Regional Grand Counsellor Quarterly Report ending June 2000

Membership

As can be seen by comparing the above tables, the increase in membership figures is keeping within reasonable reach of the allocated target.

Whilst some districts are performing reasonably well, (beauty is in the eye of the beholder), the Illawarra district, which was lagging behind the others, is catching up with the rest of the Region. This is a reflection of the good work by both DGIWs (District 106 and District 107).

We have been trying several options, from publicity, functions to which public figures are invited, U3A courses about Freemasonry for the public, proselytising through Surf Life Saving and Beach to Bush Safaris. However, the problem remains that in certain areas, people do not want, or could not join anything that involves a certain amount of work and money.

In this Region this problem is very predictable, as this is a very complex Region of mixed and varied population with different strata in their composition.

From Western Sydney, with young people and small children paying the home mortgage and high youth unemployment, where parents of a good age to join the Craft are still supporting their unemployed children, to the Southern Tablelands with a mixture of high unemployment and matured retired people.

The Illawarra, (Wollongong, Port Kembla, Dapto, etc.) with an extremely high chronic unemployment, and collieries and the steel works closing down does not leave much room for membership to the Craft.

The Shoalhaven District with mostly retired and elderly population, and the closing of factories and primary industries on the Far South Coast.

To these problems we may add the advance age of many of our members.

Without trying to interfere with Dr Albert Einstein and his Theory of Relativity, I wonder if we are failing to apply this theory by looking at our membership in a relative perspective. It would be interesting to study our membership trends and to find that we may be looking into our membership decline from a different angle.

What could also be interesting is to compare our membership one hundred years ago and its relationship with today's membership, and the number of members 50 years ago and its constant decline since. Are we perhaps going back to the original number and we look to the present membership decline from the unreasonable highest membership point of the last 50 years?

Perhaps we are trimming ourselves to a normal membership figure from an unprecedented high in the 1950's. Unfortunately we are constrained by today's pressures of maintaining a viable membership for our Lodges and a financially viable Grand Lodge.

During a recent research for the Committee on Relations with Sister Constitutions I obtained some membership figures showing that although Freemasonry membership in all the English Speaking countries could be counted in millions, European Freemasonry could only be numbered in thousands, the former having been in serious decline whilst in the latter a steady increase had been observed.

Examples of these figures is given as follows:

These figures match figures previously compiled by the Committee of Relations on Sister Constitutions, with the exception of Germany, in which the current official figures of the Regular Grand Lodge are at variance, showing that part of the increase in Germany may be due to the recent proliferation of Mixed or Feminine Grand Lodges.

Membership Movements

Recently I downloaded a masonic paper from the Internet related to the current issue of membership decline in the Craft. It gave clear indications of the severe decline, mainly in the English speaking Grand Lodges, but no indications of European Freemasonry. Some data on European membership is given above.

The content of this paper provided the idea to implement a local assessment in selected Lodges within the South Coast Region. For example;

• Select a Lodge in each District, maybe two Lodges, depending on the District.
• Suggest to the Lodge that they nominate a Brother to conduct the following research in periods of five years from 1945 to 2000.

1. Average of Initiations in each 5 year-period.
2. Average of Affiliations in each 5 year-period.
3. Average age of candidates for initiation.
4. Average age of affiliates.
5. Average years from initiation until the candidate reached the Master's Chair.
6. Average years from Initiation until the candidate resigned or was excluded.
7. Deaths to be included in this survey and detailed in separate column.

I realise that this paper was showing us nothing new that we don't already know about the decline in membership. However, it proved beyond doubt that at least in England, the age of candidates did not vary a great deal from 1945 to the present day, and that the years of active years in the Lodge from initiation to resignation dropped from an average of 23 years in 1945 to less than 4 years today.

The research in this paper proved that retaining of young members is perhaps more important, under certain conditions, than gaining new initiates. However one must take into consideration the ageing of our masonic population to replace our membership in the future, and to continue with our Membership target intake.

This exercise may or may not prove to be beneficial to our knowledge of the causes of membership decline, but it will make each lodge involved in the research more aware of the need to work and be more involved in this problem.

Preliminary discussions with Secretaries of some lodges have been favourable and Lodge Corrimal (District 107), Lodge Federation (District 108), and Lodge Kiama (District 106) already provide some useful information.

Only three Lodges have completed the assignment, but the pattern is emerging very strongly in the need to retain members. In one case, the retention of the member until his resignation from the Craft was 9.13 years, whilst in 1999, showed only 2.7 years. A fair analysis cannot yet be completed until more Lodges participate.

Abbreviated Example of Lodge Federation No 196

Lodge Kiama No 35

As can be observed from the above table, the number of Initiates and Affiliates dropped dramatically, as well as the years from Initiation to call off, however, a very close relationship exists between the ages of Brethren for Initiation and for affiliation. This is of course too early to analyse, but it is my feeling that further research figures will only consolidate the trend

Surf Life Saving

At present, we are working on the development of the Water Safety Programme, which proved so successful last year. In November/December of this year a new seasonal programme will be implemented in the Far South Coast area, although with different schools. The Catholic Schools have agreed to the programme and will be included in this current year.

It is expected to visit 30 schools with a reach of about 4,000 school children to teach them how to swim in safety.

The South Coast SLS Branch (Milton to Kiama and Port Kembla) will be attempting to run the programme this year, whilst the Illawarra Branch has formed a Water Safety Programme Task Force for consultations and to attempt the implementation of the programme in September this year

The Education Department have sent, through the State Member for the South Coast, Mr Wayne Smith, MP the contacts needed with the schools in the Illawarra, the Shoalhaven, and the area of Campbelltown.

I have attended the Illawarra Branch Annual presentations and was delighted by the attention to our sponsorship. The President of this Branch, Mr Ken Sweeny achieved the Administrator of the Year Award and was elevated to Life Membership. A letter of congratulations was sent on behalf of the Grand Master, the NSW Masons, and from the Masons of the Illawarra.

I was also invited to attend the Annual Presentations Award at Pambula on the 22 July 2000.

The Surf Awareness and Water Safety Programme conducted last year was an outstanding success, where a total of 28 schools have been visited and instruction given to about 4,000 primary school children in the coastal area between Batemans Bay to Delegate and including schools within the South Region 10, in towns such as Bombala, Eden and Pambula.

Mr Bruce Frost, the President of the Far South Coast Surf Life Saving Branch conducted the tour accompanied by the DGIW, VWBro. Noel Pollard. I attended several venues. Assisting Mr Frost were two local surf lifesavers, Liam Misko (17) from Narooma and Zoe Harris (18) from Tathra, fresh from their Higher School Certificate examinations.

Stage One is already completed, even though there were many difficulties during the period of teacher's strikes to be able to sort out the arranged meetings, and the tragedy of the school Principal who died the day scheduled for the presentation.

Narooma Medical Facilities

The Regional Project of raising Community Awareness to the need of improving health service facilities at Narooma is going forward as planned. As there appears to have been some confusion regarding this project I would like now to present the full report of the project.

In discussions with the Health Department Authorities it was stated that at no stage was it ever envisaged the building of a hospital as the NSW Masons have not the funds, nor the willingness to embrace such a project, nor is it our function in the community to build hospitals but to support charities and people in need, people who are in less fortunate circumstances than ourselves.

The Critical Care Centre was a possible option provided it was taken as an extension of the proposed redevelopment of the Community Health Centre.

I had discussions with Mrs Kay Morris, Manager of the Southern Area Health Service Sector who briefed me to planned redevelopment of the Narooma Community Health Centre and the fact that a "Critical Care Centre", even annexed to the new Community Health Centre will cost the Government $8 Million a year to run. An impossibility in the current situation.

The Narooma Community Health Centre was originally built in 1975 as a demountable building to house 6 staff mainly supplying Community Nursing to Narooma and surrounding areas.

Since that time Community Health has continued to grow to meet the changing needs of the community. Currently there are 15 staff based at the centre with others visiting regularly to provide services including community nursing, early childhood, diabetes education, dietetics, basic foot care, counselling, physiotherapy, speech pathology and aboriginal health.

The expansion of services to meet the ever changing needs of the population is now limited by space and ready availability of equipment needed by staff.

The announcement of a $900,000 capital grant in November 1997 for the redevelopment of Narooma Community Health meant that the space problem could now be overcome and that there would be opportunity for increased service provision for the Narooma community. However this funding did not provide for the extra equipment needed to increase services or the replacement of outdated equipment.

Our main function will be to raise community awareness and to assist in raising local funds with the community to purchase much needed equipment for the new facilities.

On the following list of equipment given to me are the high priority items that will allow the Health Service to either continue current services and/or extend services in the areas of Cardiac Rehabilitation, Speech Pathology, Physiotherapy, Podiatry, Well Clinics and Child and Family Services including immunisation and parenting programs:

• Hydrologic adjustable bed
• Scales
• Adjustable examination light (fixed to ceiling)
• Doppler for wound management
• Digital sphygmometers x 2
• Stethoscopes x 2
• Tympanic thermometer
• Foot/leg bath with hand held shower
• Storage cupboard for sterile dressings etc.
• Height adjustable chairs one with arms
• Immunisation fridge
• Height measure
• Early Childhood Scales - both fixed & portable
• Wide sink with non touch taps
• Pamphlet stands for current resources
• Exercise bike with computer programming capacity
• Height adjustable plinth
• CELF Preschool Assessment
• High quality tape recorder
• Video Camera and player
• Goldman-Fristoe Test of Articulation
• CELF 3 Language Assessment
• Equipment (toys, books etc. ) for family therapy room

Our offer to raise community awareness of the need to raise funds for the support of the community health facility in Narooma is greatly appreciated. Not only the Health Service would be happy to acknowledge the support of our organisation in any funds raised but we can also count on great public support.

A General Public meeting will be held at the Narooma Golf Club on Wednesday 19 July 2000 commencing at 6 PM. We will be grateful for a strong masonic presence.

Many other Service Organisations, the Federal and State Members of the area, the Eurobodalla Mayor, Surf Life Saving Far South Coast Branch, and Health Department Administrative Managers, Local Doctors, and the main element of each community, the people themselves, have been invited to attend.

The Health Department is printing yellow leaflets to advertise the date of the meeting. Their staff took the task of the distribution to all shops and professional offices in Narooma.

We will be proposing at the meeting to form a Steering Committee, the construction of a Web Page to advertise the campaign, and some means of raising monies such as Young Debutantes, Young Disabled Persons, and Second Chance Debutante Balls, as well as Dinner Dances, BBQs and Raffles. I am very appreciative of the grant made by the Grand Charity Board Committee as it will allow me on behalf of the NSW Masons to start the initial fund with a sizable contribution of $5,000.00

Masonic Buildings

I believe one of the many obligations of a Regional Grand Counsellor is to ensure that all aspects related to the well being of the Craft are attended to, and to ascertain the needs of the Lodges, and by implication the needs of the Brethren within his particular Region.

Masonic Buildings are an integral part of the Regional Action Plan in ensuring that quality is promoted in every facet and at every level.

Rationalisation seems to denote a dirty word to many as it tends to be associated with some reduction of already obtained gains. This is not necessarily so, as rationalisation could be taken as having more and smaller, or less and bigger Masonic Centres, or Masonic Buildings which are modern, in a logical location for the needs of brethren today, and perhaps a commercial building able to produce an income and be suitable and secure for Lodge meetings.

Rationalisation of Masonic Buildings in the Region commenced four years ago and great success has been achieved in the Southern Tablelands area.

The Committee to investigate rationalisation of masonic building in the Illawarra after presenting several options to the Brethren at a District Combined Meeting is continuing to meet at regular intervals. More work is to be done before the project will be ready to be presented to the lodges of the District for approval.

After having experienced the success in the Tablelands and the Illawarra, I believe now is the appropriate time to undertake a study of the Masonic Buildings in the Eurobodalla.

A Regional Advisory Committee was formed to ascertain the present and future needs of the area. Once those needs are determined, it would be presented to the members of the District for further discussion and action, so they will be in possession of all necessary facts to enable effective decision making.

The Committee, under the leadership of VWBro Neil Toyer, PDGIW, has already identified several feasible options.

At the moment all options are in the "think tank" mode pending further investigation. These options will be presented to the brethren of the District for evaluation before action is taken. In the final analysis it will the decision of the members of the Lodges to take the appropriate action

Basin View Retirement Village

I was invited to attend the AGM of the Board of Management of the Basin View Retirement Village and to act as Returning Officer. In my comments, the need for the Committee to contact either Grand Lodge, the DGIW or the RGC when public activities are organised was stressed, particularly when State or Federal Members are participating, and explained the recently missed opportunity of having the Grand Master, who was in the area at the time, at a very important function in the Berry Retirement Village.

Berry Masonic Retirement Village

Accreditation was awarded to the Berry Masonic Village Hostel on April 2000, after only two and a half years of operation. The accreditation was awarded for the maximum three-year term because of the high standards of the Hostel.

Debutante Ball

I attended the Debutante Ball at Wollongong and the one organised by Lodge Milton. Both functions were well attended, however the protocol procedures were very different from each other, showing the need of guidelines for this type of function without encroaching in the individualism of the organisers. The newly appointed Regional Protocol and Ceremonial Facilitator, VWBro Ted Herring, PDGIW will work in consultation with the different Debutantes Ball Committees within the Region, in a paper to set guidelines to be proposed to Grand Lodge for evaluation.

Young Achievers

The Regional winner was announced at a District Combined meeting organised by Lodges Abercorn and Shoalhaven on 18^th April, 2000. This meeting incorporated an Anzac Ceremony open to the public after the closing of the lodge and all candidates and their families were invited to participate.

The selection panel after a comprehensive ballot agreed to nominate Mr Liam Misko.

Liam become involved with the Surf Life Saving movement in 1995 and since then his life has changed dramatically!

He suffered from a learning difficulty, and until he reached 16 years of age, Liam was virtually unable to read and write. This problem affected all areas of his life and he lacked confidence, was a poor communicator and would never "have a go" at anything.

At the end of 1994, he was persuaded to become involved in a "Nippers" morning that his younger sister Sarah was attending, where he discovered that "he could do some of these things", and started to compete at Surf Life Saving Carnivals.

The more he competed, the more confident he grew, and his new found confidence spread to other areas of his life. He became involved in School Sport, and was awarded the much coveted Pierre de Coubertin Award in 1999.

Having discovered himself it became easier to tackle his learning problems and in the last two years he was able to conquer most of these, gaining both the School Certificate in 1997, and Higher School Certificate in 1999.

In attaining his Higher School Certificate he was also able to gain two Firsts during his Year in Design and Technology and Building and Construction and was awarded a Rotary International Engineers Award for Design and Technology.

In 1999 the Far South Coast Branch of Surf Life Saving sponsored by the NSW Masons decided to undertake a "Beach to Bush" Education Tour of Primary Schools from Batemans Bay to Eden and across to Bomballa. This Tour covered over 28 Schools and in excess of 4,000 students. He was selected as a leader for this project, and after completing the Higher School Certificate "went on the road", going to many of the Schools on his own to deliver the message of Surf and Water Safety.

At the end of 1999, the Far South Coast Branch of Surf Life Saving nominated Liam for Selection to attend a Surf Life Saving Australia Youth Leadership Development Camp, and he was one of the 26 young Life Savers selected from across Australia to participate, where he learnt more of the Administrative side of Surf Life Saving.

There were many other worthy candidates with the capability to represent the South Coast in a region considered as a poor educational area. I hope this programme of Young Achievers initiated by Grand Lodge will continue for many years as in addition to being a good PR exercise for Masonry, it has the potential to attract young people or their parents to the Craft.

A separate link in the Regional Web Page has been dedicated to the Young Achievers for 2000.

Regional Web Page

The Regional Web Page is still under construction and expected to be finalised for approval by Grand Lodge by the end of July 2000. There are several pages at present waiting our own approval. Free of charge E-mail addresses have been obtained to reflect the districts and the region. These addresses are to be transferred to the new RGC and DGIWs at the termination of the term. Addresses are as follows:

rgc11@hotmail.com South Coast Region 11

dgiw112@hotmail.com Illawarra District

dgiw113@hotmail.com Shoalhaven District

Address of the Web Page South Coast Region 11

http://www.oocities.org/region11_nsw/

U3A Courses

The courses about Freemasonry offered to U3A were accepted and implemented at a minimum cost to the Craft or to the members who acted as tutors. All courses were greatly successful and an excellent exercise in public relations. It took some time for the initial preparations, but all tutors in all districts are now prepared to offer subsequent courses.

That about 50% of the participants were female and the rest elderly retired gentlemen, would not detract from the fact that these are the very same people who talk to their families and many other people, the majority being tutors themselves. In addition, the presenters being members of the local Lodges were very enthusiastic, as it gave them something very practical to do, and by the quality and quantity of the lectures, they learned themselves about the Craft and its presentation and now have become well known in other areas of the community.

Five participants to the course in Nowra attended the Grand Installation at the Town Hall last year and were very impressed by the ceremony. The comments were that they had never realised that Freemasonry could be of such high standards.

In the courses offered at Batemans Bay, Nowra, Kiama, and Moss Vale, the common factor was that after eight weeks of lectures, in which very few of the participants were absent, everybody agreed that it was a pity the course finished so quickly.

The U3A courses offered again this year proved an outstanding success. This may not be reflected in the intake of new candidates but in the form of a public relations exercise with the community, the same community that could make favourable comments at home and on the many non masonic organisations to which they belong.

The newly appointed Regional Education and Membership Communicator, VWBro Ross Bush will undertake the coordination of all U3A Courses within the region. Courses are expected to be conducted in Batemans Bay, Milton/Ulladulla, Moss Vale, Camden, Kiama, Nowra, and Bulli.

We are in the process of negotiating courses at the Southern Adult Education College and more details will be available before the next RGC quarterly report.

Action Plan

An Action Plan was developed during the DGIWs Convention in Sydney, where every DGIW and the RGC considered many points in need of implementation within the Region if one wants to further improve the situation of Freemasonry in the area. It was finalised with many feasible ideas and taking into consideration the costs involved in their implementation without compromising quality.

A full copy of the Action Plan was posted to each RGC to share ideas and for their evaluation and comments at the next RGCs Conference.

The Action Plan will be released at a District Combined Meeting in District 113 on 15 August 2000, hosted by Lodge Abercorn No 60, where the Chairman of the Members Board, RWBro Neil Richardson was invited to represent the Grand Master. We would like to express our thanks to the Grand Master for appointing RWBro Richardson, PJGW.

It was suggested to open the lodge at 7 PM and receiving the Representative of the Grand Master at 7.10 PM to witness the conduct of the business of the lodge, so suggestions at the end of the meeting could be made in time saving procedures.

The Lodge will then be closed, with everybody remaining seated and masonically clothed and the Ladies to enter the Lodge Room to join the Brethren for the presentation.

The DGIW will effect the presentation with the assistance of the Regional Education and Membership, Protocol and Ritual, Special Projects, and IT Facilitators. The Information Technology Facilitator, Bro Graeme Beresford, will present a computer demonstration of the Regional Web Page and the CD Rom. The documents for the Regional Pilot Scheme to obtain a Certificate of Proficiency in Lodge Management will be offered to those Brethren wishing to participate.

Sufficient time for questions from the Brethren and the Ladies are taken into consideration and the DGIW will provide a copy of the Action Plan (25 pages off) to all present.

Similar presentation will be conducted at the regular meeting of Lodge Wollongong No 546 on 21st August, 2000

Regional Meeting

A Regional meeting was organised on 28 May 2000, which included the DGIWs and the DGIW Designated and their wives to discuss common points of interest and to obtain an easy transition in August 2000. It proved a very successful meeting as every one expressed points of view with regards to the Region.

The DGIWs and their wives from the previous term (1996-1998) were also invited to add their own valuable experience and to pledge full cooperation and support to the new Action Plan.

New Lodge at Kangaroo Valley

A Steering Committee to form a new Lodge at Kangaroo Valley was formed and meetings were held during this quarter. Discussions disclosed the following preferences:

• The lodge suggested name was Silver Oak.(Silver Oak Lodge, now defunct, was operating in Kangaroo Valley more than 100 years ago).
• Meetings to be held on a monthly, by-monthly or quarterly basis.
• Suggested meeting times, starting with luncheon at 11 AM at the Kangaroo Valley Friendly Inn, meals to be paid individually by each attending member or visitor. No toasts or speeches are envisaged. Meeting to start at 12 Noon until finish.
• Furniture is now available from the Bowral Masonic Centre, including Mosaic Pavement, and VSL.
• As we are in possession of historical documents detailing all names of Foundation members, affiliates and initiates of Lodge Silver Oak, the Kangaroo Valley Historical Society has been approached to undertake research about the descendants of those Brethren in the hope that they can be invited to attend preliminary meetings with a view to joining the Lodge.
• The potential membership is very hard to gauge at present, however, with the meeting scheduled at the beginning of the week and at the time suggested above, farmers and businessmen would be able to join and attend. The town is becoming very popular as a tourist attraction, especially during the weekend, and more people owning shops are moving into the area as well as some retirees.
• Another potential source for membership is the area of Bowral and Mittagong with the transfer of Lodges Jubilee and Carnavon to Moss Vale.
• One of the big problems is the lack of a suitable place for meetings and the storage of furniture. Investigations are now underway for a possible site at the upper floor of the Friendly Inn Hotel (back to the old times?), however, there are several other possibilities, such as the Council Hall available at $150 per meeting and the Council Showground. At the moment the Friendly Inn is the most appealing, as the Lodge Room could be cordoned off during the weekend as a tourist attraction and this could bring customers to the hotel for meals and drinks. The owners of the hotel are to be approached regarding this matter, pending talks and approval from Grand Lodge.
• There is a strong bonding in this small community, with more committees than other relative sized populations. Several years ago a new Lions Club was formed to compensate for the demise of the one at Nowra, which in the view of many would perish in a few months, but is still going strong and growing.
• As the original Lodge Silver Oak was formed over one hundred years ago by members of Lodge Broughton, I suggested that once again, as a historical moment, Lodge Broughton could sponsor the new lodge.

Photographs of the building of the proposed meeting place for the perusal of the Masonic Buildings Board has been scheduled for the second week in July.

Keep Australia Beautiful Award

A letter was received from Michelle Gapes, CEO of Keep Australia Beautiful Council (NSW) together with a framed certificate to be presented at an appropriate time to Mr David Johnson of Gerroa as a nominee of the Outstanding Individual Achievement Award.

As Mr Johnson is an outstanding citizen of the Municipality of Kiama, I considered it most appropriate to invite the Mayor of Kiama to participate in a joint presentation. The presentation was made at the Council Chambers. Members of the Media (newspapers and Prime TV station were invited to attend and report)

Visit of the Grand Master to the Region

The Grand Master visited the region on his scheduled programme to visit all Regions in the first six months of his tenure to get acquainted with the brethren of the Jurisdiction, and visited the area within Batemans Bay, Moruya, and Narooma and the Illawarra. It was a successful visit as many of the Brethren were able to listen to his plans for the future and to answer questions regarding Grand Lodge policies for the future. Follow up action was taken where relevant to this Region.

We also had a pleasant visit by the Grand Master to Lodge Basin View Daylight as one of the local residents was celebrating his 100^th birthday. The Mayor of the Shoalhaven Council, Clr Greg Watson was also in attendance.

Juan Carlos Alvarez, PJGW
Regional Grand Counsellor
South Coast Region 11