The "Saturday Morning Breakfast With Neighbors" and Craft Talks from Kristine Burns and Willie Billeter
Our Guest Speakers for Thursday, December 8, 2022, were John Ray from the Unitarian Universalist Congregation and newer Sunrise members Kristine Burns and Willie Billeter, who each gave their craft talks.
John Ray is in charge of the Congregation’s “Saturday Morning Breakfast With Neighbors” program. He moved to Santa Rosa about 10 years ago and started helping to serve the breakfasts, and somehow ended up being in charge about 8 years ago! John was introduced by Stacy Drucker-Andress, who is also a volunteer with the program, helps with breakfast, and runs the warm clothing program for the Congregation at the Glaser Center. John mentioned that the program is run entirely by volunteers and private donations. Panera provides the bread products, which they pick up ever Friday evening. They feed 100-150 people every Saturday morning, although the number is increasing this winter. The breakfast is busier toward the end of the month since some people get government benefits at the beginning of the month when they don’t need it as much. He told us about several people who lost their jobs or had personal failures and needed help for a short time to get back on their feet. John was presented with a donation at the meeting from Sunrise. The donation will be used to help provide food for the breakfast program.
Kristine Burns has been a member since June 2021 and was sponsored by Penny Millar. She has taken a windy road to her current profession. For as far back as she can remember she always wanted to be in law enforcement, preferably with a federal law enforcement agency. She studied law enforcement in school and finished at the top of her class. She had an internship in the Coroner’s office but learned that a medical condition would not allow her to pursue a career in law enforcement. She stared going to Sonoma State seeking a science degree to focus on forensic science, but in her first semester she was hit by a drunk driver while returning home from school one night. At the time she also volunteered at the fire department, and that same department helped her at the scene of the accident. She faced multiple surgeries because of the accident and ultimately had to leave school. She then went to work in her family’s business. She also started her own business doing artwork. She finally went back to college, received a degree in business, and started managing her mother’s businesses. She then moved on to work in financial planning and later in tax. She has worked in taxes for over 20 years. She’s an enrolled agent, works at Dillwood, Burkel & Millar, and is thinking of getting her CPA license.
Willie Billeter is a co-owner and CEO of BC Engineering Group, a local civil engineering and land planning office. He was born in Santa Rosa, and attended middle school at Comstock and high school at Piner. While at Piner he took a drafting class as a freshman. He went to work at JDS Uniphase and spent 3 years there. For two of those years, he was in the Intelligent Light department. In that department they cut glass into small components that went into concert lighting units of different colors and sizes. He worked his way up to department lead and was involved in quality control. He also got involved with the engineers and learned that the design work was done with Auto Cad, which he’d learned about in high school! He started with a civil engineering company after JDS Uniphase and later worked with his two brothers with a company in Healdsburg. In 2016 they decided to start their own business and opened up BCE. He was married in 2011. They had their first child in 2016, which made 2016 a very busy year! Willie has been connected with Past President Warren in two different ways; hockey and as co-workers at JDS!
