RLSSWA CEO Peter Leaversuch with new Life Member David Cummins and RLSSWA President Colin Hassell

A night of celebration at our 2018 AGM

Royal Life Saving Society WA’s Annual General Meeting was held last night at our headquarters in Mount Claremont. The night was a great time of celebration, reflecting on the successes of the past year, and long-time service of a number of faithful members.

As part of the evening we welcomed a new member to our board of directors, Justine Leavy, who is a Senior Lecturer and Researcher, School of Public Health; Collaboration for Evidence Research and Impact in Public Health (CERIPH), at Curtin University. Her professional expertise in the evaluation of public health programs, focusing on physical activity and injury prevention, will be extremely worthwhile as Royal Life Saving continues its work in the prevention of drowning across the Western Australian community.

In 2017 Justine was invited to update the Drowning chapter in The International Encyclopedia of Public Health, 2nd edition. She is also currently a Board member for the Australian Health Promotion Association (AHPA), and Chair, Research, Evaluation and Evidence Translation Committee (REET) for the AHPA. We are pleased to welcome Justine to our board and look forward to learning from her wealth of experience.

Current board members David Cummins and Mark Gubanyi were re-elected to the board for a further three years, and we are pleased to have them continue to share their extensive experience in and passion for drowning prevention.

We sadly farewell board members Jeff Fondacaro and James Sheridan. Jeff has been on Royal Life Saving WA’s board of directors since 2006, leading our engagement with 130 public swimming pools throughout Western Australia and sharing his expertise in the development of the Society’s Guidelines for Safe Pool Operation and risk management services. He also advocated for the inclusion of the Pool Lifeguard Award as the industry standard in public aquatic centres, championed the implementation of the Watch Around Water Parental Supervision Program, and directly contributed to the successful implementation of vocational training in safe pool operations.

James Sheridan has been on the Royal Life Saving Board of Directors since 2015, sharing his skills in relation to governance, risk management, leadership and organisational culture, as well as a general background in aquatic recreation and aquatic facility management. James has recently moved to the Northern Territory to pursue work opportunities, and while we are sad to lose him from the Royal Life Saving WA Board, we’re pleased that he has recently joined the board of Royal Life Saving Northern Territory to continue to share his expertise within the Royal Life Saving family.

A very special part of last night’s celebrations saw David Cummins elected as a Life Member of Royal Life Saving WA. David began his formal contribution to the Society in 2007 when he joined the Board of Directors, sharing his more than 45 years of experience in the aquatic industry. We are extremely grateful for David’s long-term contribution to Royal Life Saving, in assisting with the development of our Strategic Direction, leading the review of our Constitution, being instrumental in the development of our Honours Awards Committee and Bravery Awards event, implementing the RLSSWA HELP grants program and applying his professional expertise in advertising and networks in the media industry to assist in promoting our various campaigns.

David served as President of Masters Swimming WA from 1987-1992 and a member of Masters Swimming Australia’s Board for 20 years over two terms. He served as Chairman of the 1999 Pan Pacific Masters Swimming Championships and has also chaired many State, National and Masters Games Championships.

Locally David has held many club positions with both The Cottesloe Crabs Winter Swimming Club Inc and Claremont Masters Swimming Club Inc. He was an instigator of the annual open water Swim Thru Rottnest in 1976 and has been the event coordinator ever since.

With a list of awards and achievements too long to mention, we are extremely pleased to welcome David as a Life Member of the Society.

To read more about Royal Life Saving WA’s successes throughout 2017-18 and our goals for the future please download our latest Annual Report.

You can read about the many other awards received by members of the society at last night’s AGM by clicking the link below.