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Rotary Club of Casper WY
Meeting Summary
03/28/2016
PN Richard Schwahn stood in for President John Starnes today and called the meeting to order promptly at 12:28, and welcomed everyone to the club meeting.
Inspiration, Pledge, 4-Way Test:
Anne Ladd
Greeters:
Nicole Tholson and Larry King were the greeters today, and Nicoole introduced the members who brought guests:
First, visiting Rotarian Pam Walker (PE of Teton Valley Rotary Club);
- Richard Schwahn introduced his wife Michelle Schwahn, her friend Betty Jo Reynolds and his daughter Madeline Schwahn, who will be our outbound exchange student to the Netherlands this fall;
- Susan Griffith introduced her granddaughter Beau Griffith;
- Joe Nickerson introduced Jeremy Yates from CPD;
- Tom Crull introduced Kieth Mamot;
- Tim Monroe introduced his wife, Joanne Monroe, also JoAnn and Merrill Smith (volunteers with Vision Beyond Borders);
Song and Merriment:
Dennis Lower cracked us up with a couple of good jokes, and then Gary Pehrson had us all stand and led us in the seventh inning stretch while we sang “Take me out to the ballgame” in honor of Baseball opening this coming weekend.
Family of Rotary:
Jimmy Goolsby let us know that his aneurism turned out to be a benign tumor (a Meningioma) and there is enough room in his head for that and his brain too. He is thankful for all of the thoughts and prayers in his behalf.
Rotarians of the Week:
Deb Theriault nominated Anne Ladd for stepping in at the last minute to cover inspiration, pledge and four-way test today for Tucker LaPrade who was unable to make it.
Stephanie Sneesby nominated Sheryl Foland, Eric Easton and Susan Griffith for stepping up last minute to help with the Scholarship application they needed to get done quickly.
Announcements:
- Don Harris talked with us about Habitat for Humanity. His son and wife and he helped get Habitat started in Casper by involving the Methodist Church and the Rotary Club. The first meeting they had 50 people show up and they got started in 1995 with the first two houses on Sun Drive. Since then they have built 31 more houses in Casper. He had a show of hands from everyone involved in some way with Habitat here in Casper, a large majority of club members have been involved, great work.
- Richard Schwahn let us know that on the table is a ticket from Rotaract’s fundraising event for Casper College Scholarships.
- Richard Schwahn announced that we will have two exchange students this fall so please think about being a host family as we will need six families.
- Dave Elmer has volunteer signup sheets on each table for Duck Derby which will be August 20 this year. Put your name and number and he will contact you to see what area you would like to volunteer for.
- Tim Monroe reminded us that he needs us to fill out the forms on the table so that he can get them put together for our upcoming club birthday.
- Tim also announced for Glenn Januska that on Monday April 11 our club meeting will be at the airport and there will be two opportunities to tour the airport, one at 10:45 before the meeting and one right afterwards at 1:40. There are signup sheets on the table so if you are interested please sign up so they can be prepared for those who wish to do the tour.
- Bill Schilling took a minute to talk about Rotary Park. He let us know that on April 25th we will get to see the plans for the Amphitheatre we are going to build at the park. On June 25th we will have a Rotary work day at the park to start moving dirt where the Amphitheatre will be by the lower parking lot and to dig the trench for the electrical. The Wyoming Conservation Corp will be returning this summer also.
- Dick Jay announced that early registration ends this Thursday for District Conference so if you are going pleased get signed up by Wednesday.
Classification Talk:
Deanna Frey introduced herself to us today. She bravely admitted that she is not a Wyoming Native and she is a Greenie, but she got here as quickly as she could. She started her adventures in Wyoming by becoming the first Special Education teacher in Green River back in 1974. She was also the Cheerleader sponsor so she got to travel all over the State and see a lot of Wyoming and learned to love it. She then became program director of the Green River Child Development Center and during that time they adopted a little boy with fetal alcohol syndrome and she learned a lot from him. She then moved to Casper and took over as the Executive Director of the Child Development Center here and John Starnes was the first person she met at the Center and he helped her get settled in. After a few years she moved to Cheyenne where she worked with the Children Advocacy group for 12 years then helped her Mom who was suffering from Alzheimer’s. About a year and a half ago she came back to Casper to work as the Executive Director at Seton House and she is really enjoying working there and giving back to the community. She said that she learned that in Wyoming there is only one degree of separation and that here, people care. She thanked Martha Rakestraw for sponsoring her.
Program (Wyoming State Treasurer):
PN Richard Schwahn introduced our speaker, Patrick Cline, with the non-profit organization Vision Beyond Borders. He created Vision Beyond Borders in 1995 and focuses on getting bibles around the world and helping with Humanitarian aid and rescuing people from human sex trafficking. They have been sending supplies to the Syrian Refugees that are in great need of help. He is amazed at the suffering that these refugees are going through. They are sending basic toiletries, toys for the kids, clothes and blankets to help them be more comfortable. He then spoke with us about Human Trafficking. There are a half a million girls that are being sold for as little as $10 to human traffickers every year. It is amazing how families are selling their females for money. He has a friend in India that has a salon where she teaches these girls about Christ and she helps them understand that this is not right that they should be human sex slaves. The girls think, because of their religion, that they are being punished for something they did in a former life and so she works on correcting that thought process. He showed us some slide of the area and the people they work with. In The red light area where the salon is there are over 7,000 girls and women who are held captive and forced to be sex slaves, even young girls under the age of 9. They have to service 20 customers per day or they do not get to eat that day, they have all just accepted this as their fate. In Mumbai there are over 70,000 girls that are being held as sex slaves. It is heartbreaking to see the way women and girls are treated over there, being raped and sold like meat. The people they have helping over there are in constant danger as they try rescuing these girls. They have a safe house there where they house the rescued girls and teach them skills and have bible study so that they can become self-supporting to help keep them from having to return to the streets. They are seeing a lot of success and they want to now buy some land to build a bigger safe house so that they can house 200 girls as a time to be able to rescue more. It is so bad that mothers are selling daughters and husbands are forcing their wives to be prostitutes. Brothers are selling sisters and it is a huge problem and very heart breaking. It is so bad that there have been many free abortion clinics set up. He showed us pictures of some of their success stories of girls they have rescued and taught to be more independent. What a fantastic job they are doing to help these poor girls be rescued from this terrible life they are forced into.
PN Richard Schwahn adjourned the meeting at 1:27 p.m. reminding us that we are back at the Parkway Plaza next week.
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