OPEN NIGHT IN PLANNING MODE

On Friday February 29th 2008, the Central District will host an OPEN NIGHT. Please start to spread the word as potential candidates need to be informed.

District Training Day – October 13, 2007

Brethren,

On Saturday October 13th, our district will host a day of training - exemplification for all office-bearers as well as those who aspire to office. Even if you are a past master, you will be welcomed.

Please reply to me – Barry Minster – as we will be providing a light lunch and attendees are needed to register their attendance.

Starting at 0930 hours, we envisage all floor officers in particular for one on one training and would expect at least IGs Deacs and DC and WM if possible.

Others of course would be most welcome.

We need at least 50 to make the exercise worthwhile.

Anticipate 9.30 start and would be concluded by mid afternoon.

RING PULLS NOW EQUAL HEARTKIDS

Following the donation of $5000 to the University of Chiang Mai that provided prostheses to disabled children and adults in Thailand, a change of direction has occurred.

Heartkids chosen as the recipient for funds raised through the ring Pull program

The Task Force has been involved with Heartkids for many years and has chosen this charitable organisation to receive the funds raised by the collection of ring pulls in the future.

WHY HEARTKIDS?

It is their mission :

• To meet the needs of children and young adults with a congenital or childhood-acquired heart defect.
• To raise community awareness of the needs of those affected by heart conditions.
• To raise funds for paediatric cardiac research at the Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne, in the hope that more children with heart defects survive and lead an improved quality of life.

It is our mission :

• To continue to gather as many of those ring pulls as we can to enable us to support this worthy cause.

Remember brethren, charity begins at home so lets get behind this project and show just what freemasons can do for Heartkids!

What Ring Pulls to collect?

Freemasons’ Victoria Task Force thanks the Solar Masters Group for their support in managing this project.

Please pass this on to every freemason you meet and see it is read in your lodge.

Neil W. Price, Executive Secretary, Freemasons Victoria Task Force
Thursday, 28 June 2007

Web Site Is Back

Folks, I am sure that most of you would have noticed that there was a problem with the old web site, where a number of pages were displaying a "Not Found" message. I am not too sure what the problem was, but realised that the content could not be recovered because it had been corrupted within the database.

Now, without getting technical, there is absolutely no reason for the corruption to have occurred, as this web site is hosted on a commercial hosting facility with redundant power and cooling, and with industrial-strength security. Additionally, we were running a stock installation of the Drupal content management system – we weren't tinkering with it in any way. All I can surmise is that there was (and likely still is) some bug in the product that caused the corruption, and I am not prepared to risk the content to that software again.

For that reason, I have migrated as much of the content as I could salvage into this new web site, which is using a Wiki. I have had a lot of experience with this software and trust it a lot more than I do Drupal, and while it does not have all the bells and whistles that Drupal does, it is probably even easier for people who are not professional web developers to use. So for now the web site is being hosted as a PmWiki installation.

What has happened is that we will need you all to re-register please. Just drop me an email through and give me your real name and whether you need access to the Omega Group and/or the District Panel sections. I will email you back the details of your logon with instructions. I do apologise for the inconvenience, but I felt it is better to take the hit now rather than persevere with a possibly unstable site.

Thanks for your patience.