Strategy Could a real Port fan implant themselves on the board?

[RussellEbertHandball]

FishingRick04 had a crack a few years ago, but didn't get in. I believe he said you aren't really aloowed to canvass or campaign? This seems rather odd to me. Every single time these elections happen it seems the the candidate the board/AFL/Putin wants to get in does. It feels kind of rigged TBH.

The club has never encouraged publicly canvassing for votes, but it happens a bit in the background.

At the October 2019 Bigfooty focus group with KT, Richo, and Stephen Shirley that FishingRick04 organised, I brought up the whole 250 word candidate statement and how useless that was to find out about the candidates, and there has to be a better way to do it.

I suggested/asked KT, why couldn't the club organise for one of those Thursday Talking Footy evenings Baz Curtain ran most Thursday nights during the season at The Port Club, to have the candidates there, they all got say 10 minutes to give their speech and then have a 20 or 30 minute Q&A with those who attended - and had ordered dinner and drinks as was the way for the Thursday night sessions.

KT said he'd never thought about it and I asked is there anything that would legally stop it. He said no. I said Ok, why not then and he said he can't see any reason to say no. Then Covid hit and events at the Port club were shut down, and then the redevelopment happened.

I will lobby again for the 2023/24 elections for the February 2024 AGM director election to at least have a night where candidates can present themselves and their ideas to members.

 

[bomberclifford]

The club has never encouraged publicly canvassing for votes, but it happens a bit in the background.

At the October 2019 Bigfooty focus group with KT, Richo, and Stephen Shirley that FishingRick04 organised, I brought up the whole 250 word candidate statement and how useless that was to find out about the candidates, and there has to be a better way to do it.

I suggested/asked KT, why couldn't the club organise for one of those Thursday Talking Footy evenings Baz Curtain ran most Thursday nights during the season at The Port Club, to have the candidates there, they all got say 10 minutes to give their speech and then have a 20 or 30 minute Q&A with those who attended - and had ordered dinner and drinks as was the way for the Thursday night sessions.

KT said he'd never thought about it and I asked is there anything that would legally stop it. He said no. I said Ok, why not then and he said he can't see any reason to say no. Then Covid hit and events at the Port club were shut down, and then the redevelopment happened.

I will lobby again for the 2023/24 elections for the February 2024 AGM director election to at least have a night where candidates can present themselves and their ideas to members.

I think this is a good start for a long term plan.
Getting people from here to those Q&A nights would be a great way to get our voice heard.

Before this, your previous post mentioned influencing current board members. Do you have a plan for that?

 

[RussellEbertHandball]

I think this is a good start for a long term plan.
Getting people from here to those Q&A nights would be a great way to get our voice heard.

Before this, your previous post mentioned influencing current board members. Do you have a plan for that?

Yes I do, but its slow burn at the moment. I think they have circled the wagons after my misleading and deceptive representations thread, I started about 10 days ago.

 

[bomberclifford]

Yes I do, but its slow burn at the moment. I think they have circled the wagons after my misleading and deceptive representations thread, I started about 10 days ago.

Let me know if there's anything I can help with.

 

[FishingRick04]

FishingRick04 had a crack a few years ago, but didn't get in. I believe he said you aren't really aloowed to canvass or campaign? This seems rather odd to me. Every single time these elections happen it seems the the candidate the board/AFL/Putin wants to get in does. It feels kind of rigged TBH.

The thing is, even if you canvass you go to a page where all the candidates are.

So fishingrick does the leg work, promotes people to vote, they go to a page where they see all reps and “Wangas” bye bye fishingrick.

Anyway, find it unlikely the two member elect board members would have much influence anyway.

I do feel calls were made to get old mate Trevor Theile back on. Apparently he was a good contributor from what I’ve been told.

 

[240volt]

Looks like Fisting Rick never had a chance.
It’s all rigged

 

[The Smaller Warrior]

Tredders is honesty the only chance tbh, Ben is the best dude ever but that's long term thinking as I can't imagine his CV would stick out enough currently, he also wanted some time away from the club

 

[Kenny_Powers]

Encouraged by this thread! Systematic change is desperately needed within the club, and the members and supporters on here seem to be the last bastion of hope this club has of returning to what it once was. Port has all the ingredients to become the most successful club in the land again, to become a real heavyweight outside of Victoria, to become, what I'm certain people like Bruce Weber envisioned when we went for the license. The squandering of it all by the bozos at the top, pains me no end.

 

[Schulzenfest]

If Tredders tried to run for the board, Koch would institute a vaccine mandate for meetings.

 

[Chewy316]

If Tredders tried to run for the board, Koch would institute a vaccine mandate for board meetings.

Good thing then that Zoom allows people to do these meetings from home then!

 

[Fizzler]

I don't think so and even if we could, I don't think it would make a difference when Koch has a dictatorship.

As I've said previously, I think the right way of going about this is forming a supporters trust style organisation, independent of the club, who advocate for the supporters on issues. Ideally it would contain enough members to have political sway and media access.

The supporters trust would have the explicit stated goal of the PAFC board being returned to member control.

In the mean time it would regularly poll it's membership and release transparent results so the will of the membership can be accurately gauged and presented.

We all know the club is going to spend the next 6 months either saying absolutely nothing or spinning Hinkley we some kind of unlucky genius. We all know they're doing nothing about the bars. We all know they have no real interest in clearing our debt or returning the club to member control.

I will say that I personally have absolutely no idea how to set this up or run it. But I think it's the best way forward.

Imagine if we could get 10,000 members on something like this.

I’m far more inclined to become a member of this than to starting paying the club as it is right now to become a member.

 

[Enviable Tradition]

I’m far more inclined to become a member of this than to starting paying the club as it is right now to become a member.

The aim of the trust should be to raise enough $$ to buy back the club into members hands.

That wouldn't need to be paying off all debts but just enough to sway the powers that be


On SM-G975F using BigFooty.com mobile app

 

[El_Scorcho]

The aim of the trust should be to raise enough $$ to buy back the club into members hands.

That wouldn't need to be paying off all debts but just enough to sway the powers that be


On SM-G975F using BigFooty.com mobile app

Yep, potentially fundraise for the debt, but hold that money and only use it when we have certain guarantees about control going back to the members.

Once the board is back in the hands of the members, the supporters trust no longer needs to exist because we have representative control.

If I had the skillset or experience to get something like this off the ground, I'd already be doing it I guess.

The fact that we're under AFL control is ridiculous. We're a mid sized club in terms of turnover and membership. The issues that put us in financial peril were external to us and have been mostly (but not completely) nullified by the move to AO. If the AFL want us to be more financially stable they could negotiate to fund the SANFL directly so we don't have to do it via the stadium deal.

In any case, the AFL appointee David Koch hasn't reduced our debt and we continue to run into issues because of it, such as not being able to sack a failed coach.

 

[Papa G]

Tredders is honesty the only chance tbh, Ben is the best dude ever but that's long term thinking as I can't imagine his CV would stick out enough currently, he also wanted some time away from the club

Is Tredders bitter about the abhorent way he's been treated by just about everyone? Would he be of the attitude everybody can go * themselves or does he still care deeply about the club?

 

[raptalia]

The next members elected board director won't be voted on until early 2024 when Kathy Nagle's 3 year term is up.

Given that there are only 2 directors who are elected by the members and the rest are appointed by the President (ticked off by the AFL), you're really not going to make much of a difference unless you're enacting change with AFL approval (ie changing the non members elected board directors).

Easy to say it, actually achieving said change is another matter all together.

Even the Member Elected Board members could be rigged. Those in power simply get a stooge in the form of a past player to run for the Board. Everyone votes for him because of the champion he was rather than his ability to stand up and represent the Members. That said the PAFC website currently lists 10 Directors and not one of them has played the game at senior level. Not sure what happened to Gavin Wanganeen, I had an idea he was a member elected Director at one stage but he is not listed so I am either mistaken or he is no longer on the Board. By all rports Wanganeen was a bit of a 'yes man' anyway and the guy he replaced, George Fiacchi was far more militant.

 

[Enviable Tradition]

Is Tredders bitter about the abhorent way he's been treated by just about everyone? Would he be of the attitude everybody can go * themselves or does he still care deeply about the club?

A bit of both I'd say

On SM-G975F using BigFooty.com mobile app

 

[Lockhart Road]

Even the Member Elected Board members could be rigged. Those in power simply get a stooge in the form of a past player to run for the Board. Everyone votes for him because of the champion he was rather than his ability to stand up and represent the Members. That said the PAFC website currently lists 10 Directors and not one of them has played the game at senior level. Not sure what happened to Gavin Wanganeen, I had an idea he was a member elected Director at one stage but he is not listed so I am either mistaken or he is no longer on the Board. By all rports Wanganeen was a bit of a 'yes man' anyway and the guy he replaced, George Fiacchi was far more militant.

Gavin stood down, an election was held, if you are a member you would have been invited to vote.

Rob Snowdon was elected.

He represents the ‘football’ demographic among the membership.

We are waiting for him to do what we elected him to do: Sack Hinkley.

 

[John the Butcher]

Has anyone contacted Snowdon?

 

[TeeKray]

Tredders needs to get involved somehow. We need people who hate losing and he hates losing. We do a lot of losing on and off the field and nobody at the club seems to care much.

 

[240volt]

Tredders needs to get involved somehow. We need people who hate losing and he hates losing. We do a lot of losing on and off the field and nobody at the club seems to care much.

Thing is losing was never accepted at Port Adelaide in the old days no matter who was in charge heads would roll at seasons end. Fast forward to 21st century Port Adelaide and there just happy to be part of a national competition and have some occasional success and that is measured by the basics of making finals.
The difference is miles apart from what we knew as the Port club then and now.
That’s why anyone old enough can’t and never will accept what’s going on at our club.
The only ones that think it’s ok is the happy clappers that have come on board in the last 20 years or so. Unfortunately the old ways will never return and we are stuck with this corporate circus.

 

[VineValerian]

Thing is losing was never accepted at Port Adelaide in the old days no matter who was in charge heads would roll at seasons end. Fast forward to 21st century Port Adelaide and there just happy to be part of a national competition and have some occasional success and that is measured by the basics of making finals.
The difference is miles apart from what we knew as the Port club then and now.
That’s why anyone old enough can’t and never will accept what’s going on at our club.
The only ones that think it’s ok is the happy clappers that have come on board in the last 20 years or so. Unfortunately the old ways will never return and we are stuck with this corporate circus.

And the jerks in control know we will all be dead in a few years, so they are laughing and leaving a s**t legacy, that will leave a stain forever on what used to be a glorious and successful organisation

 

[The Smaller Warrior]

Is Tredders bitter about the abhorent way he's been treated by just about everyone? Would he be of the attitude everybody can go * themselves or does he still care deeply about the club?

I can't speak for Waz, but I'd say it's a little of both - but he deeply cares about the club. He's the one person I feel would stick to his guns once inside the inner circle, where as others in the past have shown they join the status quo.

 

[Interstater]

The first step is to lobby the current board to have the constitution changed to set the date for returning to be a member controlled club. The crows have it set as 2028, why don't we?

I also think we have to stop talking solely about debt.
You can have a $20 million net worth and borrow $1 million, have it be positively geared and still have a debt.

 

[Kenny_Powers]

Someone on here posted earlier about establishing a sort of members collective or members trust that

I don't think so and even if we could, I don't think it would make a difference when Koch has a dictatorship.

As I've said previously, I think the right way of going about this is forming a supporters trust style organisation, independent of the club, who advocate for the supporters on issues. Ideally it would contain enough members to have political sway and media access.

The supporters trust would have the explicit stated goal of the PAFC board being returned to member control.

In the mean time it would regularly poll it's membership and release transparent results so the will of the membership can be accurately gauged and presented.

We all know the club is going to spend the next 6 months either saying absolutely nothing or spinning Hinkley we some kind of unlucky genius. We all know they're doing nothing about the bars. We all know they have no real interest in clearing our debt or returning the club to member control.

I will say that I personally have absolutely no idea how to set this up or run it. But I think it's the best way forward.

Imagine if we could get 10,000 members on something like this.

(Bumping this thread) re above, this was a fantastic idea, does anyone know any means of establishing something like this?

 

[bomberclifford]

does anyone know any means of establishing something like this?

There is something in the works that could fill this role. Needs some buy in from a few people before it can get off the ground though.