Wee Waa Rotaract Club’s charter night celebrations

The Wee Waa Rotaract Club’s official Charter Night celebrations welcomed a bright new division of young community volunteers to the shire region at the Imperial Hotel on Saturday, March 23.

An impressive 12 new Wee Waa Rotaractors have put their hand up to bring the club to life, and the diverse range of young people and those who are “young at heart” are excited to get going and bring fun new opportunities to the community of Wee Waa.

Ethan Towns is already a member of many local clubs and committees but is excited to be a first-time president of the new organisation.

“We have no expectations to be like the other local Rotaract divisions,” said Ethan.

“We’re going to make something completely different, and above all when we see a problem in the community, we want to go out of our way to fix it.

“We’ve got big plans, and I’m confident we have great members who know how to follow through.”

In the last year of his Ph.D. in Entomology, Ethan has worked at CSIRO for 10 years.

As well as being a Narrabri Rotarian and future youth director for the club, he is vice chair for Arts Northwest, a reptile co-coordinator for WIRES, on the public art advisory committee in Narrabri, secretary for the Wee Waa Show Society, and a member of CREATE festival.

The Wee Waa Rotaract journey started after a conversation between Ethan and Rotaract district representative and fellow new Wee Waa Rotaractor Kirk Harvey, who said, “Why don’t we start our own Rotaract division?”

After reaching out to some of the young professionals and school-leavers around town, Ethan saw great enthusiasm from the young community looking to create more opportunities and get involved.

The charter dinner was a dazzling formal affair, held in The Imperial Hotel function room with decorations generously provided by Wee Waa High School’s P and C.

The event was a great chance to bring some sparkle to the Wee Waa nightlife, with 50 attendees coming from local and further areas to come and ring in the exciting new chapter for the new club.

Getting to the official charter night was a milestone for the new division, who are eager to get their projects and ideas underway in the community.

First and foremost on their agenda, is turning the old Rotary Park into an official dog park, which has already sparked keen interest from the Shire Council. Aims to “quench the boredom of young people staying in town” are also on the list of priorities, with a new gaming console room at the Wee Waa Community Arts and Cultural Centre also in the works.

As well as being presented with their official charter, the Wee Waa Rotaract club received plenty of support from local volunteer communities, who came together to share in the celebrations.

The Rotary Club of Narrabri members were in attendance and club president Karen Kirkby gave a speech to welcome and encourage the new club.

“The Rotary Club of Narrabri is extremely proud of Wee Waa Rotaract,” said Karen.

“This is an amazing group of young leaders and adults who have come together to form an organisation with a common goal of improving the lives of the people that live in their community, and the community at large will certainly benefit.

“It will also be a great chance for the members of Wee Waa Rotaract club to develop their leadership skills and gain the skills they need to contribute to their community.”

Besides goals to give back to their town, the club hopes to entice fresh faces to come forward and get involved in their local community.

“These young members will come to understand that once you get bitten by the volunteering bug, you get more out of it than you give,” said Karen.

“By taking charge of the community they want to live in and not waiting to be provided with something, it shows how highly motivated they are.”

“The Narrabri Rotary Club will be here to mentor them and share the experiences and skills that many Rotarians have had.”

Ethan and Kirk Harvey are both members of the Narrabri Rotary Club and were very appreciative of the amount of support the club has extended to the new division, also sponsoring the club with $1000.

The club has had a lot of support from local organisations like the Wee Waa Lions and received donations from the closing Wee Waa Rotary Club.

The charter evening followed a traditional format, with an official welcome to country, speeches from Rotary president Karen Kirkby, as well as a presidential speech from Ethan.

Mayor of Narrabri Shire Darrell Tiemens was also in attendance and gave a speech, as well as the Rotary district governor Alyn Miranda who came from Newcastle to present the club with their official charter.

A display table featuring symbolic items representing each of the 12 members was a delightful and unique addition to the celebration and Ethan’s own addition was a table starring two lizards who stole the show– a Blue Tongue named Bluey and Matilda the Shingleback.

Wee Waa Rotaract vice president will be up-and-coming Wee Waa author, Will Tuckey, the new secretary is Cody Smith, and the treasurer is Tegan Mckenzie whose new baby is already an honorary Rotaract member.

Another exciting addition is Teliah Croaker, who is fresh out of high school and will run the gaming club at the Wee Waa Culture and Arts Centre.

Mr Towns also hand painted each visiting guest a canvas artwork to take away as a memento of the special evening.

The club welcomes anyone to get in touch with a local member and come along and give it a go. – Fun times are definitely on the menu.

 

To order photos from this page click here