If attending in person, please reserve by June 8, 2026 usingthis link.
Wednesday's program is an important Club Assembly as we start a new and exciting year. On June 10th, we will hold a club assembly as we start to focus on the 2026-2027 Rotary year. During this session, we will discuss the five lanes of committees for the club, along with the organizational chart. Be thinking about what activities of the club and a committee on which to serve. During our club assembly, we will also outline what focus areas we plan to address this year.
We look forward to seeing you there!
Invocation
Mellie Bevilacqua
Executive Director
Foundation for Southeast Texas
Pledges
John Lee
Director
Lamar University Small Business Development Center
Introduction of
Guests
Andrew Edwards
Producer
J.S. Edwards & Sherlock Insurance Agency, LLP
Introduction of
Speaker
Jay Wilson
Director of Membership & Retention Greater Beaumont Chamber of Commerce
Please volunteer for Head Table responsibilities through the
Board of Directors Meeting- Foundation of SETX at 11:30 AM
24
End of Year Celebration- 5:30-7:00 PM- There will not be a Noon meeting
Victor Zaloom
June 14
Regina Rogers
June 12, 2002
24 years
Lee Potter
June 12, 2024
2 years
Harley Swearingen
June 11, 2025
1 year
June 3, 2026
Ashling Drew
ExxonMobil
Program Review: Debbie Maxwell
The meeting of the Rotary Club of Beaumont was held on Wednesday, June 3, 2026 at the MCM Elegante’ Hotel. The noon meeting was called to order by club President Uliana Trylowsky. Joining Uliana at the head table were Bruce Walker providing the Invocation, Connie Tilton leading in the pledges to the flags, and John Lee for introduction of guests.
Announcements:
*Jay Wilson introduced a new member: Jeremy Fults.
*Lee Potter reminded members of the meeting for June 24th at 5:30pm at Edison Plaza for a “Swan Song” for the ending of Uliana’s tenure as club president.
Connie Tilton introduced our speaker: Ashling Drew who has been in the energy industry for over 22 years. Ashling is a geoscience expert and is at the forefront of sustainable resource innovation. Ashling was speaking to us today about ExxonMobil’s “Carbon Capture and Storage” (CCS) facilities in the southeast Texas area. CCS has 3 main components:
Capture of CO2 – primarily from large industrial plants; Transport – the largest underground pipeline in the world; and Storage – space underground to permanently store the CO2. There is a Rose CCS near the Cheek, TX area that is established and ready to start operations. There is the Sunflower CCS near Nome, TX that is in early construction.
Ashling assures us of the safety of this technology, that the holding areas are very deep, away from water aquifers and the CO2 is absorbed into the rock and sand of the holding area. She said that the pipelines are constantly monitored with safety sensors and that the CO2 pipelines are the safest of all pipelines. There is no risk of explosion or combustion. Any risk would be a release of CO2 that if a certain weather condition happened to exist at the same time, the CO2 could be held close to the surface in the area possibly occupied – so rescue operation would be to enter with masks to extract anyone who might be exposed. She informed of the economic benefit for communities as keeping Southeast Texas on the frontline in the Industry, and that it is a benefit to those companies who need to capture CO2 to have access to this technique.
At the conclusion of this very informative presentation, it was announced that a donation would be made to Rotary International for the speaker in the area of “Community and Economic Development”. Next week’s meeting will be a Club Assembly and we were reminded to be ready to sign up for departments and programs. After reciting the 4-way Test, the meeting was adjourned.
