Becoming an Incorporated Association
Postal Ballot to Change our Incorporation and Rules
The Surry Hills Neighbourhood Centre Cooperative Limited has voted to become an Incorporated Association. This occurred via a postal ballot of members, and the results were confirmed by a vote at the Annual General Meeting, December 2006
The purpose of the ballot was to vote on four (4) Special Resolutions pertaining to our conversion to an Incorporated Association. These resolutions were explained in a Disclosure Statement, which should be read in conjunction with the new Rules.
Click on the links to download full copies of the Disclosure Statement, the Special Resolutions and a full copy of the Rules of the Surry Hills Neighbourhood Centre Association. Full copies of these documents are available in hard copy from the Centre office at the above address.
All members of the SHNC were invited to participate in the postal ballot. Advertisements were posted in local newspapers, and written notice was sent to all members at their registered address.
| Download | Format | Download Size |
|---|---|---|
| Special Resolutions | Adobe Reader | 14kB |
| Disclosure Statement | Adobe Reader | 36kB |
| Rules | Adobe Reader | 91kB |
Background Information
Conversion from a Cooperative to an Association
Presently the SHNC is an incorporated Co-operative, and requires substantial changes to its rules to meet the latest requirements of the Department of Fair Trading. Additionally, changes to our incorporation are necessary to assist us to obtain desperately needed financial support from businesses, and to preserve favourable taxation conditions for our staff.
To achieve all of these objectives, the Management Committee has evaluated the options and determined that the preferred course of action is to convert our legal incorporation to that of an Association and to adopt modified rules which meet all the above requirements.
The new SHNC Association's proposed new rules have been drafted and the proposed objectives of the Association were based on discussions at the Information and Planning Forum held on Saturday 22 October.
Achieving this will require special resolutions to be passed by a postal ballot of members.
Information and Planning Forum
On Saturday, 22 October 2005, an open Information and Planning Forum was held at the Centre to explain the proposed changes to the community, and to receive community feedback, and to determine the objects for the new SHNC Association to be incorporated into the Rules which will be put to the AGM on 7 December.
A handout was provided to all people at the Forum. Click here to download a copy of the handout. (164kB download. NB Adobe Reader or equivalent required.)
Discussions at the Forum were briefly summarised on butchers papers. Click here to read this summary. Note that the objects have been reworded to a form for suitable for incorporation into the Rules, preserving spirit and intent.(23kB download)
Click here to download a copy of the full proposed "Rules for Surry Hills Neighbourhood Centre, an Association incorporated under the Associations Incorporation Act, 1984" (91kB download). The Objects determined at the Forum are now embraced in this document.
Postal Ballot
The postal ballot of all members was held in the month prior to the AGM on 11 December 2006. The four special resolutions were accepted by the postal ballot, and this result was confirmed by the members attending the AGM.