President David opened the meeting with our land acknowledgement, and the singing of O Canada.

Chair announcements

President David re-heated his lobsters on the BBQ this year and recommends that method. He also thanked all of the Lobsterfest volunteers.

RYLA: Charleswood is sponsoring one camper.

Convocation for Charleswood Rotary scholarship recipients: David will attend Oak Park, Iain will attend Shaftesbury and LeeAnn will attend St. Pauls.

Our scheduled speaker, Andy Orr, had to cancel this evening. He forgot that it was his daughter’s graduation. Jack Wilson filled in with a report on the Assiniboine Forest.

The Assiniboine Forest is home to an abundance of varied wildlife and plants. It also acts as a carbon sink. Before COVID the Forest had approximately 170,000 visitors annually. During COVID that rose to over 200,000 and has remained at that level.

The Charleswood Rotary club has raised close to $1 million for the Forest. We work with the city to reclaim and restore land, to add wayfinding signage and upgrade paths, and have recently added an outdoor classroom. A washroom is in the works. The big dream is to add an east side parking area.

The washroom is in progress. It is basically a trailer. It will feature all stainless steel fixtures to deter vandalism. It will be 3-season for now, and the city will contract with someone to maintain it, and to lock it at night. The cost is approximately $70,000 plus $5,000 for shipping, $10,000 to create a base, and something to connect it to power. The total is estimated to be a little over $100,000. Andy will join us at a future meeting to talk about the washroom installation in more detail.

Happy Bucks

• Lloyd enjoyed his Lobsterfest lobster with friends, and also enjoyed a Juneteenth celebration.
• Dawn found the Lobsterfest event delightful, and had ten friends together, including herself. She also ran in the Manitoba Marathon on Sunday, with her grandchildren.
• David enjoyed breakfast with his daughter on Father’s Day. He was impressed that she was able to book an 8:22 tee time for golf together, until he realized that there was no way to get to the golf course due to the Manitoba Marathon.
• Chuck found the lobster event lovely, and especially enjoyed Iain wearing Chuck’s lobster costume.
• Jack W had a good time at Lobsterfest and had a great time at the lake with a former exchange student.
• Lyle dodged a bullet on Friday. He thought he had 9 lobster and 1 chicken ticket, but he actually had grabbed 9 chicken and 1 lobster ticket. Kathleen loaded his car but a short distance away he had the idea to check, and found his error.
• Ed Thompson enjoyed having guests for lobster and Saturday.
• Chuck added an addendum: there were two glitches where a chicken was in a lobster bag.

50/50 draw

Joyce had the lucky ticket, but no blue marble.

Coming up

• June 29 there will be no meeting, in recognition of Canada day.
• July 6 is the handover meeting at which President David will hand the presidency over to LeeAnn.