Rotary Club of Guelph-Trillium

2006-2007 Presidential Memories - Barbara Bent

Wow! What a year this has been! The theme for this Rotary Year was “LEAD THE WAY “and our Club did indeed lead the way to achieving and even surpassing the goals set.

I was so fortunate to be blessed with a hard-working, enthusiastic, fun–loving and congenial Board of Directors that made the year one which I will always remember. Working with our Club to “Lead The Way“ was Clarence Haverson (Treas.), Darlene Carpenter (Sec.), Laurie Lantaigne (Past Pres.), Peg Anderson-Coats (Pres. Elect), Francine Dore (Club), David Halls (Vocational),Carrie Rutter & Cam Skipper (Community Service), Laura Greenway (International) and Patsy Marshall (float).

We were recognized at District with a Presidential Citation for a successful year of accomplishments. I would like to take a moment to recap our achievements, as a club in 2006 – 2007.

1) Our focus was membership and we inducted 8 new members. (Welcome to Scott Van Engen, Rance Willis, Beverleigh Broughton, Ryan Player, Barry Walker, Brian Morcombe, EJ Stross and Julie Snyder ). Our goal was to increase membership to 50 and we hit our target. We also lost 5 members (standard 10% attrition) – Wayne Hong, Wayne Pritchard, TC Varkey, Jason Fraser and Larry Henderson.

2) Literacy was the focus of RI President Bill Boyd, this past year and we took on the challenge. We adopted 250 grade 3 students at St. Michael’s, Jean Little, F.A. Hamilton, St. Peter’s and Lorraine Ave. schools in our community and will provide special Rotary Dictionaries to all at special assemblies. This will provide us with a presence in the education system within our community.

We also gathered our old used books, sorted them appropriately and donated these treasures to 6 community groups in March (Action Read, Onward Willow, Change Now, Women in Crisis & Evergreen Senior Centre).

3) Our focus was fun and we sure know how to PARTY! Francine and her committee worked very diligently to ensure a year of great fellowship.

In order for pod members to form bonds within their groups, we instituted the first ever Progressive Pod Party, in November, rotating from Ken Boyd’s to Liz Fisk’s to Sonia Spekken’s homes for an amazing evening of good food and camaraderie.

We began monthly Pub Nights, an idea adopted from Oakville at a monthly President’s meeting. It sounded like a good idea. Sam Coats was placed in charge of this new venture and did a great job coordinating the monthly event.

“Winterfest “at Mike & Laura Balnar’s was a smash with over 80 people in attendance – the perfect family outing.

Clarence and Barb Haverson hosted the first Pizza and Pool Party to relax and unwind and compare stories of the day’s event after PYHO.

Charter Night was a fabulous evening at Gregg & Joni Mitchell’s, complete with minstrel entertainment and even a song by the Board, to the tune of “What’s New Pussycat? “ (Can be seen at the end of this document.)

Darlene Carpenter did a brilliant job of listing our alumni in our Roster and we invited them to our social events, to keep in touch.

4) Our focus was fund-raising and we had a year to knock your socks off! We

had the best year ever for donations to RI Foundation. It was over $300/member. Prior to year end, we were second in the District at $250/member, but at year end ADG Ken Boyd informed us that we indeed ended up in first place!

We raised $12,850 in less than 8 weeks, with our raffle, and donated this to Community Living Guelph & Wellington.

We worked hard at Ribfest and made over $60,000.00, with Maneesh as the chair – our best total to date!

5) Our focus on the community is to help where we can with sweat equity as well as donations. We donated to over 10 groups this year and the cheques were handed out in May. Our “birthday” money helped Wyndham House for youth to get started, on their own, with Zehr’s gift cards. We teamed up with the Salvation Army to help fund and pack the Christmas Hampers. PYHO was another smashing success, complete with a project of marvelous engineering – the ramp at Sunrise – thank you to Jack Tacoma and crew. Our bingos have increased their budgets and we have a new venue – The Royal Chartwell. Bruce Macpherson has welcomed Liz Roth to his team to co-ordinate the monthly event.

6) Our focus was international and we championed 4 great causes. Our own Darlene Carpenter was a member of the team for the Nogales Shoebox Project, in Mexico. We partnered with a Rotary Club in Brazil to provide equipment for a bakery project to feed and educate the locals with a trade. Many thanks to Laurie Lantaigne and her team for making this matching grant happen, to maximize our funds. Dr. Jim Thompson brought us in contact with Sister Vandena and Laura Greenway has kept up this relationship and helped us to direct funds for a new roof and toilets at Opportunity Village, in Nepal. A portable greenhouse may be the next step and we have flagged funds for this for next year’s Board. We also had a terrific Landmine Dinner at Liz & Dave Fisk’s on June 3^rd with real diffused landmines and an excellent presentation by Tim Conley (Francine’s new husband), where 17 people donated much needed funds.

7) Our focus was vocational and we increased our Fred Black Scholarship amounts. This initiative is handled by Gregg Mitchell each year. We also funded 2 deserving U of G students with scholarships as well. We sent 2 ambassadors to RYLA, from our own club – Eric Carpenter & Erica Spekkens. They were amazing representatives of true Rotarian commitment.

8) We had several new initiatives for our meetings this year. In an effort to encourage bringing new members into the club, the Board instituted a new rule that the first meeting a guest attended would be free .Each meeting began with the lighting of the candle given to us by Sister Vandena, to reflect on those less fortunate and their daily struggles, during our moment of silent reflection. During each weekly meeting, a member of the club was mentioned and formally thanked for all their valuable contributions to our club and presented with a “Lead The Way” pin, as Rotarian of the Week.

Clarence Haverson had an idea to reward Perfect Attendance and pins were purchased and presented to 17/50 people at year end – a notable accomplishment. It is no small task to get up so very early each and every Wednesday of the year. That is dedication!

Our own Ernie Gilliatt put forth a request to begin each meeting by reciting the 4 Way Test. We had a poster size sign made up and began this practice each week.

9) This year, we had many members in need. Bruce Macpherson handled the Sunshine Committee tasks with compassion and caring in a timely fashion, and even underwent surgery himself. We had more than our share of sickness, surgeries and deaths, including our own T. C. Varkey and young Nicholas Lambden, grandson of Elizabeth.

I consider myself so very fortunate to have served in the company of so many giving and remarkable professionals. It has been an honour and a privilege to have been president this past year and I thank you all for the many gifts which you have given me – your kindness and understanding, your support, your efforts to help one another. When things get tough, the best thing about our club is that we rally around each other and say “What can we do to help?” We are our own best example of “Service Above Self” and I am so very proud to be a member of such a great club!

I toast the Rotary Club of Guelph Trillium, not just a club, but a family of amazing humanitarians!!

What’s New Trillium

Chorus

What’s new Trillium? – 8 new members

What’s new Trillium? – a super new website

What’s new Trillium? – Literacy and more

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What’s new Trillium? – Progressive Pod Party

What’s new Trillium? – Alumni in the Roster

What’s new Trillium? – Pubbing on Thursday Nights!!

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What’s new Trillium? – Money for Foundation