"HEAD WINDS."

Evening Post, Volume LXXXII, Issue 27, 1 August 1911, Page 8

"HEAD WINDS."

THE Y.M.C.A.'S POSITION. "AN INCUBUS OF DEBT." Mr. H, N, Holmes, secretary of the V.M.C.A., in the course of an interview with a Post reporter to-day, intimated that the local V.M.C.A. was in the position of a- vessel encountering a succession of head winda. The institution was not making any leeway ; on the contrary, tho social and spiritual work was progressing in every direction, Figuratively speaking, an effort will shortly be made to raise the wind, in other words, to try ahd remove the heavy debt which hange over the building. This is some JBSOOO. The interest is £300 per annum. Every week £10 has to be made up somehow or other to keep thinge going. Mr. Holmes, as haa been announced, is going to England and the United States. His strenuous work not only as secretary, but as preacher on Sundays, have rendered a change and rest impera» tive for him. "Thfe time has been a very hard one lately for me," he said. " I don't mind the work, but this debt of £3000 has pressed very hardly on u» all. It came about in this way: Many people who promised to help us financially fully meant it at the time, but the financial Stringency caught them, and they were unable to Meet their engagement to us, they not give us the money they promised. Then th» gymnasium, from which we expected to gain "considerable revenue, did not pay its way fof two or thre© years. > lam thankful to say that it has quite done this under Mr. Howard's management. On the boardinghouse side, there hae been a very small margin of profit, although that has been til© means of bringing many young fellows to the association, and also of great service to newcomers in giving them a decent place to stay in while W4itirtg a lew days to go into the country. "The physical work has been a great success, and I think the V.M.C.A. is now a regular athletic centre. W© have quite a number of meetings here in connection with sports bodies. We only charge a small fee for the use of the rooms, but the association has become a sports-rallying place. Our membership has increase^ by over 80 in the five months of this one year as compared with the corresponding five months of 1910. But there is, as I said, £10 a week to be met, and every week. We hope to celebrate our tenth anniversary with that £6000 debt extinguished. We are then trying to secure fifty men who will be willing to become sustaining members at £5 5s a year. Of theso We have already fourteen promised. "As additional attraction we have now a billiafd-room and a smoking-room. These are innovations. I know that their introduction is contrary to Ihe views of many of the great friends of the V.M.C.A. as &n institution, particU' larly those in England. But they have been appreciated here as in some of the largest associations in Australia. The billiard-room yields 9s or 10s a day, and the revenue from the tables goes towards paying for them. We make it a strict rule that every man. pays his share of the game, 3d each. There is no paying by the loser. The smoking and sitting-room was furnished at a cost of £12, raised' by the men themselves. "I think I am right in saying that the smoking and billiard-rooms have been found a great convenience and a great attraction to men who might not otherwise have come to the association because- no provision had been made for them to smoke. Probably they would have gone to places with more unpromising surroundings had w© not met them in the matter of smoking and billiards. As I say, I hope ws shall get this incubus of a debt disposed of, and that its extinction will be accomplished, or at least in sight, by the time I leave."