Fishing Victoria Forum

frozenpod wrote:What is the process for electing people to VR fish?

In layman's terms to be elected to the board you first have to be elected to the state council,to do that you can be an affiliated member ie someone nominated by a club,presumably the clubs vote who they want in to represent them.That's fine but a lot of clubs aren't free to join,so added expense on top of your licence every year, or lack of an affiliated club within your area or fishing interest might not be an option. or

An Unaffiliated member ie someone who is a non club member and represents all the non club members(probably the majority of us on here).How you get nominated for that one & who votes on it i dont have a clue.Same as if there where more moninee's from an area than positions,who votes to decide.

I'm sure they are all good people with our interests at heart 100%,and many of them volunteer their time & are probably put out of pocket by doing it.

Maybe one of the guy's on here who is in a club can shed some light on it all, or ask around their club for us on how it all work's.

I would just love to know what % of the 750k licenced vic anglers is actually eligible to vote.Even at 1% that means 7.5k got to vote.Anyone know someone who did,most anglers i ask have never even heard of vr fish.

Via your local state member is the best way to let your thoughts be known. The govt of the day will alway's control our licence $$.

Vr fish is a good start,just needs some fine tuning,open communication & education about how it all works,be thousands of us out there willing to possibly jump on board if only we knew how it all worked.

Whilst a little complicated that does sound reasonable.

Whilst it wouldn't allow a non club member to be nominated I could see issues with a forum or facebook hero so to speak getting a lot of votes when they may not be the best person for the job.

I also agree that the people involved are most likely volunteering there time and would be better served by spending there time with there family, earning a pay check or fishing.

As a starting point before we delete this section can we get people from VRfish to let us know what is going on?

Fishing vic sort of is a club, at least I kind of have that feeling.

Perhaps if VRfisho (they might already but we don't know where to look) can provide more information about meetings decisions, outcomes ect we could know what is going on and possibly make some suggest if required.

On the face of it I feel like it wouldn't be the worst idea to incorporate FV as an angling club, although there are probably a bunch of complications I haven't thought of.

I would guess 75% of fishermen in vic do not belong to a club a few do who want to chase records or feel the need to prove they are better by winning comps. But most people want to just catch fish for fun. So vr fish only represent only about 25% of anglers in this state and as they are funded by the state government they will recommend any thing they put up.
If vr fish truly want to represent all vic fishermen they should give everybody a crack not just people nominated from clubs

I don't disagree but perhaps the current system has evolved from what hasn't worked previously?

Whilst there are plenty of great people involved in fishing most wouldn't care about the reasons for the regs politics ect.

Maybe the system we have now with a bit more transparency could work ok?

This is Russell from VRFish. Please excuse my tardiness in responding to the posts regarding VRFish but I was a surgeons scalpel edge away from death early this year and it has taken this long to get myself back to somewhere near normality.

"Drew 2" has explained very well the makeup and structure of VRFish, and he is correct when he says that the members of VRfish are passionate fishers who only have the best interests of fishers at heart. Anyone can nominate for membership to VRFish, both from Clubs/Associations or general fishers who do not belong to clubs. Also, anyone can write to/phone VRFish and raise any issues that need to be addressed/resolved.

We are not politicians, lobbyists or activists - just recreational fishers who give up our time to make sure that Victorians can keep going fishing.
Sometimes, we are able to get beneficial wins easily and other times, the benefits take years to come through. A good example is Devilbend and fishing access to the Lake. One of our members, Tom Camp has worked for over 10 years to make it possible for fishers to access the lake. He fought every conceivable argument from every conceivable community and interest group against fishing access to the lake and we finally won access. We now also have two (2) fishing platforms erected on the Lake. How many of you had any idea that VRfish was working with Tom to get this outcome. How many of you even knew who Tom was and how much of his family time he spent on this issue (not that he was out there shouting about his efforts). The only news that came out when Devilbend was finally opened to fishing was simply a community invite to the "Devilbend Opening Ceremony". Tom was there, quietly in the background.

I agree with 'frozenpod" that communication is really important for any organisation, whether its the local fishing club trying to get new members, a huge corporation like Telstra trying to convince you to buy a new phone or VRFish telling you what we are doing and asking you for your feedback about ways to improve fishing across Victoria.

We have a web site, a facebook page, a twitter account, an instagram presence, we place information articles in fishing magazines, we provide presentations to fishing clubs, we partner with Fisheries Victoria to hold an annual series of fishing forums across the state, we run surveys to get feedback from fishers, we visit fishing tournaments and we assist various people and clubs to run family fishing days, rock fishing safety courses and junior clinics.

With all these interactions with fishers and the community, I would love to know from you what else you would like us to do to raise our profile and give you more information.

What I will promise is that now that I am back on my feet, I will respond to your questions and get your thoughts on how to improve our fishing opportunities.
Cheers, Russell

for those on FV Russell is a board member of vrfish and the previous chairman and is only interested in promoting rec angling

Until I bacame a member of this forum (FV) I had only heard a few things about VRFish and they were all negitive. After reading your post I have gained a bit of knowledge of what VRFish does. One thing that was of interest was (Quote: we are just recreational fishers who give up our time to make sure that Victorians can keep going fishing) Well could VRFish help out with a problem myself and many other fisho's with a disability have? I saw in your post about fishing platforms being erected and that's great. What we need is more areas with access to the waters edge with Disable Parking,??? within a short distance of melbourne. A lot of us have trouble even walking short distances, and carying a bit of gear is out of the question. I hope this post is covered under the category (to make sure Victorians can keep going fishing?) Remember you don't have to be in a wheel chair or have a limb missing to have a Disability

vrfish wrote:This is Russell from VRFish. Please excuse my tardiness in responding to the posts regarding VRFish but I was a surgeons scalpel edge away from death early this year and it has taken this long to get myself back to somewhere near normality.

What I will promise is that now that I am back on my feet, I will respond to your questions and get your thoughts on how to improve our fishing opportunities.
Cheers, Russell

I think this is the best way to start and was one of the main issues of distaste towards Vrfish on the forum.

Vrfish came onto the forum and made there presence known, but failed to show any contribution to any questions asked or issues raised by members.

I can understand that due to illness you were absent, and I hope the members take this into consideration.

Now that someone is here again and can show a presence on the forum with replies to queries made, maybe the forum members can turn a negative view into a positive one, of Vrfish and the job they attempt to undertake.

X2