dodo

And the initial audit report , a year earlier, used the word "imperative" in it's recommendations. We (RA) were told from the first audit, and it just went downhill to the last. From reading through the lot, it comes down to tech managers inheriting poor data (rubbish data in files) and poor administrative practices, with no oversight and no support. Look at the first followup audit - Adam Finn had been in the job a day, and promised CASA to address the issues. The issues beat him. He was gone within 6 months. Why did he leave? It doesn't appear to have been voluntary (from the RA announcement). Where was the board? So from a an "imperative" need for remedial action in Nov 11 to "little confidence" in RA and Non-compliance notices in Nov 12 took 12-13 months, during which we had two new tech managers. Where was the board? Obviously, we had a long term compliance issue, basically due to poor practices and administration, but there is still no evidence that we have taken real steps to provide a reliable ability to correctly register an aircraft within our remit. It looks like our administration is at the shoebox filing state, and no real steps have been taken to address this. Where is the board? dodo

Count through the posts - the vast majority are critical. Credit and praise are given, but are vastly outnumbered by criticism. dodo PS This is fairly standard - people are more passionate in their comments in internet posts.

As far as the criticisms go - people don't post on an internet forum to praise (or very rarely) - they whinge about what is wrong. As far as the "why?", I think it is a lot better than just condemning the board for what has gone wrong. Let's ask questions and listen. Then consider the future. As far as the intent of the board members, I have no doubt as to the good intentions of every one of them, and in the one case where I can form a view, I can see the abilities and attributes that person brings to the board. It doesn't mean they get everything right, as we have seen. However, we still can't meet basic requirements (minutes, financial statements, aircraft registration requirements), and we need to address this. Communication to/from the board has been so poor that a meeting seemed a good idea - and still does. I agree with your concerns that hasty action might result, but I hope the board meeting will be more communicative, and the questions and answers more sensible, due to the face to face nature, and the basic good sense of most who attend. As to some of your "ifs", I think RA members are capable of resolving these as they occur. In some of the wilder scenarios - a board resignation for example, I think the constitution provides enough guidance to allow a sensible resolution, but I doubt that will be necessary. One thing I don't believe will happen is that the problems will all be resolved in a single meeting, but I think we can get an idea of the situation, and make a start, dodo

DGL Fox, while I agree with some of your comments, I take issue with the whole "minority" bit. I don't know Andy or David Issacs from a bar of soap (outside this forum). I have become overtime, concerned with what goes on in RA-Aus - my club's aircraft being grounded for a few days a while ago, some odd references in the mag, but nothing substantive, until all the recent issues which clearly require some explanation (failing multiple follow-up audits, inability to provide minutes or financial statements, staffing issues particularly Adam Finn sudden and unexplained departure). So I am concerned. And I put my name to the request for a General Meeting for that reason. I don't know whether I am in a minority or not. I hope not. If I am in a minority, I think we have a problem. I'm not a part of any conspiracy, nor do I know anyone who is. I can't see any other way within our constitution of getting an explanation (yes, I tried contacting board members with varying success, got a lot more info by contacting an EX-board member, which doesn't improve my outlook!) And I have no idea how we can get most or all members to a meeting, physical or electronically. So I can't see how we can get an explanation from the board with you (and many others like you) present without your action. So find someone who you trust who is going. Get them to ring you when a motion is proposed and get your voting intention. Or give them instructions. I believe there are a number or members of known integrity to whom you could give a proxy with instructions. One suggestion might be that you get John McKeown to take your proxy and ask him to vote against any motion that might prejudice further action - ie you want substantive motions to be presented in advance of the Natfly meetings, which would then give you a chance to review this meetings discussion, and decide on the new motions? What I am getting at, as politely as possible, is that you have two choices: 1 ignore the issue because it IS difficult when you live in a remote area, let alone half a continent away; 2 take what action you reasonably can (get your board member to understand your concerns very clearly, work out how you can use your proxy vote, whatever you can think of!) I think your position is that other members may attend and vote, and are in a position to attend and vote, where it is very difficult for you to do so. The logical outcome of that is none of us should attend and vote! dodo

Tiger, they did not instruct us to give our proxies to a board member - they just suggested it. Other than that, I agree with you. I was disappointed that they didn't mention the last tech manager - he was hired after this blew up, so it was a current board appointment, a current board firing... and we still don't know why or what the potential outcome of that may be. No GM/CEO/whatever, no tech manager, and no real explanation. There were three follow-up audits, not one, as the letter suggested! However, I would like to hear explanations before I form a lasting opinion. Running RA-Aus would be challenging, so I can understand mistakes & f-ups. I really want to know why we ended up where we are and where the board think we are going. dodo

The ferris wheel was less than 40m off the runway centreline. No problem with the splay? I am not necessarily blaming the splay, but that is not a good place to put a structure, dodo

I wasin the office for a bit of the time, but don't pretend to know all the details. What I did observe was: -new rego's, being rather different from a renewal were handled separately. This is pretty much inevitable, but in practice meant if all was OK, they would get priority in effect. I don't think this was intended,but the side-effect that manufacturers/importers weren't unnecessarily delayed wasn't a bad thing. However, if there was a problem with the aircraft's rego, god only knows how long it would/will take! - flying schools were contacted, but it is not that easy to determine a flying school aircraft. If the aircraft was known to be instructing, it got some priority because it would affect more people. I don't know if this was a deliberate policy. Many instructional aircraft don't belong to the school but are cross hired, so hard to know in any case. Because of the small number of airecraft with flying schools, I think it had an effect close to zero on delays for any others. Basically, if RA can't register aircraft as they fall due, it doesn't really matter. The backlog so overwhelmed the process that it doesn't really matter. One example I can comment on is Slarti's aircraft (because I didn't follow any single case through, and Slarti has indicated dates of outcome). Slarti's aircraft was close to due or overdue when I saw it in mid-December, I doubt he messed around providing needed info, and it still took over a month after that. I don't know why,but my guess is that it went from a huge pile awaiting someone to read, through another huge pile awaiting info, through another huge pile awaiting the tech manager, through another pile awaiting the CASA consultant. It wasn't a case of first in, first out - it was "can I do something about this pile of work. Start on it and just keep plodding on". In short, anyone who thinks this is a neat, tidy process where priorities are assigned doesn't understand. If God, the Minister or CASA rang, and told RA that CASA would shut RA down, and the world would end if your particular aircraft wasn't sorted, it would take hours simply to find your file (check pile A. No luck. Check pile B. No luck. Check Tech managers pile no luck. Check tech managers office. No luck. Ask around some more..find it back in the compactus because it has been approved and the letter sent yesterday). I think Middo and the Tech manager were working 70-100 hour weeks. So was anyone else in the office who could usefully help - but you need specialist knowledge. If they took Christmas off, they deserved to. To those suggesting prioritisation, or just working a few more hours, imagine an earthquake hits a town of a couple of thousand. 20 RFS blokes in three or four trucks. How do you prioritise? YOU DON'T - you just get stuck in, handle each urgent job as it comes, ignore the non-urgent. What else can you do? And you keep going, day after day, week after week. Bluntly, get real. If it was easy, it would have been sorted out in a couple of weeks. Whatever I think of RA management and how we got into this mess, once you are in the shit, all you can do is work with what you have, dodo

I agree. But...lets not let the organisation and rights we have get stuffed up, either. dodo (joined 2009)

Rather than edit my post again, one more point: after a debacle like this, should a board: a) micromanage the crisis; or b) take responsibility, and work out what went wrong, while allowing the administration to work through the issues? dodo

Question: After a car crash, what do you do first? Correct answers: 1 the best you can in the circumstances, whatever they may be; and 2 don't crash,and you don't need to answer the questiuon Once you are in a mess,you have to deal with it as best you can. My observation during a short period was that RA was never equipped in process or staffing to deal with that amount of registration work. And that seems reasonable. When you get asked to prove every registration is OK, and the files show many/most have minor or major issues, you need a serious number of people with a serious knowledge of obscure aviation law. The simple answer is don't get into a mess like that. But for those arguing priorities, or just demanding RA hire a few more, I suggest you tell me what the right MTOW is for a 19 reg, with an explanation of your answer? which countries we accept a type certificate from, under which conditions? who is the authority for a 55 rego? These are in some ways silly questions,but if you think we can just hire more staff for a couple of weeks, the answer is no. Again, get it right over the years and you don't have a problem. Get asked to justify everything, you are in a mess. As for priorities,they were probably made on the run. The only bits I saw were people trying to minimise damage - a call to FTFs to tell them that if they were being badly affected to call. I think priorities after the fact and reacting to a crisis are not the issue. dodo

OK, I was confused. Thanks for the correction, dodo

I thought we were getting both Dec and Jan because they fell behind earlier in the year...or have I become confused?

Once the dust settles on the current RA-Aus issues, it would be a good idea to consider RA-Aus role and relationship with CASA. For all the RAAOs, CASA pays little, gets a lot of administration done, and doesn't have to do much. I think all RAAOs should consider that,and consider how they think this should develop. It might be one organisation says - CASA pays for what should be CASA administration, and can't complain if the administration is poor when poorly funded by CASA - and therefore concentrates on costs to its membership. Another might think costs are less important to their membership, so long as certain rights/responsibilities or similar are preserved. For example, the Warbirds might be prepared to suffer more administration and costs in return for more freedoms - or the paragliders might just want to be left in peace so long as they stay far from anyone else (limited rights,but limited responsibilities and costs). sorry if this is a little off-topic, but I think the RAAOs should consider these issues, as CASA certainly will! dodo

Dethroned? Where did that come from? I just want some answers. Why can't RA-Aus meet it's most basic obligations? What happened? What is being done to ensure we meet these in future? I am most unimpressed that we need a GM to get answers from our representatives. dodo

...and your problem with the dodo is? dodo

I sympathise with his frown and deep concentration dodo

They were published as part of the AGM minutes: definitely not private, and late but not very informative. On the RA website they are here: http://www.raa.asn.au/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/Minutes-AGM-22-9-2012-Final-Version.pdf And I share your concerns about a long meeting, but I don't forsee short answers, or few questions. As for the board being in bunker mode, I suspect they already are in some cases - check out the the weird and un-constitutional motion suggested by Gavin Theobald and Myles Breitkreuz. Obviously, things are so bad they want to suspend the constitution. That sounds like some weird US disaster movie to me. I think the delay in holding this meeting is likely to result in closed minds rather than open ones, but I think that good sense by those attending may prevail against that. A lot of people are unhappy, but I think most have the sense to listen to both the questions and the answers, and form opinions based on what they hear, dodo

DWF, I would like an explanation of what has gone on to land us in the s**t. We can't meet our basic obligations under our governing legislation (minutes of an AGM, and provision to members of financial statements for Gods sake!). We have so frustrated our regulator that we can't register aircraft except under direct supervision of a consultant chosen by CASA. So what is going on? Why won't the board tell us why and how we have so badly stuffed up that we can't meet our most basic obligations? So we call a meeting to ask in person - what else can we do, when the board is so unresponsive? And then we listen. We need answers before we can decide on action. I can't see any alternative route that makes sense. Putting up a motion now to direct the board to do x, or to express no confidence in y, makes no sense without information from the board. Given the delay in the meeting, I suspect opinions may have hardened, and prejudice may occur. I think a meeting in late December would probably have provided explanations before frustration hardened opinions. However, I think the best outcome might well be that NO motions are passed at this meeting,and that people think about what they hear, and then,after the meeting, propose motions in advance, and preferably publicly debated before the Natfly meeting. - if those motions are necessary after this meeting. But even that idea of mine is pre-empting what we ask and hear at the February meeting. dodo

On the grounding issue: What action did the board take on receipt of the initial CASA audit report? What subsequent actions were taken in response to subsequent followup audit reports? Why were these not successful? Why did the board not anticipate CASA action after not one,but three follow-up audits? What has the board put in place to avoid similar outcomes in future? On governance: Why has the board been unable to meet a number of basic regulatory requirements over the last year, which many other associations (under the same and similar legislation) do not seem to find onerous? The focus is not on the minutiae, but on the root causes - the "Why?", not so much the "How?" Communications: I have no idea how to ask a question about the boards communications, because I genuinely believe the board doesn't really believe there is a problem. Any ideas appreciated! dodo

Thats a good idea. Check out "The Troll Hunter". That was made in the same vein,but with CGI graphics, which would have put up the cost a bit, but perhaps not as much as you might think. It is also a very cool movie. dodo

Has the Thruster arrived? What model and from where? And did the rego go through OK? dodo

Yellow wings and blue body? BMW motor? Might have been built by Mike at Tumut dodo

Thanks Jim, I appreciate your approach more than I can express. I thank you for taking seriously your responsibilities in a difficult environment, dodo

My belief on this, and I don't claim any special experience, is that there is nothing wrong with informing members of issues under discussion. While under discussion,it probably isn't a good idea to publish details of minor points,who is/isn't in favour - the board should get to decision before saying what issues Fred disagreed with, and what points Joe hung out on...so let the discussion get to a point of consensus or a vote, then set out the position of each. ...but that the issue is discussed by the board is not secret or confidential - or anything other than the business of the membership. If it is of interest to the membership, it should be available. I think the President needs to consider what representing a membership means. It isn't leading, following, doing - it is representing. And that means informing the membership so that you can get the opinions to represent them. Jim, you have my sympathy on the frustration, but more importantly, my strong support for representing and informing the membership. I suggest you ask the President what his message meant. How does he reconcile his duties as a director with his message? dodo

My correspondence with the Prez wasn't very satisfactory. I wouldn't call it communication - but maybe I don't communicate well. Could be me or him. dodo