agm report 2015 -...

Office: 012 804 1853 • Crisis: 012 804 3619 • Rape: 082 340 2061

www.lifelinepta.org.za

AGM Report 2015

http://www.lifelinepta.org.za/

LifeLine Queenswood

Personal Growth Course 2014

Viva Village

Mamelodi

Counselling offices at the outreach centres

www.lifelinepta.org.za 1 LifeLine Pretoria AGM Report

Chairperson's Report 2 & 3

Director's Counselling Statistics 5

Treasurer's Report 6

Integrity

I believe in the value of Emotional Wellness and I practice what I preach by seeking ways to pursue it for myself and others.

Diversity

I deeply respect and value the differences in people and culture and I believe that emotional wellness is a universal

human need.

Passion I commit to do all I can to promote and facilitate Emotional Wellness.

Innovation

I want to get out of old moulds and mindsets and apply fresh thinking in my quest for ‘emotional wellness for all.’



This has been a year of both sadness and joy; loss and gain. For health reasons, Esther Crous, our chairperson, with-drew from office; and for personal reasons, Wendy Krause, our long- standing Board member, also resigned. Their presence is greatly missed. Because we had neither Director nor Receptionist, the Board, now under the leadership of Sonya Rayne, took over the reins with a new style of governance: teamwork between Board, Staff and Volunteers, rather than dominance by the Board. This has resulted in a spirit of enthusiasm and creativity not experienced in a long time, e.g. under the initiative of the volunteers, 2 additional counselling rooms were made to be warm and welcoming. We have reviewed our volunteer database to validate for "active" and "non-active". Hopefully this spirit will carry us into an ever brightening future. As Treasurer, André Vest has held tightly onto the financial reins and we are most grateful to him and Evans … for all their time and effort. Their financial report will speak for itself. The Community Centres - under Sharon Pearlman’s grooming - has identified the scourge of stigma (rape, HIV, abuse …) as a festering sore in the communities of Mamelodi and Soshanguve. This needs immediate attention and an anti-stigma campaign and concert is being organized provisionally for July. This will make our presence more visible within the community. For the first time in seven years, the personal growth and counseling courses have been presented in Mamelodi thanks to the subsidy from Lotto. We foresee therefore greater help being given for all emotionally injured people in our Tshwane area. New premises at a local shopping centre have been found for our Soshanguve centre which should now thrive unimpeded by bureaucracy. We have formed a partnership with Viva Village and are also in the process of partnering with ECHO in Pretoria East and have also had meetings with SADAG. All our Community Centre Administrators have become actively involved with the rape support group recently set up at Watermeyer. It is hoped that shortly they will be setting up their own support groups within the Community areas. Our Administrators will also become more actively involved in the rape crisis line counselling services, allowing for counselling to take place in at least six of our official languages. Rape bags have again been distributed to Thuthuzela, hospitals and police stations. Queenswood has four new members after they attended the courses presented there and Father Chris organized the mahala printing of our newly designed business cards. He also constantly markets LifeLine wherever he goes. Thank you Father Chris. Communication has really taken off with great attention being given to the website, Facebook, Twitter and the blog. The ‘old blog’ from before 2013 is a cause of concern because we cannot delete from the search engines and this causes confusion as it comes up on screen when anyone does an internet search for LifeLine Pretoria. The LifeLine monthly newsletter continues to get good reviews and Janet of Webzi has recently done a major updating of the LifeLine Pretoria website for us and is willing to continue making changes/additions as their part of ‘paying back’. Some of the students from Varsity College have elected LifeLine Pretoria as their marketing project. Lucky has been giving weekly talks concerning life skills on Mamelodi FM. Schools have been given short talks on LifeLine services; and skills have again been shared with Reach for Recovery. Four Personal Growth and Counselling Skills Courses have been given at Watermeyer, also one at Queenswood and one at Mamelodi, so our number of volunteers is gradually increasing, and we hope to have our target of 80 reached by December. A new system of mentors for probationers has been started and in-depth training for probationers and anyone interested is in progress. Ongoing training, which is held every second month, has included Trauma, Couples Counselling, HIV and Self Mutilation. Vodacom are using LifeLine Pretoria as a Pilot Project which will enable cell phones with a crisis line number to be used. Volunteers can therefore do night duty from home. We will now be able to advertise a 24 hour service again and this will enable us to be joined to the LifeLine South Africa number. Already the number of people rostering for telephone duty has improved. Telephone and Face to Face counselling has averaged a 100 sessions per month. Highlights of our year have been the acquisition of Faith Chaane as our receptionist and Teresa da Silva as our new Director. What a wonderful birthday present these have been for us in our 40th year of service to Pretoria.



Fundraising is always a problem and fortunately Lotto has again helped us out this year. Our Annual Golf Day was held at Irene Country Club. We had 14 four ball teams playing on the course. Many thanks to the team consisting of Sylvia Shannon, as the head of the project, Lorraine and Susan at the 7th hole for shooters and snacks, accompanied by the “Boys”: Lucky, Lazarus and Sean…. to help. At the booking-in table Elmari, Sonya, Sylvia and many more worked quietly behind the scene, with Agnes and Lucky sending out invitations and replying to all the queries. All the prizes were donated, sponsored or gifts given and many bottles were donated for our Booze hamper. Thank you to everyone who contributed. It was a great success and we look forward to the 2015 Golf Day in September which promises to be loads of fun. The profit made on the 2014 Golf Day was R90 434.10. Probationers are expected to organize a fundraising event, and we have received many donations in money and kind from friends of LifeLine and volunteers. Overhanging trees were a threat to our buildings, so they have been trimmed and some even removed. Family members of volunteers have helped to beautify the garden. The South African Catholic Bishops’ Conference used LifeLine Pretoria to give a condensed course to the Justice and Peace Ministry members of six dioceses in South Africa. A lot was learnt from both sides. A list of possible sponsors from 303 corporate donors, 16 embassies [foreign missions & agencies] and 130 foundation trusts was secured and shared with LifeLine Pretoria's Director, Teresa, and Receptionist, Faith. These lists are loaded onto the receptionists’ computer at LifeLine Watermeyer. Faith has a scripted call sheet to guide her on what she should say when she establishes contact with a possible sponsor. Teresa has sent CSI communication to over 50 companies in the past two months. Only 4 of the embassies and 16 companies were interested to have LifeLine send them a funding proposal. Some of the embassies now only sponsor certain sectors such as child centres. Companies are looking for specific projects to sponsor. They have requested audited financial statements. Most companies have already done funding allocations for this year. For the next financial year, the board portfolio Corporate Customers will need to change focus to "Project Funding". Our finances are in a much more positive position, with thanks to an excellent volunteer treasurer, controlled spending, volunteer contributions, sponsors and donors. In the last year, LifeLine Pretoria has undergone significant change. We look forward to how this will strengthen the services we offer to the communities we serve. MEMBERS OF THE BOARD Flick Mullan (Chairperson) Sonya Rayne (Vice Chairperson) Andre Vest (Treasurer) Jenny Tweehuijsen (Secretary) Sharon Pearlman Sheila Houghton Tom Sebastian Dawn Mosdell Esther Crous (Resigned January 2015) Wendy Krause (Resigned partially February 2015)

Our Chief Whip keeping us all in Line..

LifeLine



Graduation 2014

&

Thanksgiving

LifeLine Volunteers do everything and anything - moving offices, sorting out, repacking, sweeping up mess, changing cables and so much more.

Personal Growth Watermeyer Feb 2014

Personal Growth Course

Watermeyer 2014



Director’s Statistics

0

200

400

600

800

1000

1200

Telephone Face to Face Male Female Total

Clients Counselled for 2014 - 2015

Telephone F2F Male Female

75%

13%

12%

Clients Counselled

Individual

Couples

Families



LIFELINE PRETORIA

TREASURER’S REPORT FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 MARCH 2015

It is fitting that, on the happy occasion of its 40th anniversary, LifeLine Pretoria is able to report a significant improvement in its financial performance and a positive outlook with regard to its prospects for the future.

During the year under review, 2014-15, the organization increased its total own income by 29% to R570,919. This was achieved mainly through the presentation of additional personal growth and counselling skills courses. Total expenditure, on the other hand, was brought down by an impressive 34% to R566,354. Of this, R203,105 was funded out of a Lotto grant of R552,840 that was secured in October 2014. This means that only R363,249 i.e. 64% of the organization’s total own income mentioned above was used to cover expenditure during the year. This enabled the organization to increase its retained income by 67% during the year to R622,095. This does not include the balance of the Lotto funds that were carried forward as at 31 March 2015 and which amounted to R349,735.

The audited financial statements for 2014-15 will be available for scrutiny during the 2015 Annual General Meeting and thereafter at the LifeLine office in Val de Grace, Pretoria.

The positions of director and assistant director/bookkeeper were vacant during the year and these functions were ably maintained with the valued assistance of various Board and staff members. A new director was appointed in April 2015, this was made possible by a generous two-year salary sponsorship by a long-standing friend of the organization. A long-term lease at a token rent has also been secured for the premises occupied by the organization in Val de Grace.

If the organization were to maintain the 2014-15 ratio of income to expenditure, there is no reason to doubt that the organisation will exist for many years to come, even without Lotto funding. However, the demand for LifeLine courses fluctuates and this can lead to a drop in income. Other income sources may have to be worked more aggressively to compensate for this expectation. Nevertheless, one can safely predict that LifeLine Pretoria will still be going strong two years from now.

The ideal situation is for LifeLine Pretoria to be self-supporting so that future applications for Lotto funding can be specifically focussed on financing the organisation’s community outreach programmes. This focus must be clearly visible in the organisation’s annual operational planning and budget documents.

At this point one must pause to express sincere thanks and appreciation to the many donors, volunteers, Board members and friends of LifeLine Pretoria who contribute financially and otherwise to the well-being of the organization and consequently to its ability to provide the much-needed services that it renders in the community on a daily basis.

Report compiled by André Vest

Treasurer: LifeLine Pretoria Board



Irene Golf Day

Booze Hamper won on the day

Queenswood Woman’s Day

Lunch and Fashion Show

Our newly renovated counselling rooms 1, 2 and 3.

Please come and see……..


agm report 2015 -...

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