Your editor was thrust into the Chair's role at our meeting last Tuesday in the absence of our Travel Agent who must have been swanning around in flip flops!
Ana joined us again as a visitor and Judy and Neville were welcome back from their respective journeys once the Chair got his thoughts together!
PDG Alan Still proposed our International Toast to the Rotary Club of Baton Rouge in Louisiana, USA. There are also two other Baton Rouge clubs - Sunrise & Capital City.
Stepping up as President (yes, her official induction is on Saturday but 1 July & the new Rotary year clicked over on Sunday morning), Bernie ran through some important announcements:
- Changeover dinner on Saturday
- No meeting next Tuesday
- Board meeting on Monday afternoon, 9 July
- RI President Barry Rassin's letter to incoming Presidents - see his July editorial here
Mark slipped in Part 1 of his announcements about the Bohol, Philippines orphanage project, before introducing our Guest Speaker, Darryl Iseppi who will be District Governor for the 2019-20 Rotary year. District Governor Elect Darryl is currently District Rotary Foundation Chair for 2016-19 overseeing fundraising and grant activities for The Foundation in our District. An important part of that role is educating clubs and club members on the importance of supporting Our Foundation and how it works.
In a very clear presentation of how the Foundation works, Darryl:
- explained how a donation of $1,000 today will return to District in three years' time when $500 will be available for District grants and the other $500 for Global Grants
- illustrated how one club (Bribie Island) contributed USD 1,000 and how with other clubs and districts the project became a USD 329,000 endeavour to vaccinate 28,500 girls in PNG
- demonstrated the benefits of the association with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation when the vaccine for the above project was purchased at a fraction of what might have been the case
- indicated that applications will open in November for District grants in the 2019-20 Rotary year when some USD 80,000 will be available for club projects.
Learn more about The Rotary Foundation at the Rotary District site, or go to Rotary International.
Other announcements included:
- Part 2 of Mark's announcements about the Bohol, Philippines orphanage project involved dedication of our 7 August meeting to prepare the toiletry bags which Mark will take with him in September.
- Roger announced that a few people were tree planting on Saturday (details here) and garnered quite a degree of support for the event on National Tree Day (details here)
- Pam reminded us that our incoming Rotary Youth Exchange Student from France, Chloé Mear will be arriving on 17 July. Julianna will be the first host family.
- Mark your diaries for the District Changeover on 30 June next year at AussieWorld.
- Volunteers for RYDA are sought - details here
And then …… Sergeant Merv took the floor for his fast moving maiden outing.
