President Mitch Sadsabi opened the meeting at 6:30 pm. With a toast to the King and Canada.

There were 20 members and 2 guests in attendance

 

There were no announcements made

 

Three new members were inducted into the club

Mike Fisher who was proposed by Mike Henry

Carol Chan Who was proposed by Bob Dodds

Shawn Fang Who was proposed by Bob Dodes

 

Club membership now stands at 39

 

The below listed committees gave a review of their activities as follows:

New Generation presented by committee chair Ralf Soader

Ther are four main areas listed bellow

It is an Oakville Cluster Event were 3 Rotary Clubs each provide Bursaries for 10 students

Each Bursary = $3,000 x 10 = $30,000

For the Centennial year, 2025, the cluster is targeting a total of $100,000. To achieve this, RCO is considering adding 2 students @ $3,000 totaling $6,000

Awards event will be held virtually in early June, targeting June 11th

 

The next camp will be taking place at the district 7080 facilities between May1st and May 4^th. It is for Ages 18 to 25.

RCO has typically sponsored 1 or 2 participants annually @ $800 per. We will be deferring participation to fall of 2025

 

This is a  scholarship offered by our district totalling  $90,000 for a Masters in  Peace & Conflict Studies

RCO has contributed $1,500 in 2024 and is committed $1,500 in 2025

 

Rotary Clubs in Oakville in the past sponsored T.A. Blakelock Interact Club

Since we are not sponsoring a club we are Looking at sponsoring a Grant Writing Competition amongst Interact students

It will be one student at $500 per student sponsorship

 

In cooperation with Rotary club of Ottawa, we may Sponsor high school student for a Parliamentary Camp in Ottawa

 

RCO Youth Services Committee budget = $40,000

Educational Awards: 10 x $3,000 = $30,000

Educational Awards > consider adding 2 students $6,000

RYLA: defer to fall of 2025

Peace Scholarship: $1,500 approved

Interact Grant Application > consider 1 x $500

Target Expenditure: $31,500 to $38,000

International presented by committee member Heart Johnson

A global grant we are leading for Kenya secured the go ahead and will be moving forward. It is for Nutrition maters which is a program that will support Women Entrepreneurs to Improve Nutrition in Western Kenya.  We are the lead club with several other clubs participating as well as input form district. Our total contribution is 14000 dollars. This project has been in the works for about 2 years 

 

We have contributed 5000 dollars towards the MOB project which did secure a global grant. The money will be used to supply 5 mechanical pulmonary ventilators, and 5 vital signs monitors, for use in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) of the Regional Hospital of Zacapa, Guatemala.

 

In cooperation with several rotary clubs, we will be supporting and effort to install solar panels in Costa Rica. The project is designed to support electricity cost for charities which are a large expenditure in their annual budget. Our contribution is 15000 dollars

 

We will be donating an amount of 5000 dollars to Health Partners international (hpic), The funds will be used to send much needed medical supplies to support displaced people in war torn Sudan and Gaza.

 

Indigenous presented by chair George Vicent who took over a week ago

As a club we will continue with supporting the efforts that have proved to be productive specially:

 

Support Water First which as an organisation that trains ingenious professionals to process clean water that is supplied to remote indigenous communities.

 

We have provided a donation of 10000 dollars to Sheridan College bursaries.  These amounts are used to help indigenous students attending the college cope with challenges. They are far form home with limited resources.

 

We still support a scholarship for the University of Sudbery in partnership with Rotary of Oakville Trafalgar

 

We will also support Inspire again which is a scholarship educational program towards higher education for qualified individuals from the indigenous communities in higher education

 

Community Development present by chair Mike Henry

As we were running out of time the chair was not able to go through the whole presentation but gave the important highlights

The committee has been very active funding 8 projects this year so far totaling 57000 dollars out of 100000 budgeted. There are two main projects under consideration. 

The committee will ad in environment focused projects under its direction

There will be check prenotion and photo shoot a Oakville Trafalgar hospital later this week

There are lot of efforts on developing more hands-on activity and we are waiting for replies form potential organisations.

As chair of membership committee as well, Mike Henry advised that the member survey results is complete and will be shared at later date due to time constraints.

We have six new members at the club

Bob Dodds gave an update on the potential sale of the rotary Centennial tower. There are three parties interested in purchasing the property. An assessment from them will be done soon. Al three are planning to operate it as affordable housing and will continue serving current residents.

George Farrow and George Vincint had along meeting with the residents who were concerned. They were advised that new owner will have superintendent on site to address their issues under the new ownership

President Mitch closed the meeting with a toast to friends and Rotarians around the world