The current situation regarding Q Jetty is that we have received the formal tenders for the replacement of Q Jetty to a floating jetty. We have a short list of suppliers who tendered on the project and the tenders came in very close to our original estimates and way under the figure that we requested finance approval from the Members earlier.

We have not awarded the project yet due to some technicalities with the bank. We have received conditional approval for finance from the bank for the project however one of the conditions is that we must declare ALL costs associated with the project, which is fair enough. One of these conditions regards the fire fighting water supply, which must be up to new standards and unfortunately our landlords Department of Transport cannot supply either the water pressure or the water flow required to meet these new standards. This water supply is a land based item and not covered under the tender for the jetty replacement. We have questioned the DoT regarding whose responsibility it is to upgrade and pay for the water supply system to meet the new standards and it has only been confirmed this week, that it is the responsibility of HYC to do this for our site. We are getting quotes now so that we can finalise our submission to the bank and then proceed with awarding the successful tenderer the project.

We did discuss all aspects of this with the DoT, who have been extremely helpful and given the estimates (between $50,000 up to $200,000) we put a number of arguments forward and asked many questions. It has taken DoT from late December until just now to give us a formal response to our questions.

Another slight glitch we have encountered is with the engineers’ report on the other jetties, we had two areas that came up with immediate investigation being required. The first was the VIP jetty, which we organised a more in depth survey and report and that came out showing that all is OK with that jetty and a safe working load of 800 people.

The other area of concern was R Jetty (fixed section) concrete finger jetties are in an unsafe condition and have been closed and require immediate replacement. We have investigated the possibility of replacing the existing concrete fingers with the aluminium fingers that are being removed from Q Jetty as they cannot be reused in the new floating system (these fingers were replaced a few years ago, same issues I understand as we have now on R Jetty). We have established that we can utilise these fingers from Q Jetty to R Jetty and will save a huge amount of money, but we are still up for around $150,000 . This will proceed as soon as we remove the fingers from Q Jetty. Completion date for Q Jetty is around June to July now.

A number of Members have already experienced a trip out or two on the new Club boat Alibi. It has had all of the upgrades fitted and working well with the exception of the bow thruster which is fitted, but waiting on parts to complete the electrical/hydraulic connections. Management have been working on the actual costing of the vessel to come up with a fare charge out rate for the sections of the Club who mainly use it. The fuel consumption is being constantly monitored and is currently using just on 50 litres per hour, which is very good. All other costs associated with the boat are known and hourly rate or rate per passenger is currently under investigation.

Feedback from some Club Members have indicated that they want a user pay policy for the Club boat, however the Management Committee is looking at some sort of subsidy and having a user contribution system whereby the users cover the full cost of fuel, maintenance, cost of replacement vessel and general running costs. The Club to cover pen costs, lifting etc. as a subsidy. This is yet to be finalised.

It would be a pity not to have a Club boat because the costs were prohibitive and not run junior fishing clinics and yachting that required a start boat. It is not only the Dive section and Angling section that use the Club boat. we as ordinary Members of course do not want to be covering the full burden for the cost of the boat though. It is all to do with being a Club rather than just a place to pen your boat.

In January the Club ran our Premier Yachting regatta, the Pot of Gold and the Dash for Cash.

The number of participants was good for the Pot of Gold and also for the Dash for Cash. I understand the day was well supported by Members and participants. Unfortunately I could not make the day and thank Vice Commodore Mark Taylor for taking over the presentations and welcoming everyone. I was at Narrow Neck on Rottnest Island with the Power Section participating in their annual Australia Day activities (my wife Maree is on the organising committee for this event) where we had over 70 Members galivanting on the beach. Both the Power Section and the Cruising in Company Division support the Pot of Gold regatta, by vacating their pens for the weekend to allow visiting yachts to have accommodation for the regatta, so thanks to those Members who gave up their pens. For those who are wondering too, the annual spaghetti eating competition at Narrow neck, was not won by Paul the Vacuum Skinner as he was a no show, but by Dean Suck it Up Haines. A good show by those who entered.

Also in January we held our inaugural Progressive Dinner with HYC and MAAC. Fifty Members from each club participated with the HYC Members catching the bus from our Club to the MAAC for canapes and entrée and a welcome drink. This was very nice, especially the oysters! We then jumped back on board and headed back to HYC where we were again greeted with a drink and had our mains and dessert. The music was good, maybe a tad loud while we were eating, but following our meal, many took to the dance floor. A very good initiative and we will do it again.

We are organising another Special General meeting (SGM). This was announced at the last SGM in December and it is to change the Constitution by Special Resolution to give Management more flexibility with the nomination fees for new Members. As it is part of the Constitution, we require to give at least 45 days notice of the meeting, that is why it wasn’t done in December. We want to increase our Membership numbers and our current nomination fee of 200% of annual subscription is hampering our efforts and we are behind budget because of this. We are aiming to have a flexible fee between 25% and 200% that can be set by Management as conditions and Member numbers change.

We received the hydraulics engineering report for the fire system for Q Jetty today (8th Feb) and it appears that we can proceed with just putting a fire booster system in place for a costing at under $50,000, not the $200,000 spoken about a month ago. So by the time you read this edition of Compass, the replacement of Q Jetty will be well under way with the contract awarded.