President Dick Jay called the meeting to order promptly at 12:26, with the ring of the bell and welcomed everyone to today’s meeting.

 

 

Greeters: Joe Bennick and Genevieve Lynch were our greeters today and Genevieve introduced the members who brought guests:

Gary Pehrson had us stand and led us in singing “Now Thank We All Our God” in honor of Thanksgiving this week. We then sang “Cowboy Joe” for UW winning their game.

 

We are sending two cards around for Rob and Paulann Doane.

 

Bill Sullivan nominated John Barasso for his new position in the U.S. Senate, he also nominated Mark Owens, Deb Theriault, Rod Aaker, Guy DeWitt, and Jim Grenfell for speaking at the meeting with Park and Recreations about various projects at Rotaryy Park.

Jim Porter nominated Gene Theriault, Fred Feth, Barry Johnson, Tony Valdez, and Dennis Gazdiewich for helping him with the sorting of the Rotary Archives up at Casper College in preparation for them to be scanned into the archives at CC.

President Dick Jay nominated Barry Johnson and team who are working on the Centennial Celebration, they are doing a great job.

 

Becky Byron was awarded her Paul Harris Fellow today.

We also inducted a new member today, Paul Wilhelm sponsored by President Dick Jay, welcome to the club.

 

Jim Porter announced that we are in need of some more volunteers on next Monday at 2:00 at Casper College Library to help sort through archives that the Casper Star Tribune has of articles and pictures of Rotary so that they can be used for our Centennial Gala celebration in the advertising and the memory book and other things.

Lisa Scroggins announced that the marketing committee is still in search of any and all pictures of past Rotary events so please get those to her if you have any.

 

President Dick Jay announced that a large cold planet was found near Earth associated with a small dim star known as Barnard’s Star, Congratulations Bob Barnard for being honored in this way. He also announced that with the upcoming Dinner for Paul Harris Foundation we are in need of a Committee Chair to help organize that dinner, he got a volunteer, thank you.

Also the Board of Directors met this morning and spoke about the Scholarships we used to do for nontraditional students so they are going to do a matching grant that will match up to $7500 during his tenure for any donations made from members to the Casper Rotary Foundation, more information will follow.

 

President Dick Jay also announced that December 17^th will be our annual Christmas Party.

 

Martha Rakestraw introduced our great student of the Month from KWHS Logan Hensley.

 

President Dick Jay asked Senator John Barasso to address us today. John honored our Veterans in honor of Veteran’s Day last week.

 

President Elect John Griffith introduced Dale Bohren from the Casper Star Tribune. Dale purchased the Casper Journal to compete with the Casper Star Tribune and then the Tribune purchased the Journal and he now is the Publisher. He has always felt that a newspaper should be a reflection of the life of the community in which it circulates. Community news is sometimes ordinary and sometimes not but he feels that when you read a paper like the Tribune that you should see a clear and accurate reflection of what is going on in the community and the State. It should have the stories that matter to the community and that affect them. Community news is personal news. Today there are many ways of getting your news but it is the newspapers that provide the volumes of fact based information and in depth reporting necessary to carry on an actual conversation that has meaning. Twenty years ago when he bought the Casper Journal it was mostly print because online was brand new so the social media and online presence did not exist like they do today. Technology has forever changed business and everyday life. Today the Start Tribune reaches way more audience than ever before because of the new technology. The online and app for the Start Tribune has had over 440,000 unique visitors on average for the past three months. In 2004 when the Star Tribune took over the Casper Journal they had 27 employees that they had to integrate into the Star Tribune employees so some people’s jobs were eliminated and it was one of the hardest things he has ever had to do. At the Tribune they have integrated many aspects with the national corporation desks, since Lee Enterprises is a large corporation with 49 daily papers and 350 weekly papers, in order to save time, money, and improve quality. They have experienced layoffs due to these things as well as havi8ng to cut costs. However, how the reporting and covering of the news is done can’t be integrated with the corporate desks because that is what makes it a local newspaper. They have the largest news desk in the State of Wyoming and are the last remaining seven day a week newspaper in the State. The areas of focus are local and state governments, energy, outdoors, education, cops and courts, sports (local, HS, College, and UW), arts and community, and politics. All of these things matter in the community in which we live. The opinion that they publish is the focus of the first amendment. He gets a lot of reaction from readers about the editorials, some of them feel that he is trying to tell people what to think but that is just not true, he is trying to get people to think and learn and create their own opinion based on fact. The letters to the editor give voice to the community especially for those who have nowhere else to voice their opinions. He prints all of the letters to the editor except for personal attacks, gender slurs, racial slurs, or consumer complaints. The political letters are very important for the citizens to be able to have their say about the politicians unless it is absolutely false. Most people do not have any other way to get the leaders to listen, the letters to the editors gives them their voice. With the syndicated columns that the Tribune carries, he is trying to stimulate thought and conversation so he carries those with different viewpoints because he is seeing that today people only want to read or hear those opinions that are the same as their own. By carrying differing opinions he hopes that it will stimulate people to understand other points of view. The newspaper also is able to help with non-profit collaboration through giving donations as well as free advertising and participating in things like the We Read program. The local advertising is especially important as that is how they pay for the newspaper and also 35% of the readers read the advertising first. All of the content is consumed in many different forms from print to digital and all over the world. Last August the printing of the paper was outsourced because the press has worn out and was just not producing the quality paper that they want to produce. To purchase a new press would be a $10 million investment so he decided that it was better to let someone else spend the $10 million and allow them to print the daily paper in Cheyenne. The only difference will be the paper will be coming from Cheyenne to Casper instead of from Casper to Cheyenne. The press in Cheyenne can have them all printed in 30 minutes and ready to ship. The newspaper industry is not dying but instead it is evolving, much like most companies in the world today. The Casper Star Tribune will continue to be in the forefront of the news no matter how it is delivered in the future.

 

President Dick Jay concluded the meeting at 1:26 letting us know that next week we will be at the Ramkota and our speaker will be Jimmy Goolsby speaking about the oil and gas industry.

 

“Be the Inspiration”