April 4, 2023 Lunch Meeting (Apr 09, 2023)

President Robert Olmstead III pondered the need to use the microphone since Al was not in attendance... then a deep voice from the back of the room exclaimed that Al was, in fact, present. The Prez then clarified his comment by identifying the subject of his comment as the "deaf Al." So to clarify even further, Handsome Al = Deaf Al and Big Al = "Hearing Capable Al." The Prez rang the bell at 12:00 noon and utilized the microphone to welcomed everyone to the Best Damn Rotary Club in Arden Arcade. This is his 34rd meeting for the year and he said he felt as though it had been quite some time since he saw the members as the club was dark last week due to time needed to collectively recover from the Poker Tournament hangover. He asked Emily Ballus to lead the pledge of Allegiance to the flag. He then asked Todd Eichman to offer words of wisdom. Both did as requested... and in fine style.

Hearing Capable Al introduced his guest, Bruce Lee, a former Mayor of Loomis California, he is also a former state employee with a keen interest in taxpayer issues, and is a world traveler. When Al found out about his travels, he told Bruce that Rotary is worldwide and invited him to the meeting to learn more about Rotary.

Todd Eichman introduced Matt Stumpf, Past President of the 20/30 club, soon to be leaving the club upon his 40th birthday when he ages out and looks for a Rotary club to join.

Announcements and Other Fun Stuff

Jenny Davini will be sending out bills for lunches for the next three months. Please pay her as soon as you can to minimize the time she needs to spend on collections. She noted that Guido upped his recovery fee from last quarter and she hopes not to have to use his services. (Warning, Guido is not a Rotarian and doesn’t live by the 4-Way test.)

Off-site Lunch, CA State Library

Next week we have our off-site lunch at the State Library for April 11. The meeting will start at 11:30 am in the Supreme Court building by the Law Enforcement Memorial in the old Supreme Court chambers. A signup sheet was passed around. You will not want to miss this opportunity to see the rare documents that few people ever get to see. Guests are welcome to attend. The event is scheduled to end at about 2:00 pm. Parking is available at 10th and L streets. Car-pooling is recommended.

Rotary House Clean Up Event

Tim Cahill announced that the Rotary House tenants are moving out and the clubs are getting together on April 8th to prepare it for the net occupants. Neither Tim or Lisa Asperger are available to help on the 8th. Tim asked for volunteers to represent our club in this effort.

Rotary house is about 11 years old and was built by 7 Rotary clubs on land purchased from the city for $1.00. Families with children being treated long-term at UC Davis Hospital can stay in the 2 bed, one bath house near the patient during treatment. One patient/resident went on to start a Rotaract Club in his/her high school.

This just in... via text!

Fireside Chats are coming!

Patrick O'Neil is in the process of putting together Fireside chats. He is looking for a couple of members to host the gatherings. Linda Bigler and Matt Ross volunteered to host. We need one more location. Please let Patrick know if you are interested in hosting a fireside chat gathering... fire places are optional.

Scholarship Lunch

John Gabriel announced via the Prez that this year's Scholarship lunch will once again be held at Del Paso Country Club on May 9th. We started passing the hat to help cover the cost of the meals for the 35 students, parents and teachers that will be attending. We need to cover the $1,000 cost. You can donate $430 to cover a meal or any amount you feel you can afford to help the club reach the $1,000. John started the fundraising with his own personal donation of $100.

This is an awesome event, specifically designed to make club members feel like they wasted the time they spent in high school. You will not want to miss this opportunity to be impressed with the future leaders of our country.

Active 20-30 Club Fund Raiser

Matt Stumpf, Past President of the Active 20-30 Club, participant in the Poker Tournament, announced they were reviving their annual fundraiser, Spring Party. This event ran for 48 years and took off the last seven. He and his even co-chair Derek, are in their last year and are getting

Read-out in July because they are 40 years old. The entire Rotary Club, in unison, offered to have join Arden Arcade Rotary. They have recreated the fundraiser and he hopes it will be his lasting legacy for the club.

The Active 20-30 club celebrated their 100th year last July. They raise money for underprivileged youth and special needs children in Sacramento. A lot of "past-actives" go on to join Rotary clubs. Matt has history with our club and was a part of a group study exchange several years ago. He participated in our poker tournament and lost all of his money to Big Al.

This year's Spring Party is "Party Carlo." It is Friday, April 21st at the Tsakopoulos Library Galleria, downtown. You do not have to be in your 20's or 30's to come. This is a high-end, cocktail attire, casino night class party. The secret word is Party-Carlo. The evening features live music, casino games throughout the night, Winnings from the games can be exchanged for raffle tickets for chances to win many valuable prizes most of which are valued over $500 each. The grand prize raffle is for a trip for two to Vegas. Admission is $180 and that gets you all your food, an open bar, and your funny money to play the games. This will be a great night filled with fun. This will be a great way for the Active 10/30 club to reintroduce Spring Party to the community. It will be a great event. Proceeds from this event will go to fund their annual back to school shopping spree. 100 children from low-income families in the San Juan Unified School District gets $180 to shop at Kohls.

Kohls opens early to accommodate this shopping trip. Club members are partnered up with a child and they go throughout the store to purchase new shoes, pants jackets and shirts. For many of these kids it is the first time they ever get new cloths. Every ticket purchased for $180 sponsors a child and gets you a great night out. There is also a VIP experience for $245 a ticket for a select group that would like to attend a champagne reception, enjoy higher end food and top shelf alcohol, skipping the drink lines and being served by cocktail servers at the upper level of the venue. Go to www.PartyCarlo.com to purchase your tickets. You can save $40 by entering "Arden" as the promo code when you purchase your tickets. Sponsorship opportunities are still available.

The Active 20-20 club is a men's club. They have an Active 20-32 club, their sister club that is for women and they partner together for this event. Many of the members that age out join the Point West Rotary Club but they are looking to expand their options and our club looks like a lively option and looks like it could be a great partnership moving forward.

Poker Tournament

Prez Rob thanked Richard Goore for doing a great job with this year's poker tournament. He had asked jenny Davini to provide him with the final numbers for the tournament by Sunday at 5:00 pm. Quiet demur Jenny, without skipping a

beat, told the Prez to F-off. This made the Prez sooo happy that he was able to get Jenny to drop the F-bomb, it made his night.

Richard shared the numbers: in 2022 there were 135 players, this year we had 165.There were fewer sponsors but that was compensated for with the additional players and the 50/50 raffle. The new company that ran the tournament was great and we look forward to working with them again. The number of rebuys was outstanding.

Richard felt it was necessary to jump the gun and announce being a Bell Ringer in honor of his committee doing an outstanding job with the tournament.

More Tournament Numbers

Christine Jensen was pleased to provide the results of the fundraiser. We grossed $85,000 and netted $50,000. This was down from last year because last year had two major anomalies, a large donation of $10,000 from Niello BMW

and a crazy bidding war for additional chips during the tournament. If you take those amount out, we actually did better this year than last year.

Bell Ringers

Happy Bucks

Sad Bucks

Jonathan Barker, Bell Ringer for

UCon's Basketball Team's Win

Jonathan was very pleased to ring the bell in honor of his University of Connecticut’s Men's Basketball team's tournament championship win.

Jenny Davini, Bell Ringer and Happy Bucks

Jenny rang the bell to celebrate her return to the club meetings after taking time off to help her daughter with the arrival of her granddaughter. She matched the amount with Happy Bucks to help fund the club.

Steve Turner, Happy Bucks

Steve was happy to thank Lisa Asperger for helping out as the time keeper for the semifinals for the speech contest for our area #7. She represented our club very well. He also hopes that next year we will once again hold the speech contest for our club.

President Rob, Happy Bucks Bucks

The Prez was happy to share the good news that his son was the MVP for his recent soccer tournament.

Jonathan Barker, Happy Bucks

Jonathan was happy to share that LALO is coming to Sacramento for a special event. The LALO tequila was a favorite at the poker tournament. Contact Johnathan for more information.

Secret Word

The Prez asked for the Secret Word and Lisa was the first to respond. She knew that "Appreciation" was the secret word. It was thought that the word might be missed as it was hidden in the coming events but Lisa was not fooled and found it.

Bruce Stimson had the honor of introducing Jeannine Sparks, this year's RYE Rotary 5180 District Chair. We now have Rotary Youth Exchange back in our club. We have a long term RYE student going out next fall. We also have a short-term student going out for three weeks soon.

Jeannine joined RYE in 2017. She became inbound chair for three years and has been the District Chair for two years and probably many more to come. She is a member of the Rotary Club of Laguna Sunrise.

Jeannine got involved with RYE when her daughter Allyson convinced her to take the afternoon off from work to go to the Elk Grove Rotary Club to hear about Rotary Youth Exchange. Allison ended up going to South Korea. While there she applied to the university and was accepted to Korea University and graduated this past year and is now working there. It doesn't look like she is coming home.

During this time Jeannine came into contact with amazing Rotarians and students. She joined Rotary and became very involved with the RYE program. People involved with Youth Exchange are very passionate about it. It is something that stays with you for a lifetime.

RYE has both inbound and outbound student coordinators. Bruce Stimson is our district's inbound coordinator as well as our club's RYE coordinator that helps with the administration of the clubs program. Bruce is also the go to person for the students and serves as the councilor. However, he needs the help of a female to work with the inbound female students.

There are two main programs, Long-term and Short-term exchanges.

The Long-Term Exchange program is a District-to-District program. The students do not pick the country they go to. It is for one academic school year. It requires two to three host families. The students have to attend Rotary meetings at least once a month and participate in club and RYE service projects. Often they participate in trips to local points of interest e.g. San Francisco, Tahoe, Yosemite.

The outbound students are interviewed in the fall of the year. The host country is revealed in February or march. They are encouraged to participate in the club activities prior to departing. They are required to give the club a presentation about themselves and the host country prior to departure and after they return. Monthly video updates are sent to the club and shown at the club meetings.

The inbound students attend the local club meetings, club service projects, culinary events and are helped with transportation to the district conference. Club members are encouraged to send the inbound student emails welcoming him/her. Club members are encouraged to sign up to have the student over for a family meal or event. The club is instructed on the safety protocols for hosting the students.

There are some mandatory event elements that the club must meet: August and December orientation with a counselor and host families, A culinary event, participation in the district conference and participation in a student led service project.

There needs to be two to four (usually three) host families. They can't require the outbound family to host but can require the outbound student to provide three host families. Host families can't be compensated and should be recognized for their contributions to the program. There is no one type of host family, they come in all shapes and sizes. We have about a dozen very strong exchange partner countries.

Bruce Stimson shared that this year we have seven inbound and five outbound students. Nex year we only have two outbound. We need to build this program back up to the level where it once was hosting fifteen students a year.

The Prez thanked Jeannine for the great presentation.

Future Events

April 11^th, 2023: ***OFF SITE LUNCH***, CA State Library/Historical Documents Tour
April 18th, 2023: Bill Tobin, Shelterbox, USA
April 25th, 2023: Joe Pick-Executive Director, Firefighter's burn Institute, Poker Check Presentation
May 2nd, 2023: National Brothers and Sisters Day
May 9^th, 2023: Annual Rotary Scholarship Lunch, Del Paso Country Club
May 16^th, 2023: Kirsten DuBray, CFRE, Regional Director of Philanthropy, American River College

President Robert Olmstead III thanked everyone for coming and rang the club bell closing the meeting at 1:04 p.m.

Respectfully (more or less) submitted by,

Mike Grace

Subscribe to Bulletin

Subscribe to our eBulletin and stay up to date on the latest news and events.

Click here to sign up!