Rotary Club of Casper WY

Meeting Summary

05/22/2017

 

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.

Inspiration, Pledge, 4-Way Test:

Gary Pehrson

Greeters:

Nick Hill and Jack Swanson were the greeters today, and Nick introduced the members who brought guests:

Charles Schoenwolf introduced Sarah Szewczyk and Phillip Rael;

Lynn Lockhart introduced Errol Miller;

Steve Loftin introduced Denise Kleemyer;

Jim Beck introduced his daughter Sarah Beck;

John Griffith introduced Kristen Galles and Bill Thompson;

Kevin Murphy introduced Terry Bay and Larry Bean;

Joe MacGuire introduced his daughters Mary and Christen MacGuire;

Dan Odell introduced his sister Winne Scott and nephew Sam Scott;

Song:

Gary Pehrson had us all stand and led us in singing “America The Beautiful”;

New member induction:

Tara Short read the Induction Ceremony to induct new member Kyle Gamroth, who was sponsored by Steven Schnell.   Congratulations Kyle.

Family of Rotary:

Deb Theriault told us that she and Gene would be travelling to visit their son who is getting married.

 

Rotarians of the Week:

President Ruble reminded everyone that there will be no meeting next week in honor of Memorial Day.  He then asked all of the veterans to stand and be recognized.

Jason DeWitt was nominated as Rotarian of the Week for being the speaker for Roosevelt High School’s commencement ceremony.

Brad Diller and Donovan McComb were nominated for the KWHS boys track team win.

Donovan McComb was nominated for becoming a United States citizen.

Kodi Merschat was nominated for doing a great job creating the Friendship Board for the upcoming District Conference.

Jim Ruble was nominated for being elected President Elect of the National Boy Scouts of America.

 

Student of the Month:

Rose Heinz from Roosevelt High School/REACH Program was honored as Rotary Student of the Month.  She presented her very special story and received a well-deserved standing ovation from the club.

Susan Griffith gave a “shout out” to the Natrona County School District for having the REACH Program available to students.

 

Scholarship Awards:

Stephanie Sneesby awarded Christen MacGuire and Samuel Scott, both from KWHS, certificates and checks for $750.00 for their winning essays submitted to the Casper Rotary Club’s Four Way Test Scholarship contest. Congratulations Christen and Samuel.

 

Announcements:

President Ruble reminded everyone that today was the last day to register for the District Conference that will be taking place in Casper June 1 – 3.

Peaches Lynch spoke about the Rotary Cares Golf Tournament coming up in July.  She reminded that members that the money raised at the golf tournament goes towards building schools in Panama.  She went on to say that they need players and sponsors for the event. 

Peaches then announced that the club would be hosting a second exchange student from Argentina this year.  The student is a 17-year-old male and she will have more information later that she will share with the club.  She reminded everyone that we need 6 host families this year and urged everyone to consider hosting one of the two students.   Talk to Peaches if you are interested.

Jim Porter reminded members about the Rotary Ride to be held July 1 & 2.  He stated that, cars, as well as motorcycles are welcome at this ride.  If you are interested, Jim suggested that you call the Saratoga Inn before June 1^st to reserve your room.  The number is 307-326-5261 and ask for a room in the “Casper Rotary Ride” block.

Brian Deurloo spoke about the upcoming Duck Derby.  He asked if anyone has any Duck Derby marketing items, such as signs or magnets for cars, to bring them to him as soon as possible.

His next subject was Crossroads Park.  Phillip Giffin has taken the lead on the maintenance of Crossroads Park and on June 3 there will be a group of young people working on various projects at the park.   Volunteers are needed that day to help with the projects.  Please talk to Brian or Phillip if you are interested in helping.

Ronna Boril is in charge of the fundraising for the District Conference next weekend.  She stated that she is putting together 4 baskets for the conference and that she needs donations of items for them.  Talk to Ronna if you have items to donate.

Hal Hutchinson talked about the Highway Cleanup that is scheduled for Thursday, May 25 from 5:30 pm to approximately 8:00 pm.   He said that he still needs volunteers for that event and to talk to him if you plan to be there.  He went on to say that Nick Hill has offered to donate food from Q’doba for the workers and Guy DeWitt will be donating water.

  

 

Program (Stanton Burns - Transitioning onto Medicare):

Kevin Murphy introduced Stan Burns who is in Wealth Management with Stifel, Nicolaus and Company, Inc., out of St Louis, Missouri.    Stan began by speaking about a Medicare Fact Sheets 2017 that he had placed on the tables, saying that the booklet has the most current information on Medicare.  He said that Medicare has basically 4 sections, Parts A, B, C & D, with parts A & B being the most traditional.  He spoke about whether you should sign up as soon as you turn 65 or not, saying that if you are working at a company that has more than 20 employees and covers health insurance, you would be better off not signing up for Medicare.    He went on to say that if you are contributing to a Health Savings Account and you get on Medicare, you will be penalized greatly.  Part D is prescription coverage for Medicare and it is administered by private insurance companies.  There are literally hundreds of different plans out there for you to choose from so it is important to shop around to get the right coverage for you.  He suggested that you go to https://www.medicare.gov to help you make that decision.    Then there is Medigap or the Medicare Advantage Plan which will help to pay for claims that Medicare A & B do not cover.  There is a website with resources that can help you with this decision http://www.wyomingseniors.com/ or call 1-800-856-4398. 

President Jim Ruble concluded the meeting at 1:30; letting us know that there will be no meeting next week, but, we are back at the Parkway Plaza on June 5th and the program will be Tony Waddell from the Wyoming Wildlife Foundation.

“Rotary Serving Humanity”

 

 

 

President Elect Richard Schwahn called the meeting to order promptly at 12:29, with the ring of the bell and welcomed everyone to today’s meeting.

Percy Anderson and Dan White were the greeters today, and Dan  introduced the members who brought guests:

Gary Pehrson had us all stand and led us in singing “Home on the Range” in honor of May Day, May the Fourth (be with you), and Cinco De Maio, and he threw in Mother’s Day as well;

We had two some red badges traded for blue badges today, congratulations to Wendy Lucas, Phil Giffin, and Steven Schnell.

Today we had the immense pleasure of having Alyssa Burton as our student of the month today, she is a very impressive young lady with great plans for the future.

Bill Schilling announced that they will be doing some work at Rotary Park Saturday at 10:00 to sculpt the foundation for the kiosk at the parking area.

Peaches Lynch announced the golf tournament that is to raise money for our international project at the Panama schools to build them some classrooms. They are in need of sponsors as well as teams to golf so please sign up.

Liz Becher gave us an update on District conference and let us know that she has paper registration sheets to help those who were unable to register online. There are lots of opportunities to get involved, speak with her if you would like to help out.

Hal Hutchinson announced that highway cleanup will be Thursday May 25^th 5:30 – 8:00, meet out across from the airport entrance at SST Energy. There are sheets on the table to sign up to help and we need 24 people to make it go smoothly.

Anne Ladd was nominated for her work on April 30^th with the Academic Awards, a tradition that her mom started many years ago.

Brian Deurloo nominated Bill Schilling for his continued work with Leadership Wyoming.

Bill Schilling nominated Dave Elmer and Craig Valdez both whom just graduated from Leadership Wyoming with honors this past weekend.

Jim Anderson nominated Denise Prugh for running in a half marathon in Denver this past weekend and finishing as a top contender.

Steve Loftin nominated the following for helping out with the Food Bank Of The Rockies packing last week; Tom Broumley, Rick and Vicki Diamond, Steve Loftin, Brian Deurloo, John Griffith and Clay Hawthorne.

PE Richard Schwahn thanked Susan Stubson, who was scheduled to be the speaker today, for allowing our speaker to present today before he had to leave the country. He then introduced our speaker for today, Thomas Lockhart, son of Tom and Lynn Lockhart. Thomas started by thanking Wyoming for supporting veterans and told us that Wyoming has 49,000 veterans in the State. He spoke to us about Afghanistan and what the U.S. is doing there. He works for the Combined Security Transition Command Afghanistan, their main mission is to train, advise, and assist the Afghans with their military and police forces. We no longer have the 60 to 100 thousand troops there, we now have 8400 and with the coalition partners that are also there to assist there are just a little over ten thousand total troops there to assist, advise and train both the military and police which are about 385,000 men. A lot of the equipment that they receive comes from the U.S. as they are a very poor country. The purpose of us being there is the long term institutionalization of the country. It is a huge undertaking with a price tag of about $5.1 billion, his group’s annual budget is about $2.3 billion. He works for a 2 star General but he is actually a civilian. In training and advising they also have to supply the equipment such as uniforms, weapons etc. He showed us a map of Kabul and all of the different areas they have to travel to which was neat to see the large area that they cover in order to do their jobs. Some areas they have to get to via Chinook Helicopters in order to visit the equipment depots. With the amount of stuff that comes through the depots they have to go help them organize everything to keep it all straight. In his capacity he does logistics, medical, and information and communication technology for the Afghanistans. They have to build trust between the Afghans themselves as they are not a very trusting people, and they have to build transparency so that the Afghans can see where the supplies are and know when they will arrive so they can understand that the stuff will be delivered and when. They are also struggling with the professionalization of their staff, they have many that do not know how to read and they have never had leadership or known how to take orders or direction from leadership so they have to train them and educate them on all of these aspects of professionalism. With the logistics they have to teach how to keep the depots organized and how to track all of the equipment. With the medical side they have to make sure that the Doctors have the supplies and equipment they need to treat the patients rather than having to send a patient away to somewhere where they can treat them. The part of information and communication technology, they have to train them how to use a computer and how to translate things and understand all of the technical aspects of the jobs of shipping, inventory and ordering. It is important for us to be there to help because there are too many influences in the countries around them like Russia, Iran, China, etc. also the influence of the 22 of the known 82 terrorist organizations reside in Afghanistan and they move back and forth between the surrounding countries so it is very crucial for us to be in Afghanistan. In order to get the equipment to Afghanistan it takes a long time and is very complicated to have it travel around the world and then around the country. The long term plan is that we need to get out of there so they are teaching them how to maintain the equipment, with trained mechanics that can fix the equipment if they have the right parts. It is a balancing act to keep the peace while building the capacity for them to take care of their own country as it is a very fragile situation.

 

President Elect Richard Scwahn concluded the meeting at 1:25; letting us know that next week we are back at the Parkway Plaza. Our Speaker will be Erich Frankland from Casper College.

“Rotary Serving Humanity”