Bob’s Blog
Hello Everyone
We held our first markets for the 2017/18 Rotary year on Sunday. While July is traditionally our smallest market being mid-winter, stallholder numbers were well down compared to those who had booked in. Some members guessed it may have been because some stallholders may have thought it was only the third Sunday of the month. Whatever the reason, the sun came out and we were treated to a magic winter day with plenty of locals checking out stalls.
When I first joined Rotary, we held the markets in Narooma Plaza carpark. As you can imagine, cars intermingled with stall holders on a sloping carpark wasn’t the best way to conduct a market. The markets in those days were more a trash and treasure (actually mostly trash), rather than the variety we have today including fruit and veg, clothing, art and craft, plant stalls, jumping castles and freshly made gourmet pizzas.
Narooma Rotary Markets have been at NATA Oval since early 2000. They are now a vibrant and important part of our community. Since 2000, I estimate the markets have raised more than $175,000 for our small Club. These funds have been used to support local charities such as the Rural Fire Service, the Volunteer Rescue Association, Surf Club, local schools and pre-schools, and international and national charities such as ShelterBox, the Rotary Foundation, Australian Rotary Health, and those affected by natural and man-made disasters.
The challenge for us of course is how do we make a great fundraiser even better? When Chris returns from overseas we will undertake a quick review of our markets to make them better and more relevant to our community.
Planning is well underway again for our 2017 Renewable Energy Expo to be held on Saturday 25 November. Our goal is to build on last year’s event and to provide as much information as possible to our community about renewable energy, reducing energy costs and reducing carbon emissions. If you have any suggestions about the Expo, please let Frank know; he is keen to hear your ideas. He and Laurelle checked out a forum hosted by Clean Energy for Eternity on Sunday afternoon at Bermagui.
Have a great week everyone.
Bob
The Week That Was
Only 10 members were at last week’s meeting with many members away in search of warmer climates. We were fortunate to have many guests including Gordon Bentley, his wife Di and son Scott, Enid and Colin Holmes, Merinda Antill, Rachel McInnes, her mother-in-Law and her friend, and of course our guest speaker Anthony Mayne.
Anthony told us about his role as a Eurobodalla Shire Councillor and Deputy Mayor. He enjoys being on Council and felt all councillors and staff worked hard to improve our local communities. He said councillors often became involved in issues that weren’t necessarily the role of local government because community members felt they were contactable and understood local issues.
One question that arose during Anthony’s talk was the origins of the shire’s name of ‘Eurobodalla’ (see note at the end of The Week that was’).
Our MUNA team
Our Club will again sponsor a Narooma High team to the Model United Nations Assembly (MUNA) in Canberra’s Old Parliament House 18-20 August. This has proved to be a hugely successful program with our local students in recent years, thanks to the initiatives and dedication of some of our Rotarians and the support of teacher Lachlan Reilly.
Our team of Cyann Vlatovic (who went as an observer last year), Campbell Allison and Isaak Anderson, all from Year 11, will represent France. Sandra Doyle reports they have been busy researching France for some weeks now and working on the five resolutions they will debate in Canberra from France’s viewpoint.
Our students are now in the middle of exams but once they are over ‘the team will be back in full swing’. Sandra says they had hoped to meet up with Batemans Bay and Moruya teams before MUNA, as they had in the past, but at this stage it looks as if that day will coincide with their exams. She will continue working with the team and Narooma High teacher Lachlan Reilly during lunchtimes.
CEFE and Powering Bermagui
Clean Energy for Eternity (CEFE) organised an impressive forum in Bermagui on Sunday afternoon –‘Powering Bermagui’ – which Frank Eden and I attended. It attracted about 200 people. The outcome was the possibility of a solar farm for Bermagui and a challenge suggested by Dr Mathew Nott of a competition between Tathra and Bermagui for the most solar panels by 2020.
The eight speakers included company representatives at the forefront of technology aimed at cheaper power, improved reliability and lower emissions, and included Professor Ross Garnaut, now with Zen Energy. Speakers were allowed only 10 minutes each, with 30 minutes questions at the end.
Bega Valley Shire Mayor Cr Kristy McBain opened the forum, fresh from the launch of the Climate Council’s Cities Power Partnership in Canberra. The four south coast councils were among the 30 signatories to the initiative designed to tackle a zero emissions future despite what some described as ‘the political lethargy’ on the issue at the Federal level.
Needless to say Frank gathered lots of ideas for our Expo in November. Frank of course would love to see Narooma also respond to Dr Nott’s solar panel challenge.
More Tertiary Scholar results
Carl McEvoy, our 2015 scholar, received three credits in his recent exams for his Bachelor of Media and Communications – Media Production at UTS in Sydney. His counsellor Angie is delighted and sent congratulations to Carl from Amsterdam.
Carl’s subjects were Communicating Difference (about gender relations and cultural differences), Media Power (broke down the stereotypes of the media, from news to television shows), and Fictions where everyone in the class wrote a four-minute script and the best three scripts were made. Carl’s film, for which he did the production design, sound and was the chief producer, was in the top five.
Post script on ‘Eurobodalla’
A couple of our members asked me about the origins of ‘Eurobodalla’ following Cr Anthony Mayne’s talk last week. So… Eurobodalla was a small settlement that developed along the Tuross River west of Bodalla, in the area around Tyrone Bridge (to Nerrigundah), from the 1860s. The name is derived from an Aboriginal word for the area and supposedly means ‘land between waters’ or ‘another boat harbour’.
While Thomas Sutcliffe Mort was developing his Bodalla property, others selected land in the adjoining area of Urabodalla [sic] near the junction of the Bega, Wagonga, Bodalla and Nerrigundah (then a gold mining area) roads. There was a store near the road junction in 1865 and the mailmen between Moruya and Bega passed twice a day. At that time the main south ‘road’ between Moruya and Bega went through Eurobodalla and skirted around the Inlet to the west of Gulaga.
It is interesting to note Eurobodalla ‘nicked’ the post office from Bodalla in 1869/1870, much to the disgust of Bodalla residents who soon had the post office at Bodalla reinstated. For some years the two post offices co-existed. There were three inns around Eurobodalla about this time – Manusu’s Grecian Inn on the south side of the Tuross, and two on the north side on the road between Nerrigundah and Moruya.
Eurobodalla had the first public school in the area (which lasted at least until 1927) and for many years a tennis court, cheese factory (until early twentieth century), School of Arts and Roman Catholic Church (moved to Dalmeny in 1950s). Bodalla soon overtook Eurobodalla in importance and after the ferry was installed at Narooma in 1894, traffic bypassed Eurobodalla and it gradually declined.