In this October Bulletin you will find:
Enjoy

The President Speaks

Programmes and Social Calendar for October
 A copy of Kevin Woodley’s speaking note on the proposed change for the Garden Trail

A media release on our upcoming Bookfair.
The President Speaks!!
Greetings Fellow Lions
Yippee, Spring is here, and what terrific weather we have been experiencing in the first few days of daylight saving. Let’s hope it keeps up. Plenty of daylight hours now and good weather to socialise and get into recreational activities and of course our gardens, which are now starting to bloom and show off their best.
Talking about gardens.
At our last tea meeting, 3 rd
VP Kevin Woodley updated the Club on next year’s January Garden Trail and spoke about his committee’s concerns with the project continuing to be held in January. In his presentation Kevin suggested that the Club consider moving the timing of the Super Garden Trail from January to mid/late November, commencing in November 2016. The Garden Trail that is being organised at the moment, for January 2016, will go ahead as normal. A copy of Kevin’s presentation notes is attached.
I have has asked that Directors raise this matter at their October Committee meetings, so that the
Directors can report back to the Board with the feedback at the 22 October Board meeting. It is proposed that a decision regarding this matter will be made at the Tea Meeting on 12 th November
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2015. Please give serious thought to this project as you all will be aware that this is the major fundraiser for our Club.
In last month’s Bulletin I mentioned that the
Fertiliser Sales driven by Rob McNay had exceeded previous year’s takings. Congratulations/thanks to Rob for doing a fantastic job and also thanks to those members who helped out with order and the deliveries on 12 September, which all went without a hiccup apart from someone having their car locked in Dricon, after
(apparently) being told not to leave cars there. Some people never really listen!! Sorry about that Rob. I guess the Tail Twister can’t fine twice for such a misdeed.
A reminder of our next major project the Combined Book Fair 16/17 th October with our major effort starting on 15 th October tea meeting. That is where we will be having a “fish and chip” night followed by a working bee to help set up the books in the hall for the Fair. As much help as possible on these activities would be much appreciated.
The 8 th
October is our 10 Pin Bowling night which should be a lot of fun and it would be great if we have a lot of members and spouses support this social event.
The Membership and Promotion committee have been working hard updating our membership application form to reflect Waikanae Club rather than LCI. Director Kevin Aickin and his team are also working on a brochure to promote our Club and attract more membership. In particular
Kevin and 2 nd
VP Tony Lester had put a lot of work into this and we will have something out soon. Also Tony Lester has started the ball rolling on our website and its continuing development. Have a peek and see what you think. Tony and Kevin are also preparing a paper on future membership options.
Last Saturday 26 th
September I attended a District 202M Regional all day training workshop in
Wellington. The topics included project management, conflict resolution and membership recruitment and retention. The workshop was very informative with very good presentations.
Don’t forget it’s nearly Christmas Cake and Hamper time. Warwick Allen is working on orders and will be distributing these to members soon.
Finally, a big welcome to Lion Bob Beasley who has been recently inducted, and I would ask all members to make Bob feel at home and include him in all activities. We look forward to Bob’s participation and in due course see his profile in the Bulletin.
That’s all for now
Yours in Lions
Prez Terry
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Programmes and Socials Programme for October
Thursday 8 Tenpin bowling at Kapiti bowling alley followed by dinner : Wives and partners are invited to this fun night. A separate flyer will be sent out with all the detail. The members of
Kapakapanui club will also be invited to this evening.
Tuesday 13 the second bus tour of the by-pass construction. No cost. All the seats are allocated and coach leaves the Paraparaumu station at 1 00 pm returning at 3 00 pm. Rob Thornton will be there with the tickets. A reminder flyer will be sent out to those going on the tour.
Thursday 15 Fish and Chip evening . This meeting is the setting up of the book fair tables and books in the Waikanae Memorial hall.
Thursday 22 would normally be a club meeting night, but being so soon after the book fair there will be no club meeting. A board meeting will be held at President Terry’s home that evening.
Rob Thornton
Programmes and Socials Director
Kevin Woodley’s Speaking Notes
WAIKANAE LIONS SUPER GARDEN TRAIL
BULLET POINTS FOR SPEAKING TO LIONS TEA MEETING
THURSDAY 24 SEPTEMBER 2015

Garden Trail in January 2016 will be the 19th. Ask the question "Is it time for a bit of a difference?"

I want to put a case to Waikanae Lions that we hold our next Garden Trail (after the one being organised now for January 2016) in mid/late November 2016.
I am happy to have a discussion this evening but do not require a decision at this stage as, I appreciate, that you have had no time to consider this in any detail. Also, there is a large number of apologies this evening.

I will e-mail to you all these notes so that you have all of the information that I am going to present this evening.

I was hoping to raise the matter again and get a decision at the first Tea Meeting in
October. However, that is the 10 Pin Bowling evening and the second meeting in
October is the Fish and Chip night for the Book Fair. Neither of these have a business
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agenda. If this is discussed at committee meetings in October, Directors can report back to the October Board meeting. A decision can then be made in the first tea meeting in
November.

The reasons for considering a change in date, fall generally into two headings: o the popularity of the event; o the difficulty in getting suitable gardens.
Popularity of the Event

In January 2015, the gross takings and number of attendees were quite a bit lower than either of the previous two years (2013 and 2014) - directly comparable with the cost of tickets being $20 in each year. Reduction of 21% in gross takings and an estimated 28% reduction in attendees.

Don't get me wrong - the 2015 Garden Trail was a successful project raising $32,000 and could have been affected by the very hot temperatures, but the trend is heading south.

In the years 2007 - 2012 there was a gradual increase in gross takings and patronage reaching the high point in 2013.

Should we ask the question - is the format getting a bit stale? Should we try something a bit different?

This, in itself, would not be a compelling reason for moving the timing of the event.
Garden Trails have been successful. We have contributed over $550k to community groups over the years. However, if the popularity continues to wane this could be put at risk.

It is the second issue that does present a different picture.
Availability of Gardens

While a reduction in patronage is a disturbing trend, another issue is at the core of the whole Garden Trail - the availability of the gardens themselves!!

Over the past 18 Garden Trails there have been in excess of 200 gardens shown - some more than once. There would have been, at least, 5 times that number who have said
"no". To a large degree we are approaching the same pool of resource and it is getting harder each year to fulfil our quota of around 12 gardens. In January 2016, 5 of the 12 gardens we have managed to obtain have been on previous Garden Trails.

We do not want to lower our standards just for the sake of finding 12 garden owners who are willing to have their gardens on display.

There are a variety of reasons why gardeners turn us down: o not interested in showing their gardens; o concern regarding invasion of privacy; o family circumstances mean that it is impractical; o they consider their gardens are not good enough.
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
However, there is one reason that is becoming much more common - "Our garden is much better in the spring period. If the Garden Trail was held in spring we would consider entering!"

The January 2016 Garden Trail will be my third as Convenor. I know that some of you have been involved in organising the Garden Trails for many years. I therefore suspect that the question of the timing of the Garden Trail has been raised in the past.

However, I wish to raise this topic again and suggest that we hold a Garden Trail in mid/late November 2016.

Historically, the Garden Trail has been held in the last weekend in January because, as far as I can tell, it is considered that: o the weather is more settled, therefore the chances of a wet weekend are much less, o there possibly are still some holiday makers present in Waikanae, o there are no other Lions projects at that time, o other reasons that I am not aware of.

Climate o It is true that January is dryer and warmer than November. However, not to a marked degree. A number of graphs and statistics are available. o Average high temperatures

November 17 degrees celsius,

January 21 degrees celsius o Average rainfall

November 89 mm

January 79 mm o Average number of wet days

November 9.6

January 7 o Driest month
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November - 4th
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January - 2nd o As I mentioned before, It could be said that one of the reasons for a smaller turnout in January 2015 was that the weekend was so hot that people decided not to attend. Is January too hot?

As you all know, gardens do dry out over the summer period (especially by late January) and considerable watering is required to maintain their quality. The introduction of water meters has had an impact in this regard and some people are hesitant to offer their gardens for this reason.

Holiday Makers
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o The end of January is still school holidays - however we need to consider who our market audience is. It is not school kids, although it could be the parents of school kids. o Stats from recent garden trails show that 70% of those attending were outside of
Waikanae and 45% from outside of the greater Kapiti region. o If they come in January why wouldn't they come in November?

Other Events Around November o Waikanae Lions projects:

Book Fair - mid October

Telephone directory delivery - early November o A Garden Trail in mid/late November would not be too onerous on members - the main activity is sitting at a gate collecting tickets and money - it is not manually labour intensive. o Other activities in Waikanae :

Arts Trail - early November

Various fairs and day events o Karori Lions Garden Trail, mid November - would this impact?

In my view, it is time to make a change. We could mark our 20th Garden Trail with a point of difference in mid/late November 2016.

The organising of that would need to commence straight after the January 2016 Garden
Trail. A challenge, but one that can be met.
It is appreciated that members have not had a chance to consider this. Happy to receive any comments now. A copy of these notes will be e-mailed to you all and hopefully we can reach a decision at the 12 th of November tea meeting.
Media Release
65,000 publications stacked up for Lions Monster Bookfair
The 18 th
Lions Monster Bookfair, will open at 8am on Saturday October 17 in the Waikanae
Memorial Hall and will continue until 2pm on Sunday 18 th
. More than half a million dollars, proceeds from past bookfairs, have been distributed to the community since Lions began the project in 1998, as will also happen with this fair.
Bookfair project manager Peter Cresswell says about sixty-five thousand books have been sorted and packed.
“There’s plenty of fiction, travel, cooking, gardening, hobbies, biographies, New Zealand and other titles, puzzles and games and musical material – enough to satisfy everyone on the whole of the Kapiti Coast at least until next year’s bookfair,” Peter says.
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Unlike last year, no ancient books have been found . In 2014, two turned up, one 264 years old and the other published in 1668! Both were gifted to the Alexander Turnbull Library. Stories from other years have featured the biggest, smallest, most novel finds, along with tales of money accidently left between pages and pages hollowed to hide a pistol.
Nothing quite so exotic surfaced this year, but among the more unusual finds is a Thomas the
Tank Engine published in Japanese. Also, three private photo albums have turned up. Owners of two have been identified. Packing and sorting team member Anna Upton says she studied the albums and in one, featuring pictures of a Paraparaumu residential section under development and the progressive building of a house included a picture of a truck with the builder’s name on the door. Anna searched the phone directory and found a builder of that name who sent his daughter to examine the find and she and her father were delighted to be reunited with the album.
The second album’s ownership was established even more by chance. Anna found the name
’Connie’ on one snap. She had a friend of that name whom she called for ideas.
It wasn’t the correct Connie but the friend guessed who the correct one might be, by now resident in a retirement village, which turned out to be correct and the album was reunited with its owner. It had been accidentally disposed of when she moved out of her house into the village.
The third unidentified album has photos of a trip to Texas and what seems to be the southern
USA. Anna says other photos have been found amongst the books and will be displayed on a board at the Bookfair where owners’ relatives or friends can claim them.
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