Three Skokie Valley Rotary Club grant recipients will present, discussing their organizations and explaining how the grant funds will be used. Tisha Breitlow from the Maine Niles Association of Special Recreation, JoAnn Kempf from the Skokie Choir Concert and Josee Starr from the Mitchell Musuem will present. 

Trisha Breitlow, the Executive Director of the Maine-Niles Assosiation of Special Recreation (M-NASR) will discuss the agency and how it provides and facilitates year-round recreation programs and services for children and adults with disabilities who live in the member-district communities. Member Park Districts are: Des Plaines, Golf-Maine, Morton Grove, Niles, Park Ridge, Skokie, and Lincolnwood. M-NASR is one of several special recreation associations (SRAs), which are unique to the state of Illinois. SRAs are formed when two or more units of local government combine to form a cooperative which then provides recreational services to individuals with disabilities within that jurisdiction. M-NASR was the second SRA formed and is celebrating it’s 50th anniversary this year. Trisha will be discussing the programs, services and opportunities M-NASR provides for individuals with disabilities.  

JoAnne Kempf is retired from the American Library Association where she served as the Director of ALA Governance. She has been a member of the Skokie Concert Choir since 2005 and held the office of president 2011-2015. She currently holds the dual position of recording/corresponding secretary on the choir board. JoAnne enjoys volunteering at the Skokie Public Library as a facilitator for the Let’s Get Together Book Club, a book club for intellectually disabled adults, as well as at the Douglas Center where she teaches money skills also to intellectually disabled adults.

Josee Starr is an enrolled member of the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nation (Three Affiliated Tribes) of North Dakota and also represents the Omaha Nation of Nebraska and Wiikwemkoong First Nation from Ontario, Canada. She grew up in the greater Chicago American Indian Community, learning her culture and traditional values. She has worked as an independent artist, and her background is in Cultural Education. She has been with the Mitchell Museum of the American Indian since December 2019. The project is a collaborative mural with St. Kateri's program for Native youth, led by Negwes White. The mural depicts the Anishinaabe creation story, with creative flairs from the young artists. We also enrolled Stacy Vittal (Ho-Chunk, Oneida, Menominee) to help manage the youth and direct the creative process for the project. Stacy's background is in art therapy and art education.