Torquay Lions Club held their Changeover Dinner Thursday 26 June at the Lions Village. Ward Councillor Paul Barker, Incoming Torquay Rotary Club President Kelly Binyon as well as Installing Officer and Lions District 201V2 Leadership Team member Alan Davis were guests. Current President Colin Bellis handed over to Incoming President Ross Yapp and a new Board was installed. Stuart Miller was also inducted as a new member into the Club. Allen Osman was the recipient of the Club’s Lion of the Year Award and Ken Farrow was presented with a special award for his work as Secretary.

The Torquay Bowls Day was again the venue for the Billy Ryan Charity Bowls Day on Friday April 11. A full quota of bowlers had entered this popular event again and came ready to open their wallets to support the 3 raffles and the silent auctions. Torquay businesses had once again generously donated the prizes to be raffled and other businesses had given cash donations. In all, the event raised $12,000 for the VICSES Torquay Unit.

The Lions Youth of the Year Victorian State Final was held in Torquay on Saturday, March 29th at Kithbrooke Country Club.
The overall winner was Sebastian Lunn, from Melbourne and he will go onto the National Final – 2025 at Traralgon on May 5th.
Amelia Hulonce from Portland won the award for public speaking.
Other finalists competing included Grace Boehnke from Dromana, Olivia Woodhouse from Waverley and Oakley Tarrant from Rochester.
There were 80 Lions, judges, contestants and friends at the state final, and all enjoyed a thoroughly entertaining evening.
The standard of these young adults was incredibly high.
The contest is open to students entering their final years(yrs10-12) of schooling.
The final had students from 5 districts within Victoria, each of whom had won their district final.
The journey for the finalists was worthwhile and fulfilling with many friendships made over the last few months.
For 61 years students have been participating in the Lions Youth of the Year program, the aim of which is to provide an opportunity for young people to achieve success.
Students who participate invariably find the experience rewarding and develop their skills associated with interview technique, personal interaction, and public speaking.
The judges were Danny Vriens, Robyn O’Loughlin, Pam Hacking, Emma Jones and Stewart Miller. Theirs was a difficult task.
Sebastian received a medal, a plaque and $1,000 as winner, as well as a wonderful experience.

Surf Coast’s local Good Friday Appeal (GFA) ambassador Belle Strahan and her Mum Karen recently (27/2) joined the Torquay Lions Club dinner meeting to encourage its members to donate to the Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH) annual appeal.
Lion Brian Keane facilitated a question-and-answer interview of 16-year-old Belle and her mother. Their story stunned the attentive audience.
Belle’s relationship with the RCH began before she was born and has continued all her life. (A full story of Belle’s medical history is attached).
Because of the life-saving support of the RCH and its staff over the years, Belle has grown to be an active, competitive sportsperson and student.
She is in Year 11 at Geelong Lutheran College. Belle and leads a physically active life and enjoys taekwondo and swimming. She’s also a volunteer lifeguard patroller with Torquay Surf Lifesaving Club (after being Bronze Medallion certified in 2023).
Belle and her family are forever thankful to the Children’s Hospital and each year get involved in fundraising for the Good Friday Appeal.
Belle has fundraised more than $20,000 for the Royal Children’s Hospital’s Good Friday Appeal and HeartKids Australia over the past 15 years, including $2,139 for the 2024 Good Friday Appeal.
Her fundraising campaign page can be found in the GFA website under the Find a Fundraiser tab or https://fundraise.goodfridayappeal.com.au/fundraisers/Torquay

Torquay Lions held their second caravan park meat tray raffle on Saturday 11 January on a balmy Summer's evening. A big thank you to all the campers who supported the raffle. It is quite amazing how generous members of our community are.

Torquay Lions were up early on New Year's Day to clean up the grassed areas at the local surf beach after the previous night's celebrations. The ten local Lions were joined by a visiting Lion and family at 6:30am to make the area clean and safe for early morning beach goers. The good news is that the amount of rubbish left behind was considerably less than in previous years.

Members of the Torquay Lions Club and their partners held their annual Christmas Party on Monday 16th December at the Lions Village in Torquay. We came together to celebrate another successful year of serving our community. To add to the festivities we had a visit from Santa.

Sunday saw the second Cowrie Market for this season. It was a lovely day with brilliant weather and terrific crowds. The Lions Club were there as usual with our BBQ Trailer and Children's Train. We also had a display of the Lions Peace Poster Competition entries from the local Primary Schools. The BBQ crew were nearly run off their feet serving our delicious sausage and onion offerings. And the Train crew was keep busy all day with a constant stream of excited children wanting a ride around the Elephant Walk area. Thank you to all our sausage sizzle customers and to our train passengers for supporting us. We managed to raise an amazing $2864 for the day. As usual every dollar and cent we raised will be donated back to the community.

At the Lions V2 District Change Over Dinner in Warrnambool on Saturday 29 June the Lions Club of Torquay received two awards.
The Club received the District Website/Social Media Award and the Bank of Ideas Award.
The Website/Social Media Award was in recognition of the positive way in which Lions is being promoted in our community. The Bank of Ideas Award is in recognition of the Club's 3 year $12,750 sponsorship of the Art of the Minds Song Contest, supporting Mental Health in our Community.

Torquay Lions raised over $12,000 for the Torquay and Bellbrae CFA Brigades on Friday's Billy Ryan Torquay Lions Charity Bowls Day. Torquay Lions and Friends of Lions were on deck for the day, catering and organising raffles. There were 120 bowlers from the Torquay Bowls Club and other local clubs. In the weeks leading up to the event, Torquay Lions collected donations from over 90 local businesses. We received cash donations from our long-term major supporters Champion Blinds and McCartney Real Estate and Roy Morris & Co. Lawyers. In total we collected over $18,000 in cash donations, goods and services. The non-cash donations were used as prizes for the 3 Raffles and the Silent Auctions. The bowlers had a great day and together we helped to raise over $12,000 for our local CFA Brigades. The Bowls Charity Day is named after Billy Ryan who was a Lion and a Bowler, and was well loved in Torquay. He passed away in July 2022. Also supporting us on the day, as usual, was local councillor Rose Hodge.

On Saturday 24 February Torquay Lions Club took part in the Centenary Celebrations of Torquay's Taylor Park. Community groups were invited by the Friends of Taylor Park to set up information booths to showcase their groups activities. Torquay Lions Club recently donated funds to the FOTP for nesting boxes to to established in the park.

On Friday night two Torquay Lions sold tickets for our usual Meat Tray Raffle at the Torquay Hotel. Then on Saturday, at short notice, we held a Sausage Sizzle at Bunnings in North Torquay, while another team of Lions were also selling Lions Christmas Cakes and Puddings at the Farmer’s Market. Finally, on a beautiful sparkling Sunday, at Torquay's Cowrie Market we held another Sausage Sizzle while a second team of Lions ran our Children's Train. All told, we raised over $4,300 for the weekend. Every dollar of which will go back to the community. It was a great result! Thanks to everyone who bought a ticket, or a sausage, or a cake, or had a ride on the train. We also managed to talk Santa into coming to the market to spread some Christmas cheer . 🎅

Torquay Lions held another working bee at the Bellbrae Cemetery on Tuesday 15th August. The club regularly helps maintain the Cemetery grounds by mowing, weeding and raking the gumtree litter. The club is paid by the cemetery trust for its efforts, with the funds going into the Administration Account. This helps subsidise the costs of running the club.

Pictured are John Bell, Allen Osman and Richard Kelly.