Highlights from Anchorage East Rotary (Dec. 19)

Posted by Paul Paslay
At our meeting December 12:
  • Bill Miernyk honored a teacher and student from East High.  The teacher is Mark Elfstrom, an 18 year veteran of ASD, and the student is Kawailani Aasa.
  • Woody Angst from the Foundation Committee showed a short video on a Guatemala water project sponsored by Rotary.
  • I announced that there will be our monthly Board meeting the next day.  I mentioned that there would be food and drink!   
  • I conducted our annual meeting at which the following officers were confirmed for Rotary Year ’19 – ‘20:
    • President – Charlotte Tharp
    • President Elect – Bill Ure
    • Past President- Paul Paslay
    • Vice President – Jon Dyson
    • Secretary – Kara Blake
    • Treasurer – Clay Hightower
    • Sergeant at Arms – Jennifer Snodgrass
    • Community Service-  Co-Chairs Rebecca Sentner & Christian Deykes
    • Foundation – Bob Cox & Co-chair TBD
    • Membership-  Co-Chairs Shawn Florio & Sheila Lomboy
    • Social – Raquel Edelen
    • Vocational – Mike Zahare
    • Youth Exchange-  Co-Chairs Katie Johnson & Marjorie Poggas
    • Youth Services – Karen Smith
    • Communications – Chair TBD & Co-Chair Jeff Blake
    • International Service – Chair TBD & Co-Chair Adam Sikorski (who will also continue as Chair of the Beer Fest Committee)
  • Dave Kester announced that we have raised $4100 for Polio Plus so far this year, which is well beyond our goal.  Thanks, Dave, for your service on the District level as chair of the PolioPlus initiative.
  • Mark Schmeling attended our club again.  He was introduced by Dave Kester.
  • Jay Jackson mentioned a remarkable $899 roundtrip airfare to Nepal to attend their District Conference, for those who are interested.
  • Ashley visited us from Anchorage South Rotary, together with President Amy Mackey-Hornak.  Ashley recently moved to Anchorage and feels blessed to have joined such a welcoming community as Anchorage, and is blessed to see the generous donations that have been made to her firm.
  • Amy Mackey-Hornak pitched her club’s event, the Prohibition Day gala, which is a fundraiser for King Tech Center.
  • Frank Cahill had happy bucks for the large amount of snow that just fell on Anchorage.
  • Pat Rumley donated $100 to the Paul Harris of Raquel Edelen to honor her for the help she has given.
  • Julius Brecht, a member of Anchorage Downtown, visited our club and he expressed happiness that there was no loss of life when the earthquake hit our area November 30.
  • Raquel Edelen thanked the group for all the cleaning up that we did after the party last Saturday; this made it easy to completely clean her home.  At the party she got another 12 bottles of wine for the Foundation auction Wall of Wine, and we are well on our way to having a great Wall of Wine portion of the auction.
  • Barbara Swenson introduced her guest Amy Lester from the YWCA.  Amy is the new development director.  Barbara offered 100 recognition points to anyone who signed up on December 12 to attend the upcoming YWCA gala.
  • Katie Johnson confirmed she is back from her work stint in Kenai.  She recalled good visits with the Kenai River Rotary Club.  She said it looks like we have a second host family for our exchange student Adam Szabo!  Katie donated to her Paul Harris based on the formula 30 weeks X 5 days/week, the length of her transfer to Kenai.
  • We raised $485 for our Hilton servers.  The money was given to Rodney, our contact at the Hilton lunch, who will distribute the money among the various servers we have had over the year.
  • Sheila Lomboy, co-chair of our membership committee, introduced her guest Justin S. Eppler, an attorney in town.  I think Justin may want to join our club!
  • Justin Mills introduced his guest James Olafson.
  • Based on what I heard from Past President Sean Bradley, I spoke with Past President Lance Wilber and he agreed to be the lead for the February lunch meetings, for which the Past Presidents make all arrangements.
  • Shirley Nelson announced that the Baxter Elementary reading project continues tomorrow. 
At other times:
  • On Tuesday evening December 11, the Community Service Committee met.  Present included Laurie Hoefer, Rebecca Sentner, Sandra Wicks, Christian Deykes, Duff Pfanner, Bruce Phelps, Heather Flynn, Reed Smith, and your truly.  Approval was made of grant applications by Partners’ Reentry Program ($3,000), Campfire ($3000), Junior Achievement ($3000) and Anchorage Opera ($3000).  We need another tent, perhaps with an East Rotary logo on it.
  • Sgt Rich located the 6’ X 3’ club banner that Greg Solomon made during his year as president.  We will use it at the Nordic Skiing Association of Anchorage “Solstice Tree Tour” December 17.   We are a sponsor of this event.
  • On Thursday December 20 the Board met.  We had lots of pizza, Caeser salad and adult beverages.  Unopened bottles of wine were donated to the Wall of Wine at the Foundation auction.  I am grateful for the good attention all the board members show for the best interests of our club.   We decided not to have a Board meeting in January.  The next board meeting will be Tuesday, February 5, 5:30p, at the Captain Cook.
  • Also on Thursday, Maxine Froemling, Rich Dyson and I showed up at Baxter Elementary for the reading project.  The routine is becoming that we meet up in the main office at 9:15a, go to a classroom (grades kindergarten to 2nd grade) about 9:30a, and help out until 10:30a.
  • On Friday, Rich Dyson, Karen Smith and I attended the Xmas party for the East High Interact Club, together with about 40 students and the social studies teacher advisor Kimberly Liland.  This club will grow out of several clubs already in existence at East under Kim’s enthusiastic and able lead.  I brought 7 pizza pies from Costco, and the Interact banner and bell I borrowed from the West High Interact Club.  7 pizza pies (the recommended number I got from Karen) was the perfect amount of pizza).  Kim liked how the sound of the bell got students’ attention quickly!  The next meeting will probably be Monday, January 14.
  • On Sunday, our club was one of many sponsors for the Solstice Tree Tour.  Many thanks to Barbara Kagerer for being our contact person.  Lynn Shaver, myself, Bob Cox, and Karen Smith’s husband Terry and two of their daughters were hosts at a table serving cocoa and coffee.  The parking lot and up the road was jammed with cars and I saw large number of people skiing and walking up the Mize Trail where every few yards there were trees decorated by various sponsors.
  • On Monday, December 17, the Youth Services committee met at Mo’s O’Brady’s to discuss the club’s upcoming participation in RYLA (Rotary Youth Leadership Academy).  Katie Johnson (our co-chair for Youth Exchange) was present with Karen Smith (Youth Exchange Officer), member Justin Mills and me.  RYLA will be held in Juneau from March 7 – 10.  This program takes 50 - 75 high school sophomores and juniors and over several days develops their leadership skills.  The young people who are chosen are ones who demonstrate good prospects to become leaders, more than young people who already take leadership.  Our club’s goal is to sponsor 2 students and one chaperone.
  • On Tuesday, December 18, Jeff Blake and I once again attended the West High Interact club.  About 10 students were there, and they prepared the boxes for the food distribution and began the process of filling the contents.  Food should be distributed later this week.
  • There will no meeting of the East High Interact Club on tomorrow December 19.  Last week the club met on Monday (we didn’t get word of the change in date and did not show up), and next year plans to have its first meeting Monday January 14, and Mondays thereafter.