SCA Ltd (Australia)

It’s been a busy month, and once again we’re making the pegasus editors life difficult because that means we have a lot to tell you and will be filling a lot of pages of this issue of pegasus. I’d like to welcome Honore on board as editor of this issue and thank Lucia for her term as chronicler and pegasus editor, especially for extending that term beyond the standard 2 years.

The board is thinking about new people in new roles too, and to this end we’re advertising for new board members. If you think you have the experience, tenacity and time to be a board member, or wish to ask questions about the role, please contact our secretary. We also are looking at some changes in our directors too at our AGM at Rowany festival over Easter. We’d love to see as many members as possible attending the meeting, but if you can’t be there in person, please consider sending a proxy to vote for you (or nominate a board member as your proxy). You’ll find a proxy form here.

We’ve been working on a raft of issues related to how we make sure children are safe and our paperwork relating to children is correct in mundane law. We’ve released our new Child Protection Policy and Background Check Procedures, and are currently working on tidying up other forms related to the participation of children in the society. We’re also reviewing other policies – harassment, rental & lease agreements, commenting on sanctions policy and various ongoing tasks. And of course we’re doing general ongoing tasks like making the paperwork happen for the new bank accounts and lease agreements.

I hope to see you at our AGM, and I’d like to remind everyone that they are most welcome to attend our online monthly meetings by contacting the secretary.

Tiffany Brown/Teffania de Tuckerton

I hope you read about the changes to contributing membership in the December pegasus newsletter, or in this column. This couldn’t have happened without a lot of work by a lot of people, so I hope you’ll bear with me while I name some of them: Leonor d’Scotia for her work on administering the constitutional change process which allowed this change, Jacques du Bar sur le Loup for changing the registry database to enable these changes, Nicodemus Novello for changing the registry website, Sorle Maknicoll for changes to the SCA Ltd website and following up on contributing memberships, Caelia the Fair, for sending out messages to contributing members as registrar, and the rest of the board for processing these amendments. Seeming small changes can take a big group effort to produce like this one, so please take a moment to appreciate all the jigsaw pieces that go together to make our chronicler’s life easier and our organisation more financially viable.

While I am talking about the bumper December issue of pegasus, I’d like to thank Lucia delli Fenice, the pegasus editor and Lochac chronicler for her extra effort in editing such a long edition, and for all the editions she has edited during her extra long term. If you’ve been really inspired by her efforts, perhaps the best way you can repay her is by giving her a holiday – see the advertisement for replacement chroniclers in this edition of pegasus.

We’ve also introduced our revised alcohol policy recently. Those who read carefully may notice the requirement for a intoxicated persons management plan where alcohol is served. I’d just like to reassure people that the word “served” is important – this refers to alcohol being provided by the event, and is already a requirement for liquor licenses in many states. This revision owes it’s existence to our former board member Danielis Pyrsokomos, and I’d like to take this chance to thank her for all her work for the board and regret that we couldn’t have kept her for longer. I’d also like to thank Rurik Farseer for giving feedback on this revision on behalf of the brewer’s guild.

Just as Danielis has made her mark on the board, you’ll find an advert for replacement board members on this site, I’d encourage you to read that and recommend people of rare  perseverance to apply for our remaining vacant positions.

I hope you’ve all had a great festive season, and if you are having any summer holidays that they are very enjoyable. I’ll be heading to the lovely green Southron Gaard for Canterbury Faire where I hope to meet with some of the SCA New Zealand committee in person as well as having a lot of fun at a relaxing event. But despite that, the work of the board will continue through January as we ponder questions such as improving the procedures for applying for bank accounts.

If you’d like to hear the board in action, we meet electronically on a monthly basis, usually on the first Monday of the month (except January when we meet on the second) at 7:30pm Sydney time. Please contact our secretary <secretary@sca.org.au> if you’d like to listen in.

Tiffany Brown
Chair, SCA Ltd

It’s been a busy month or two for the Board of SCA Ltd. We’ve welcomed a new board member Donna Page (Gabriella Borromei) from Queensland and Sandra Watkins (Sláine inghean Uí Ruadháin). In sadder news, our very hardworking treasurer Margaret Sleigh (Margareta Deniskaia) has had to resign from the board for health reasons.We will miss her very much, but you can see some of her legacy to us in this letter. The role of treasurer will be filled by Sandra Watkins until the SCA Ltd AGM next easter when all members will have the chance to confirm her in the role.

Part of Margaret’s legacy is our first formal asset policy for one in Australia which was  published in the last issue of pegasus. This policy formalises a lot of existing board practices and legal requirements that were poorly publicised and gives answers to a lot of questions we get regularly asked. We hope this policy will make managing assets a lot easier for branches. Another very visible part of Margaret’s legacy is a rewrite of our constitution to make us more compliant with mundane law, ensure we have formalised procedures for replacing board members and directors and make the whole document clearer and have a lot less typos in it. This draft is coming to you now so that you have a chance to send us comments and suggestions for change before we send the final text to be voted on at our AGM next Easter.

We also have a raft of restructures to the way we operate that are designed to make things more efficient, update them to current circumstances and make sure systems we in place that can operate long into the future. While Margaret has been working on constitutional changes, the rest of the board, especially Jeff Nicholson (Sorle Maknicholl) has been working on implementing changes to Pegasus to make if financially viable with help from Leta von Gosslar in wrangling forms (thankyou!), Louise has been spearheading changes to our childrens policy and the Lochac Seneschalate have worked with us to develop procedures to accompany the policy.

That’s not all that we’ve been doing, but you’ll see more in future news articles. And in older news, Jeff has updated our website to a format that lets all board members update it, and has a brand new news feature.so you can now track the latest updates to what we’ve been doing on our website at https://sca.org.au/board/. Take a look, and check back regularly to see our latest progress.

Tiffany Brown/Teffania de Tuckerton
Chair SCA Ltd