The Ken
3/21/2022
Table Attendance/Split Club: Brandon Blatz
Fine Master: Sue Jandzinski
Invocation: Phil Michalowski
The Ken: Donna DiFrancesco
The meeting was called to order at 12:21 p.m. by President Dick with the Pledge of Allegiance and a warm prayer by Phil. There were no announcements by the club members, but President Dick reminded everyone of Shred It, which will be held on April 23, the Greenway Clean Up that will be held on Saturday May 7, and he will update us on when the Kenmore West vegetable garden work will start. Larry, in his absence, wanted everyone to consider the UB Mentor Program. If you have any time at all to mentor a student, please reach out to Larry for information. It can be done in person, via zoom or however you can make it work.
There were 14 members present at today’s meeting and we were very happy to see those who have been missing for a while. Thank you for coming! The split club was won by Donna (thanks to Paul, who cut in line ahead of me) and Paul tried for the Ace and drew the Queen of Clubs.
Sue asked the members for confessions. Dick mentioned something about the Board of Education, I think relating to his kids, but I’m sorry I missed what it was. Brandon confessed to being in NYC on vacation and basically went on a bar tour. Paul played his first round of golf and used it as practice. Mike Hettler spent a week of R & R in Florida. Sue fined herself $5 for being the Director for the month and not being present last week. Other fines were given accordingly. She then quizzed us on Spring. Did you know that Tornadoes occur more frequently in Spring than in other seasons of the year or that an egg will stay balanced in an upright position on the first day of Spring (due to the position of the earth relative to the sun)? Thanks to Sue, we now know.
Sue announced our speaker, Walt Ludwig, President of Kenmore Mercy Hospital. He began by thanking the club for our continued support of the hospital. He updated us on what’s been happening at the hospital in the past 2 years since Covid. St. Joe’s campus became a “Covid Only” hospital to treat the sickest patients and where KM intensive care doctors and nurses went to work; they also had to deal with a nurse’s strike at their sister hospital, Mercy Hospital; they lost about 10% of their workforce; and switched over to electronic medical records. They are grateful for the community support during the first wave of the pandemic, however, it lessened during the 2nd wave, and the 3rd wave (this past winter) was the toughest yet as they had to bring in agency nurses to fill vacancies. He would like us all to be good communicators for KMH, as all services are up and running. They have maintained quality ratings through it all (16 cycles to date) and have also maintained Top Hospital Status with an A rating. Walt is always a wealth of information and we appreciate him taking the time to speak to our club.