Present: President Neil Zanni, David Roth, Jim Fusco (Zoom), Ellen Gale (Zoom), Amie Avila, Enier Rodrigues Da Silva, Sierra Hughes, and Maila Berry
President Neil Zanni called the meeting to order at 7:17 a.m. @ AOCU
Pledge of Allegiance: Neil Zanni
Inspiration Quote: Ellen Gale
Birthdays/Anniversary Shoutout: Jeanie Storrs
Card Raffle: Neil picked David's name and he pulled a ten for $10.00. ($66 total)
Guests: None
Speaker: None
Happy/Sad Dollars:
We had 7 people that contributed for happy/sad dollars, and the collection of food dollars and Foundation.
New Business discuss this morning:
JAF - We all signed the thank you card and Neil will mail it to the JA Festival Committee. We made $300 from our basket raffles that day.
Neil found out our club will be recognized for an award at the Foundation dinner. Please attend; you will get reimbursed 1/2 the cost for club members. Need to attend and send receipt to get reimbursed from our club $22.50.
Sierra (she has membership at Elks) suggested we have a Trivia Night as this is popular at the Black Sheep. She attended last night and maybe we can go as a group to check it out. To book the DJ it would be $600-$700. Jim stated the Fitchburg East club is having one, too.
Salvation Army sign up sheet - Maila will have this at every meeting for people to sign up. Reached out to Lynnette to have her come visit our club before bell ringing, waiting to hear back.
Peace Initiative - we voted (Alley/David) to buy peace pole for $350 and we will get reimbursed from District. We need to decide where we want it? We can select languages on pole when ordering. Also, looking for 2 volunteers to help DG Penny with this district wide event and David/Amie volunteered. They will reach out to DG Penny for more details and bring it back to the club.
Speaker - Melissa Tasca won't be able to speak until December/January. Kelli will let us know when she is available.
Holiday Rotary party - Maila reached out to Leslie for Thursday/Friday dates in January 2027. We've had it at Cristina's but do we want to switch it up? More to come!
The Gardener's Spot - Xmas trees being delivered on 11/23, please let Neil know who wants to volunteer to unload them off the truck. Neil has the Veteran community and LHS students to assist and usually takes about an hour.
Action in our Community - is there an organization our club wants to volunteer for? Such as the Lunenburg Food pantry? Need ideas, who wants to do this, what time/day?
Old Business to reference:
Cormier Park - David suggested we mulch in lieu of our meeting to complete this task. Jim F. stated there are 3 benches with a plaque to remember past Rotarians. Neil donated mulch and now we need to get a date/time to do this??We need to get more cleanup there, get a signup sheet, can we go through Ward councilor to help with this effort (?) and do we have any more Rotary flags as backups? Maila is finding out from Kelli how much we owe her for flag from the mayor.
David and Amie working on 2027-28 budget. We need it by December so we can vote on it.
Superbowl Square raffle - David made motion that we do a Superbowl Square raffle, Amie seconded and all in favor. Sierra/Enier will chair this event, look at Penny's event to see setup and will have this available on Zeffy.
Comedy Show - David/Amie will meet to discuss.
Spoke about corporate/family memberships through RI that to hold a Rotary position in a club you must be the active primary person. The additional people in a family/corporate membership are honorary therefore cannot hold a position that we report on in club runner.
2026-27 Grant:
Tammy's funded the letter; waiting for $2,000 reimbursement letter from Rotary to Crystal Clubhouse. Jim stated it will be sent out the 2nd week in October.
The grant will be for the technology at Crystal Clubhouse and the need for smartboards for their daily tasks. They have 1 and it is going so well they are proposing for 1 or 2 more. They are touchscreen, can connect to phones, tracks meetings, etc. Our grant we were asking for $3,000 and Tammy found one for $2998. Update - Submitted grant for $4,000 and will get back $2,000.
Bylaws - At each meeting we will review sections of our current 2023 Bylaws. We reviewed Articles 1-4 together as a club. Jim F. re-handed out the edits made on Articles 1-4 and discussed at this mornings meeting. RI only recognizes the president and can only have 1 cast vote and see email from Jim on edits that were made. Leslie has master sheet of Bylaws and she will make changes once we get through them all and will send out revised Bylaws to all club members.
Maila will reviewed Article 5 for next meeting. We are going to list Co-President in Article 5, section 1, remove attendance meeting, make note Leslie/I share some of these duties. An update will be sent out for review.
Amie will reviewed Article 6. We had a discussion when we do the final review of bylaws that we put in the following: to create a financial assessment committee to conduct an annual review of the budget, banking accounts, financials, deposits, withdrawals, checks, etc. at the end of each presidency.
Joan will reviewed Article 7. We had no changes to this section.
David will reviewed Article 8 and Article 9. Need to have discussion about corporate membership to update bylaw verbiage throughout document if we want to have more than 1 primary listed. For the framework, did we verify that all Avenues of Service is included in this?
Article 10 & 11 - Alley, please review for next meeting
Article 12 & 13 - Jim Fusco, please review
2026 Upcoming Dates:
October 22nd: Open / Steering Committee Meeting following morning meeting
October 29th: Open
November 5th: Open
November 12th: Monthly BOD Meeting
November 18th: District Foundation Dinner at Great Wolf Lodge Fitchburg. 5:30 register online $45 pp
November 19th: NO MEETING
November 20th: Turkey Raffle at Athol/Orange club
November 26th: NO MEETING
November 28th: Salvation Army Bell ringing 10-5 @ Walmart in Leominster.
December 10th: Monthly BOD Meeting
December 17th: District Holiday Party
April 10, 2027: District Assembly
May 21 - 23, 2027: District Conference
Next meeting meeting scheduled for Thursday, October 22, 2026 at AOCU for 7:15 am..
