November is The Rotary Foundation month

During the month of November Rotary traditionally looks at the engine that drives us: The Rotary Foundation (TRF).  {For the uninitiated no that is not Thief River Falls}

During the regular noon hour meeting at Prante's November 25th Club Director for The Rotary Foundation Linda Twidwell-Hopkins gave a TRF 101 talk to the club.  She began by describing the history of the Foundation and how it had grown by various steps to where it is today.  She then presented the variety of ways that Rotarians can donate to TRF encouraging every member to at least be a sustaining member ($ 100.00 donation annually) but offering The Paul Harris Society ($ 1,000.00 annually) for those who could afford it.  She also looked at how the money is used talking first about the Annual Fund and describing how the money is invested for three years to pay the administrative costs but after that one hundred percent of each donation is used on projects.She talked about how fifty percent of the money comes back to the District for District Grants and the rest goes to Global Grants and the Permanent Fund.  Talking about the Permanent Fund as Rotary's endowment fund she said that members could also contribute to that through their will thus becoming a Benefactor.  She then entertained a question and answer period during which how the community had benefited from TRF (in particular after the 1997 floods) and how the club had used matching grants for international work (specifically the Guatemala project to put books in the schools that we, assisting Fargo-Moorhead AM, had built).