AHEAD of Monday night's historic vote on becoming an Association, the Geelong Region Football Committee's Chairperson, Jo Plummer, has written to all member clubs in the Geelong region in order to capture a couple of important points for consideration, and clearly set the expectations for the evening. The letter is reproduced in its entirety below...

PHOTO: Geelong Region Football Committee (GRFC) Chairperson Jo Plummer

"The Geelong Regional Football Committee (“GRFC”) has been in operation since 2007. Of recent times the committee has commenced a process to revitalize the organization and take a significantly more inclusive and strategic approach to development of the game. This process has largely been supported by majority of clubs within the Geelong Region for the benefit of the game and its ever-increasing participants. Club administrators, coaches, players, referees and an army of volunteers consistently express their desire for much more to be achieved. They want to ensure our funding, facilities and capacity keeps pace with other sporting codes in the region and more importantly, to ensure we keep abreast of our unprecedented growth.

Much has been achieved in 15 short months. But our capacity to deliver the significant gains required are being hampered by our current non-legal entity. In our current structure, we have;

• Limited capacity to attract and distribute a diverse and meaningful level of funds to reinvest in our region
• Some of our potential key stakeholders (councils, government, developers, organisations) say that our lack of legal identity uniting the region makes us difficult to deal with and support
• A significant risk posed upon the region through our inability to be ‘master of our own domain’

After much consultation with legal, accounting, FFV and business experts, we believe further uniting our region through an Association known as Football Federation Geelong, combined with our partnership approach with FFV & FFA, will provide us with the best of both worlds.

There are no hidden agendas. As a region, we deserve to be greater than the sum of all our parts. We owe it to our kids, our forefathers/mothers and our beautiful region.

In my eyes, success will only be achieved by every club embracing the journey and opportunities together that lie ahead.

We exist to compete on the field, not off it. We do not exist to poach sponsors, undermine competition structures or indeed allow our regional talent leak from our region because of our unwillingness to work together.

We exist to create a thriving and united football community, known for its inclusive and representative approach to excellence in coaching, player and facility development.

Secondly, on the evening we plan the following agenda;

6.30-7pm   

Governance, general business and any urgent items for communication

7-7.15pm    

We are hoping to hear from Rob Threlfall who is currently helping us develop a plan for fund attraction and diversification. We would also like him to share a little of his journey from the Geelong Cats and his view of our opportunity afoot.

7.15-8.15pm

Further Q&A and discussion between presidents, delegates and any club committee members interested in coming along

8.1pm

You will be asked to place your secret vote. One per club. You are voting Yes or No to;

• The GRFC becoming a legally standing associated entity, AND;
• The cost of Club membership to the new entity being set at $500 as well as player registration fees increasing by $15 per person for the next two football seasons commencing 2018.

These resolutions are interdependent. Therefore, you must vote yes or no to BOTH (not yes to one and no to the other).

The reasons for this were stated in the previous Q&A information sent on Tuesday.

Please note again, that these fees are ‘worst case scenario’. Our aim is to work over the next 7-8 months to see if it is possible to reduce these in the first instance. Certainly after the first two years, we would be aiming to significantly reduce or remove these additional components.

Lastly

Upon reflection, we are recommending the FFG committee is not be elected on Monday.

We would like to hold this over until the next Delegates meeting in June (Monday June 26). We believe this will provide more time to allow others to consider their capacity to become committee members. Prior to the June meeting we will circulate the current committee member nominations along with canvassing support for new ones. In addition, we will also be asking for new/additional nominations for each of the strategic pillars.

I look forward to seeing as many of you there as possible on Monday evening. Thanks to all for your ongoing commitment to and hard work for Football in Geelong."

Warmest,

Jo Plummer | Chair GRFC