Minutes from April 17, 2017

 

President Jim Ruble called the meeting to order promptly at 12:30, with the ring of the bell and welcomed everyone to today’s meeting.

Glen Januska and Mike Brown were the greeters today, and Mike introduced the members who brought guests:

Susan Thomas nominated Senator John Barrasso and welcomed him back;

We had four new members inducted into the club today;

Becky Byron, sponsored by Steve Loftin; Tony Cercy, Carrie Gomez, and Terra Oakley, all three sponsored by Anthony Martinez.

Jim Porter announced that the annual Rotary Club Motorcycle Ride will be July 1-2. Everyone is invited with or without a motorcycle; you can follow in the car. They will have sign-up sheets coming so mark your calendar for a fun weekend trip.

Mark Owens introduced our exchange students and had them introduce the menu for the International dinner this coming Sunday. If you will not be able to attend but would like to donate money to the students please let Peaches Lynch know and she will collect that money.

Peaches Lynch announced that our new inbound exchange student this fall will be Frieda from Mexico. Frieda says that she does not eat healthy; she likes Italian food but does not like vegetables. She is 18 years old and will be a senior. Her parents are both Doctors, she likes to sing and she likes soccer, swimming and running but she is not a big sports person. She will arrive sometime in August. We will need host families for her so think about whether you would like to host her.

Peaches then announced that the annual Rotary Golf tournament is coming up and will be even more fun this year. They are looking for sponsors as well as teams to play. There is a handout on the tables for more information. The money will go to our International project in Panama.

President Jim Ruble announced that on the tables is a print out of the new Rotary International gun policy, he also sent out an email. If anyone wants to weigh in on the policy they can contact Rotary International and if you want to voice your opinion on how the club will react please contact Jim or a member of the board, we have until May 15 to give them our club response.

Senator John Barrasso spoke with us for a few moments about what is happening in D.C. He said that as they travel they focus on the economy of Wyoming and selling our products around the world. He visited Japan to talk about our coal and natural gas and they want to purchase. He also went to China and took Wyoming Beef to sell in China. They are trying to open more markets for our Wyoming products. He said that they confirmed the new Judge for the Supreme Court, Neil Gorsuch, and he has connections to the west and Wyoming. Judge Gorsuch’s Grandfather built the Wolf Hotel in Saratoga Wyoming so this is exciting for Wyoming. Senator Barrasso gave him a picture of the Wolf Hotel with a stagecoach in front of it from 1878 that he plans on putting on his office wall. There are a lot of things going on around the world that are worrisome and that our leaders in D.C. have to deal with. He said that you can contact him whenever you want, his cell phone is 307-262-2518 and his email is barrasso@wyoming.com. He said that he got to meet with Bill Gates and Bill spoke very highly about polio plus and Rotary International.

President Jim Ruble called to order our annual business meeting at 12:55. First order of business was the financial report which is on the table showing our financials for the fiscal year to date and our assets and liabilities are very close to what they were last year. Tom Lockhart moved the financials be accepted and Tim Havasi seconded, vote was taken and passed.

Second item of business was the appointment of a new board member, President Jim turned the mic over to PP John Starnes who ran us through the bylaws and the process of nominating a new board member. The nominating committee is made up of the past president, one director from the board and one club member, this year that committee was made up of John Starnes, Dick Jay, and Bill DeGraeve. John presented us with the new board member that will be taking his place as he leaves the board. A motion was made by Anne Ladd and seconded by Jack Swanson to accept and vote on the new board member, John Griffith, he was voted in unanimously, he will take his place on the board July 1, 2017.

Chad Nelson had some questions on the financial statements, President Jim decided to strike the approval of the financials from the meeting and said that they will have a meeting to go over the financials to verify and answer the questions.

President Jim then invited Dick Jay to report on the Rotary Foundation, Dick thanked the club for the good year of donations we have had. He also thanked Dick Wimbish for taking care of the donations and awards. He also thanked all of those that help, Mandy George for taking care of the Foundation Dinner, Peaches Lynch for taking care of the inbound exchange students, Deb Theriault for the Friendship exchange, Joe MacGuire for the summer exchange students, and John Starnes for taking care of the District Grants. Dick said that we need someone to work with the School Districts on Outbound exchange students so please volunteer.

Brian Deurloo gave his report on Service Projects. He listed those who are active on the different committees and thanked them for their service. Dave Simonson, international Project in Panama; Bill Schilling, Rotary Park; Dave Elmer The Duck Derby; Hal Hutchinson with the highway cleanup project; Dave McNulty with the literacy project and reading to the kids; Don Harris, Ronna Boril, Jim Allison and Bill Pierce with Rotary Cares; Steve Loftin the Food Bank of the Rockies; Tim Monroe, Greg Dixson, V.H. McDonald and Richard Schwahn on the Centennial Committee. They are in need of someone to spearhead the Crossroads Park maintenance and all of these committees are always looking for help so if you want to volunteer please contact anyone on the committee where you would like to help.

Next Ronna Boril spoke to us about the Club administration area of service. She said that the people who take care of all f these things have been doing it or a while and are all doing a great job. She thanked Lori Klatt and Liz Becher for taking care of the Club Directory; Bill Monroe and Jim Anderson for taking care of the annual Pheasant Hunt; Denise Prugh for handling the Christmas party every year; Greg Brondos who handles the Teton Bike ride every year; Dan Odell is now taking care of Family of Rotary; Jim Porter just announced that the annual Club motorcycle ride is coming up; President Jim is in charge of the inter Club socials and Peaches and Anthony take care of the upcoming big fundraiser for the International Project, the Golf Tournament. She said that things are running smoothly and everyone is doing a great job.

Denise Prugh who takes care of the Youth Services Avenue of service gave her report. We have decided to have three $750 scholarships for High School Seniors this year, one for each of the High Schools, the due date for the applications and essays is the 25^th of this month so if you know of a HS Senior please have them apply as we have no applications yet. Denise let us know that Kevin Murphy heads up the RYLA program and has that under control. Craig Valdez takes care of Young RYLA and does a great job there. Students of the Month is headed up by Eric Easton and Martha Rakestraw and they are doing a great job of getting us students and having them speak at our meetings. Susan Griffith takes care of our Interact Club and Denise said that if anyone would like to get Interact clubs going at NCHS and KWHS please let them know as that would be a great thing to do. Sheryl Foland watches over Rotaract and she just hosted their board of directors at her house for dinner and they are doing great work and will be sending three to the District Spring Assembly.

We had two board members missing today, Tara Short who is over membership, and Dennis Jack who is over public relations so we will get reports from them at the next meeting they attend.

PE Richard Schwahn reported on the PE duties which are two things, Place to meet and eat, and the program. He thanked everyone who has sent program ideas to him and asked that we continue to do so, Dick Jay will become the PE in July so Richard will pass along those ideas to him. As far as meals and meeting place he said that there have been some bumps along the road with the Parkway Plaza’s new owners with the heat not working for a couple of weeks and the meals being hit and miss. He along with Dick Jay met with the Parkway and they have decided to stay the course for a while longer to see if things improve as we have been meeting here for over forty years. However, he does want our feedback on the meals and any other issues that come up. He let us know that next week we will be at the Rankota and we will be hearing from Deb and Gene Theriault and Jim Anderson about their friendship exchange trip to Australia. Richard then told us that he will be headed out to the Netherlands on Thursday to meet up with our outbound exchange student this year, his daughter Madeline who is having a great time.

President Jim asked for new business, none were presented so he asked for a motion to adjourn Les Crawford made the motion and Tom Lockhart seconded, we were then adjourned from the business meeting. 

 

President Jim Ruble concluded the meeting at 1:15 with the ring of the bell.  

“Rotary Serving Humanity”