VPRS 13963 Agenda of Meetings

The records in this series consist of the bound Agenda to Meetings held by the Forests Commission from 1920 until it became part of the new Department of Conservation Forests and Lands (VA 1034) in 1983. Meetings were held weekly and covered all aspects related to State Forests and forestry policy.Topics discussed include employee information, logging and pulping, plant nurseries, vermin destruction, noxious weeds, tourist reserves and recreational usage, fire prevention and supervision, construction and maintenance of railway tracks, tramway routes and roads, and land excision, alienation, selection, and usage.Although the first meeting of the Forests Commission was held on 1 October 1919, the Agenda to Meetings began at the fourteenth meeting of the Forests Commission held on 17 February 1920.The Forests Commission inherited all powers, duties and responsibilities formerly exercised by the Department of State Forests (VA 534). The Chairman of the Forests Commission became the permanent head of the Department from 1939. Administratively the Forests Commission continued until 1983 when it was one of three Departments consolidated into the new Department of Conservation, Forests and Lands (VA 1034). The Department of Conservation, Forests and Lands was officially formed on 2 November 1983, and had an interim organisational structure until the new structure came into effect on 1 July 1984. This would explain why the Agenda to Meetings/Chairman's Minutes end on 29 June 1984 and not the end of October 1983. Although the Agenda to Meetings for 1984 are in temporary bindings, three have survived - the Chairman's, Commissioner Hodge's, and Commissioner Griffin's. From July 1984 the Minutes (VPRS 3222) and Agenda to Meetings appear to have been replaced by the Schedule of Decisions (VPRS 13990).