MORE than 250 members of Lions International and their guests, from Lions Clubs of the District 201N1, visited Armidale over the weekend for their Annual District Convention.
District 201N1 encompasses the area from Collarenebri, Moree, Ashford and Iluka in the north, down the east coast to Forster Tuncurry, across to Murrurundi and as far west as Premer with 66 Lions Clubs, four Lioness Clubs and seven Leos Clubs.
The Lions Annual Convention was held at the Armidale City Bowling Club with guest speakers and the District Governor’s Banquet on Saturday evening.
The convention theme was Spring into Armidale and Armidale presented participants with a variety of weather conditions during the weekend from cold winds and hail on Friday ending with bright sunshine on Sunday.
Lion Adam Marshall, Member for Northern Tablelands, officially opened the convention with a speech in which he praised Lions and their outstanding volunteer work.
He paid tribute to the contribution made by all Lions to their communities; citing the story of the cleaner at NASA who, when asked what he did for a living declared that he helped to put men into space.
Guest speakers on the first day of the convention were Phil Wheaton who spoke of the work of the Armidale Keep Australia Beautiful Committee and the achievement of Armidale in winning the NSW Tidy Towns Award last year.
Narelle Marshall gave a wealth of sound advice with her talk on Pro-Active Ageing which provided many ageing Lions with food for thought for themselves and the potential for a whole range of projects related to the aged of our communities.
On Sunday, Lion Deb Warren and Jenny Croker of the Seeing Eye Dogs recounted the story of their ascent of Mount Kilimanjaro which created special challenges for Deb, who is blind.
Elections during the Saturday afternoon business session resulted in Lion Peter Willis Jones of Crescent Head being elected the next District Governor, Lion Peter Mercer, of Port Macquarie, being elected First Vice District Governor with Lion Malcolm Peters of the Valla Lions Club being elected Second Vice District Governor.
During the Convention International President’s Certificates were presented to Denise Sullivan of the Tamworth Lioness Club, Harry Mills of the Nambucca Lions Club and John Finnie of the Hallidays Point Lions Club. International President’s Dream Awards were presented to Gerard Cross of Nambucca Heads, Mick McGrath of Forster-Tuncurry, Peter Willis-Jones of Crescent Head and Peter Mercer of Port Macquarie Tacking Point. Colin Gadd and Rob Semple of the Dumaresq Club were presented with District Governor’s Awards.
The highlight of the convention was the address on Sunday by Past International President Lion Sid Scruggs lll from the United States. Local Lions consider themselves very fortunate in having a Lion of the status of Sid Scruggs to be their keynote speaker and his speech was very well received.
The theme of Past President Sid’s speech was what he termed his three Cs: Celebration, Change, Challenge and Commitment and he was able to relate these to all aspects of Lionism.
In closing the convention, District Governor Alan Cunningham thanked the Lions of the Armidale Dumaresq Club who hosted and organised the convention. Next year the District 201N1 Convention will be hosted by the Lions Club of Sawtell Bonville.
