A.S.A.P. Alonnisos Society for Animal Protection.

Held on 26th January 2010 At Mike and Carols villa at Votsi. Present: Chairperson - Julia Browne, Secretary - Annie Greeen Treasurer - Les Green Committee members - Craig Sinclair, Dinah Sinclair, Nik Ivison, Lyn Ivison, Mike Holmes The meeting commenced at 19:00 Apologies and Chairperson address. An apology was received from Dianne Lewin who was unable to attend the meeting. Julia thanked Mike and Carol for hosting the meeting. She said that she did not have a lot to say but what she did have would be dealt with under the appropriate items. Julia said that the recent Vets’ visit went very well and that she would email Annie with details to add to the minutes in due course. Julia said that a distressed cat had damaged a bedside light belonging to Nik and Lyn and that ASAP should purchase a new light to replace it, though in fact after discussion, because the damaged light was one of a pair, it was suggested that ASAP replace both lights. Lyn will sort out the cost and purchase of the bedside lights and account to ASAP. It was then suggested by Julia that the Licensing Office be contacted soon to check on whether ASAP will be granted a Licence to run the stall this year. Annie said that in the past the Licensing Office does not want to know until later in February. Julia said that she thought we should ask anyway and Annie said she would contact them. Julia said that she did not want the ASAP mobile phone anymore and would someone please take it. Dinah and Craig volunteered and the phone was handed to them. Les asked if the ASAP mobile phone had been registered yet and Julia said that it hadn’t but that it had to be done by the 30th June. Dinah said that she would check it out and deal with it, Julia then asked why the committee was in such a hurry to post the minutes on the website. Annie pointed out that it was decided at a previous meeting that not only would the committee try to keep the meetings short and the minutes to a minimum, but that the final copy would be available to both the committee and the website within a few days of the meeting. Julia said that she asked because she noticed a few spelling mistakes and grammatical errors in the last minutes. Mike pointed out that they were rather late being posted anyway. Mike said the newsletter went out late as well due to several reasons and he only managed to get it posted just before he left for the UK. Annie asked if an email should be sent to all members informing them that ASAP has a website and that they can find the minutes and any newsletters or information they need on it. She said that apart from the people who did not have a computer, a lot of people do not necessarily look at the website, in fact, some may not even know how to. Annie said that ASAP invites people to become members and the membership form states that they will get several newsletters a year. Craig suggested that maybe we should not include that on the membership forms in future. There was a lot of discussion about this and Lyn suggested that we try to get out at least four newsletters. Julia asked exactly how long each article should be and Les gave her a rough idea. Minutes of the Meeting held on Tuesday 8th December, 2009 The minutes of the December meeting, having been read by the committee were proposed as a true record by Julia, seconded by Craig and passed by the committee. Matters arising from the minutes Julia asked if anything had been done regarding the cats at Steni Vala. Dinah said that she had checked it out and that there was no problem. Julia reported that there are now 5 kittens at Kitty City and they have all been neutered and vaccinated. Secretary’s Report Annie said that she had an email from a lady called Isolde who wants to send some more money because she was especially interested in a cat at Votsi, which Les now feeds. Annie has replied to her and will keep checking the Bank to see what comes in and will deal with it accordingly. Julia asked if we heard from Ellen Stucki and Annie said that she had received a personal email from her saying that she has not been well and does not know if she will be able to visit Alonnisos this year. Annie has also replied to Ellen. Apart from that there were just the usual emails to the committee. Treasurer’s Report Les handed out account sheets. Julia asked about a €4 bank charge and Annie explained that every time someone transfers money to the Bank, ASAP gets charged. Les said the usual base amount seems to be €4 euros. This particular entry was because someone had paid membership fees. Les said that the December accounts were “provisional” because he was waiting for money or receipts still to be handed to him and had not completed the accounts for the Accountant for the same reason. Julia handed out hand written statements accounting for what she had received and spent during December and January. She also gave Les a receipt signed by the recent Vet, travel tickets and a receipt for meals. Julia also suggested ASAP should pay for Dinah and Craig’s meal when they went out with the vets, but Dinah said that she did not think it was right. Les further reiterated that he would not do the return to the Accountant until he has everything in and in front of him. At this point Lyn said that Dave had said that his fund raising group would pay for anything to do with the Vet’s visit. There was much discussion then as to what and how much ASAP should ask for. Julia asked Les to speak to Nik about it so that he could talk to Dave. Julia said that although the Vet comes as a charity vet, there is still a cost for the use of their instruments, consumables etc. Julia said that this year she had applied to the Edna Smylie Trust and they had kindly said they would donate £2000. Annie said they usually want a copy of the accounts and Julia said she had provided one. She said she had only one copy of the email from the Trust and handed it round, however, Lyn read it out but unfortunately as Annie was still writing she did not hear it all and as it was not passed to her she cannot record the contents of the email in the minutes. There was then a considerable discussion as to how to ask the Trust to give ASAP the money without incurring large Bank charges. Julia pointed out that they seem to want it to go to a Charity account and we will have to accept that. WORKING GROUP REPORTS Veterinary group Attached is a report prepared by Julia. She said that the Vets were very efficient and thorough and that the visit had been successful. Julia said she would like to thank all those who had helped her sort things out. Julia said that she had made 29 home visits since the last meeting and that Guy had also made a few. I.T. Mike said there was nothing much to report, everything is up and running. The minutes and the newsletter were posted as reported above. Mike then handed Julia two emails from the website, which she will deal with. Les asked if anyone had thought about looking into other computer companies to be advertised on the ASAP website. This was considered to be a good idea but nothing was decided. Membership Craig mentioned that there was still a possibility that ASAP can have calendars to sell this year. Julia said that there is someone who has quoted £2.99. She said that at that price we could go ahead with the subject matter. There was a long discussion about whether this seemed a genuine bargain, how long should the calendar run for, 12 or 15 months and how many would be needed. It was thought that 200 would be a good number to start. Julia will collate all the information and contact this supplier again for firm quotes. She asked that people send her photographs of not only cats, but, for example dogs, the horse, and the seal and there would need to be short captions to go with each photograph which she would do, as she has an idea of what she wants the calendar to look like. Feeding Group Dinah said she had nothing much to report. She said she would make some more feeding plates to go to other feeding stations. Once again there was much discussion about the feeding of tinned food to the cats. Lyn pointed out that we had agreed at other meetings that we would not feed wet food to any cat old enough to eat biscuits. Julia said that the committee had agreed to it, but that she had never agreed to this and that in her opinion it is better to feed the cats wet food because they eat it all, rather than to leave biscuits. Annie pointed out that unfortunately although the committee as a whole agreed to dispense with the wet food, there had not been a formal vote on it. Julia said it would make no differenced to her because she intended to feed the animals, especially Kitty City with wet food and if necessary would use the funds she collects to do so. Dinah, head of feeding group, said that the committee would just have to “agree to disagree” over this point. It was apparent that as has happened at every meeting, no reasonable solution could be arrived at so the matter was once again shelved. Fund Raising Julia said that it disappointing that we can’t raise our profile in some way. We are doing our best to raise money but it is not enough. Annie asked what we were doing about the events that should be happening by the committee. She said that she was surprised that people had opted to join with another group when it was decided that the committee would do something for the carnival. Lyn said that we do not have enough people on the committee and that we should start thinking and organising for next year so that we can do it properly. Annie tried to find out what exactly people were prepared to do and Lyn said she had asked the Band to do an event and they had agreed but the committee would have to find a venue and a way to charge for entry without upsetting the Greeks, there was a lot of discussion and presumably Lyn will follow it up and report back later. Annie was concerned about the Treasure Hunt which should be a committee event but which was being run by someone else. Lyn said they were running it on behalf of the committee. Julia said she would approach them about becoming members. March: Band event (date and venue to be arranged) April: Treasure Hunt (Old Town) (date to be arranged) May: Event to be arranged Any Other Business Annie said that there is a rumour going around which she wanted to tell the committee about personally and that although she intended to wait until the pre-AGM meeting, she wanted the committee to know that she does not intend to put her name forward as Secretary or committee member at the forthcoming AGM. Lyn said they will miss Annie and Julia asked if she may be persuaded to change her mind, but Annie said she would not do so. Julia asked where that left Les and he said that he may put in for committee but would definitely not put up for Treasurer. Annie said that, of course, she would continue to do her secretarial duties until the AGM and take minutes at that meeting as that is what an outgoing Secretary does. She also said that she is not resigning from ASAP as such, just the committee and would help where needed. The next committee meeting will be March 16th 2010 and the venue will be “The Last Post” (otherwise known as Villa Merlin) in Patitiri, commencing at 19:00. There being no other business the meeting closed at 20:25 Below is a report on the Veterinary visit of 18/19th January 2010 The Friends of the Cat very kindly donated the services of Alison and Jonathan, a married couple who are both vets. They were due to arrive on the afternoon of the 18th January and leave again the following afternoon. Owing to the vagueries of the both the weather and the boat services, they were trapped until the morning of the 20th. They both worked very hard and efficiently, and it was a pleasure to have them on Alonnisos. Not only did they perform the required surgeries but gave a number of consultations, for which we were very grateful. I would like to express my thanks to Lyn and Nik Ivison who donated their accommodation and surgery space, to Dinah Sinclair who not only was invaluable in helping with the collection and repatriation of animals but who also gave the vets a guided tour of the island when they were unexpectedly here for longer than anticipated, Mike Holmes and Andrew Lewin who trapped a number of feral cats and to Guy Routh who yet again gave his time freely to help with the surgery. Having collected the vets from the ferry, on arrival in the Old Village they were immediately involved in grovelling on the floor to castrate the lovely Merlin: a rather large dog, the table was deemed too small to accommodate his bulk! Alfie (an even larger dog) was also due to undergo a little alteration but, unfortunately, the relevant parts had not descended so he was spared. All in all, the vets were able to perform 1 dog castration, 18 female cats spays, 10 male cat castrations, 2 teeth extractions and five assorted consultations. Whenever vets visit Alonnisos, particularly those generously sponsored by charities with whom we have a good relationship, it is a very busy time for all of us. Not only is it ‘all go’ while they are here, but there are also the extraneous matters of ferrying animals around, transporting supplies and equipment (and vets, of course) and the massive clean up operation afterwards. It is tiring but so worthwhile. In hindsight, there is always the feeling that more animals could have been caught, that more could have been done. Such visits really require that everyone does their utmost to make such visits, which are an absolute blessing, as successful as possible.