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Keith offered our invocation. Chris Tiedeman from the Blaine-Ham Lake Rotary Club (originally from Crookston and attended RYLA many years ago where one of his roommates was Fergus native Brett Swanson, with whom he also roomed at college) was visiting us because of his association (doing public relations) with R.D. Offutt Company, the subject matter of the day's program. Other guests attending to hear the program were Bruce Brenden with the West Otter Tail Fair Board, Arlyn Hustad of Battle Lake and wearing his Minnesota Farm Bureau hat, and Kasey Lindstrom, the manager of our local R.D. Offutt store. President Zack announced that Lisa has agreed to become our club's new service project coordinator -- thank you Lisa! Jamie pumped us up for our annual peach sale, with peaches expected to arrive on August 14th. Kathy was called on to report those with excellent attendance in 2022-23, with Steve Leitte, Ken Harty, Bob Russell and Hal Leland just falling short of 100% in her records and Steve Andrews, Wally Cole and Zack Stach each achieving that distinction. Congratulations! Lisa led off the bragging and fining, the latter for missing a couple birthdays and the former to congratulate Brian on his birthday. Mary Pettit reported she tried to join last week's meeting virtually, but it was all a blur (I didn't think I talked that much). Katie offered a scooter buck and a birthday greeting to Brian as well. Brian then marked off his entire brag and fine card in honor of his birthday. Wally Cole rose to reminisce about the one-day trip he and Marcy took to Hibbing to join six other high school classmates for their monthly luncheon and to say they went 448 miles in his van without needing to get gas. Keith also commemorated Brian's birthday. Our speaker was Jennifer Maleitzke, who works in communications with Offutt. Her job involves a lot of legislative work, as well as dealing with the media. Ron Offutt originated the company; he graduated from Concordia and started potato farming in 1954. The company has 400 members (employees) in the Fargo area and is still family owned and operated. Its business consists of three pillars: farming, equipment, and food. In the latter category, they own a large French-frying facility in Park Rapids that has four production lines and runs 285 days a year. As to farming, most of the company's farms are located along the U.S. Highway 10 corridor, solely growing potatoes, trading land with other farmers so potatoes are only grown on the same land every four years. There are 12 equipment stores. Its Fergus location was acquired by Offutt in 2009, has 35 team members, with Kasey, the manager having worked there for 18 years, the last eight as manager. The local store is now undergoing a major renovation. R.D. Offutt offers a high school internship program that also supports the students in going on for two years of college. Jennifer also told us that every year they open up one of their potato farms in the Perham area so people can come in and dig up as many potatoes as they want. Concerns about the impact of potato farming on the water supply in the Perham area has led the company to take a couple fields out of production for a couple years and its representatives continue to meet with Perham officials to monitor the situation. The company does have international partnerships. Current sanctions prevent it from working with Russia but it continues to work with its partners in Ukraine. |
The closer canoe obviously exceeded the number of ducks that Minnesota law allows to be taken in one day, but Brian Tjaden, Matt Schroeder and a very helpful neighbor boy of Brian's (name withheld because under 18 and thus, a juvenile) didn't seem to care, with Zack Stach and Wally Cole guiding the other canoe and attempting to ignore the lawlessness. 
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