AUSTRALIAN PUBLIC ACCESS NETWORK ASSOCIATION

Annual General Meeting for 1997


The APANA Annual General Meeting was held on the 26th of July, 1997. It was held in Canberra at at the Grace Christian Ministries Centre, at 28 Guilfoyle St, Yarralumla, ACT.

The meeting was chaired by the outgoing President, Adam Frey, and these minutes were taken by George Hansper.

Abbreviations:

The meeting was opened by the chairman, Adam Frey at 1:16pm, Saturday 27th July.

1. Welcome

The Chairman, Adam Frey, welcomed all members who came to the AGM and especially those who had travelled interstate to attend this meeting.

2. Credentials Report

Present:

Members

    Adam Frey (outgoing President)      Melbourne
    Garry Ford (outgoing Secretary)     Brisbane
    John Childs (outgoing Treasurer)    South Australia

    Peter Childs (MC member)        South Australia
    George Hansper (MC member)      Melbourne
    Paul McConnell (MC member)      ACT
    Rebecca Richards (MC member)        Sydney

    Robin Buckley               ACT
    Chris Cogdon                Melbourne
    Bryce Davies                Melbourne
    Sebastian Filzek            Melbourne
    Matthew Geier               Sydney
    Edwin Gibbons               ACT
    Rose Mallett                ACT
    Craig Miller                ACT
    Michael Moynihan            ACT
    Gavin Murphy                ACT
    Laurie Nelmes               ACT
    Scott Neville               Melbourne
    John Newnham                Melbourne
    Edwin Parsons               Melbourne
    Mark Purcell                ACT
Guests (a non member present as a guest of a member)
    Cindy Childs
    Dave Elliot
    Anne-Marie Nelmes
    Jenifer Sayers
    Suk Yee Seto
Apologies
    Benno Rentinck (regional co-ordinator)  Melbourne
Proxy voters
    Matt Jackson
    Geoff O'Callagham
    Jeremy Selby
    Zilah Williams
    John Maaz
    Ritcjie Geissler
    Susie Kaufman
    Bob Chambers
    Hilton Brown
    Martin Rheumer
    Chris Seedy
    Darren Perera
    Ron S. Tan
    Arthur Thomas
    Daniel Bonner
    Geoffrey Travers
Proxies were also received from Bernie Morey and Rev. C. Scott Kroeger, but these were not valid as neither gentleman were financial members at the time.

3. Minutes of 1996 Annual General Meeting

A motion to accept the minutes of the 1996 AGM was moved by Adam Frey. It was seconded by Rebecca Richards. The motion was passed unanimously.

4. Business Arising from 1996 Annual General Meeting

None

5. Correspondence to Annual General Meeting

Inward

None

Outward

5.1 Notices relating to AGM

The chairman thanked Garry Ford on behalf of the members for his efforts in mailing (by ordinary post) the AGM announcement to 101 members who did not have a valid e-mail address in the membership database, or were serviced by machines no longer part of the APANA network.

6. Annual Report

The outgoing President, Adam Frey, addressed the meeting, emphasising APANA's strengths as a national organisation.

Adam noted that volunteer effort is mostly unacknowledged and that this is a healthy situation in an organisation like APANA.

Adam did however wish to thank Greg Patten for his efforts in rebuilding our membership database, and also the means for accessing and maintaining the same database.

The Secretary, Garry Ford, addressed the meeting, noting a few points from the Secretary's report. He noted in Brisbane the emergence of small ISPs which were offering internet access for as little as 50c/hour. These ISPs are relying on rapid growth to stay above water, and were generally operating beyond their means. Garry suggested that APANA was losing members to such ISPs, but that these people would return to APANA when these unviable ISPs went bust.

The Treasurer addressed the meeting, saying that he was generally quite pleased with the solvency of APANA and it's individual regions. He made two important statements for the benefit of all regions:

  1. Watch your budgets
  2. Get accounts (bills) in quickly, please

Adam thanked the John Childs for his efforts as treasurer, and noted that his services as a highly skilled treasurer were invaluable to APANA.

Adam Frey moved a motion that the Annual Report be accepted by the members. The motion was seconded by Paul McConnell. The motion was passed unanimously.

6.1 Business arising from the Annual Report

George Hansper addressed the meeting, giving a brief background on the structure of the Melbourne Hub, and why the Melbourne region had reduced it's membership fee in a time of spiralling ISP costs. While further details are in the annual report, George emphasised the signifcant step of removing the network-access component from the membership fee. This divorces APANA membership from APANA's traditional role as a network-access provider, and thereby opens the way for APANA to move in other directions. He encouraged other regions to watch Melbourne carefully, to see if this approach was working, and consider if it could work for them, too.

Treasurer addressed meeting describing how the "level of involvement" of members will vary greatly from member to member. There will always be people who just want the ISP-like services, and others who will put more into APANA by being involved in committees and the like. While there have been rumblings of dissapproval towards people "just want to surf the net", the treasurer's advice was: "Let's take their money and make the best use of it for the organisation."

7. Election of Office Bearers

There was no nomination for the position of President received within 7 days of the date of the AGM. As per Rule 38(2) of the Rules of APANA, the position of President was opened for nominations from the floor.

Due to an initial slow reponse, a 10 minute recess was held so that members could discuss the potential candidature with each other.

After the recess, 4 nominations were received:

The candidates addressed the meeting, each stating the role the intended to play as President of APANA.

An election was held by secret ballot, and Mark Purcell was elected as President by a clear majority.

The chairman, Adam Frey, thanked all the nominees for coming forward and offering their services to APANA.

There was only one nomination for the position of Secretary. Garry Ford was nominated by Rebecca Richards and was seconded by John Childs. Garry was deemed elected under Rule 38(2) of the Rules of APANA.

There was only one nomination for the position of Treasurer. John Childs was nominated by Adam Frey and was seconded by Peter Childs. John was deemed elected under Rule 38(2) of the Rules of APANA.

8. Special Business

No items of special business were received.

9. Meeting Close

The meeting was closed at 2:59pm, Saturday 27th July 1997


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