Chapter Meeting, January 2017

Happy New Year everyone! What a fantastic turn-out to our first Chapter meeting of 2017! The car park at Nissan was overflowing due to the new plant construction but everyone managed to find a space and make it over to the SLC. We must have had eighty or so members there.

With a boisterous warm-up from Dave, Barry got things underway:

As last year, we’re looking for everyone to think about things that they would like to do to support the Heart & Soul Rally. Dawn will be collecting names etc. at the next Chapter meeting. There’s a whole range of ways that people can get involved from set-up, security, reception to tear-down.

There’s about 200 tickets sold so far, so get in there now to help make the rally a resounding success.

It’s the AGM in February and this is the last time in this slot. We’re moving it to December from now on, to match the other UK chapters. There’ll be a few questions raised at the meeting, so try and get along if you can. There’ll be pie and peas for everyone too!

We’re looking for some ideas for guest speakers for 2017 chapter meetings. We’ve had some great presentations in 2016 and all suggestions are welcome.

Any ideas for ride-outs in 2017 are welcome too. Helen passed round a copy of the Events Calendar for 2017 and there are quite a few free weekends. All the events are also in the calendar on the website. This is your Chapter, so please speak up if you have an idea!

The Chapter is twenty years old this year, and we’ll be celebrating in various ways throughout the year – watch this space! Hopefully, Lyn will get some great-looking badges for us too.

Duncan provided a quick update on the year-end accounts, with a very healthy balance. This allows us to freeze membership rates for another year. Great news for everyone.

Duncan is standing down as Treasurer soon, so this is one of his last updates. Gary will be taking over the role shortly.

It’s a busy time for memberships right now, so get your renewals to Mandy. The form for 2017 is on the Chapter website.

Ruth announced that the next L.O.H. meeting would take place on 28 January 2017, at Jennings Harley-Davidson Gateshead. We’ve arranged a bowling evening, on 21 January 2017, at Washington. Tickets are £12 per person. Please let Ruth know if you’d like to attend.

Robin provided a quick update on the website too. We’ve being doing some updates over Christmas, so everything looks great again. All the Chapter events and UK rallies are in the Events Calendar, helping everyone plan their riding year ahead.

The website is for everyone and if you would like to see something new on there, or would like to contribute a story or some pictures, please get in touch with Robin.

There’ll be a great event at Jennings Harley-Davidson Gateshead on 14 January. It’s the start-up event for the annual Battle of the Kings competition. Grant said that there would be bands, traders and a scran van there during the day. Sketch, who is helping design the bike, will be there too. It sounds like a great event, so get along if you can.

Finally, Barry presented Rachel with her L.O.H. Rider of the Year award and certificate. Well done to Rachel!

Dave, Steve, Ray and Lesley were the winners in the raffle. Dave moved like lightning to snag the JD!

The next meeting is the AGM, on 2 February. Did we mention the pie and peas (!) ? See you all there!

GeordieHOG Editor