Minutes of the West Bridgford Bridge Club Annual General Meeting held on Monday 25th April 2016

Present: S Dawson in the chair and 23 members as recorded on the attendance sheet. Apologies were received from 5 members.

1.  Minutes of the last meeting The minutes of the meeting held on 27th April 2015 were unanimously approved.

2.  Matters Arising No staff gratuity has been given since the move to the golf club as the staffing situation is more complicated there. To be reviewed at the next committee meeting 3.  Chairman's Report Shiona Dawson presented her second (and final) chairman's report. She noted that overall the new venue is satisfactory. It is cheaper than the Arena but it can be a bit noisy and crowded if there are a lot of tables. Shiona thanked the various club members who help with setting out the tables, organising and scoring the boards, directing on club nights and maintaining the club web-site. She also thanked the committee members for their various contributions. Our two teams of 8 have had some success. The A Team finished 3rd in division 1 and the B team fifth in division

3. Thanks to Shirley and Sheila for organising their respective teams and to all those members who participated in the teams. Shirley and Ian were winners of the county-wide winter competition for the Black Cup. Shiona noted that our membership is decreasing. Notices have been put out in a variety of locations and local publications in an effort to attract new members. The county are hoping to encourage more participation in events with the introduction of new competitions for intermediate players. Within the club a “Find a Partner” system will be initiated, with the point of contact being Richard Ekins.

4.  Treasurer's Report Ian Dovey reported that we are generally running on a break-even basis. This year we lost just over £20. The loss was mitigated somewhat by the move to the Golf Club where the room charge is less than the Arena. As a consequence of this there is no immediate need to increase the subscriptions or table fees. Ian thanked David Dunford for examining the accounts. There were no questions on the accounts and the report was unanimously adopted. (Proposed by Roy Shopland, seconded by Tim Gregory).

5.  Committee This is Shiona's final year as chairman and David Hazeldine replaces her for the next two years. Shiona is willing to remain on the committee and Dave Beaumont has volunteered to be vice-chairman. There was a vote of thanks to Shiona for her hard work over the past two years, in particular for managing the move to the new venue. The were no additional nominations for the committee and so the remaining committee members were re-elected en-bloc with the following positions: Chairman: David Hazeldine Vice-chairman: Dave Beaumont Treasurer: Ian Dovey Secretary: Clive Goode Committee members: Tim Anderson, Shiona Dawson

6.  Competition Winners Only two competitions were run this year, the Winter Competition and the Aggregate. Both were won by Shirley Ashtari and Ian Dovey.

7.  AOB The committee were asked to consider introducing training sessions for beginner/intermediate players. This could take place before normal Monday duplicate sessions, perhaps on a once a month basis. The meeting concluded at 7:23 and was followed by bridge.