Mayor Tom Schwedhelm is originally from Novato and moved to Santa Rosa in 1981. He received an AA degree from Santa Rosa Junior College in Administration of Justice and a Bachelor’s Degree from St. Mary’s College in Business Management. Later in his career he earned a Master’s Degree from Sonoma State in Psychology focusing on Organization Development. Tom joined the Santa Rosa Police Department in 1983 and capped off his career in the Police Department as Chief of Police from 2009-2013. He was elected to the Santa Rosa City Council in 2014 and re-elected from District 6 in 2018 with 96% of the vote at which time the Council elected him to be Mayor.
Among the civic bodies he has served on are the Ad Hoc Rent Stabilization Subcommittee, the Board of Public Utilities, the Violence Prevention Partnership Steering and Policy Committees and the Water Advisory Committee.
In our community he is on the Board of Directors of the Santa Rosa Junior College Foundation, volunteers with United Way Schools of Hope Program, the Boys and Girls Club, Tomorrow's Leaders Today, Leadership Santa Rosa, Chop's Teen Club, Social Advocates for Youth and Catholic Charities.
He has been married to Jackie since 1987 and they have two children. Among his personal interests are bike riding, abalone diving, golfing, travel and fly fishing.
Our speaker for Thursday, July 16, 2020 was Bill Tobin of ShelterBox USA. The program was fantastic! Bill is a member of the Rotary Club of El Dorado, past president, and past “Rotarian of the Year.” He has been a committed participant in ShelterBox since he was the president of his club in 2010. While he was President he was asked by several Interact kids how they could help in an international project. He asked them to do some research and come up with a project. They found ShelterBox and he has been hooked ever since! Interactors rule!
ShelterBox was founded in 2000 by a Rotary Club in Cornwall, England. The Cornwall Club ‘adopted’ ShelterBox as a club project. ShelterBox has never been a project of Rotary, although it partners with Rotarians and Rotary International in disaster relief projects all over the world. The original ShelterBox idea was to find some way to help people survive during a disaster. The solution was to distribute emergency shelter materials to families to allow them to survive during the disaster. This concept has grown to include boxes with materials for tents, cooking, solar lights, warm weather clothes, blankets and activity sets for children. Most people love having tarps, rather than prefabricated tents, because tarps can have multi-purposes after more permanent homes are found.
ShelterBox has been on the ground in such disasters as the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami, the 2010 Haitian earthquake, the Syrian civil war, and the Chad River Basin. Key current projects include Syria (civil war), Bangladesh (Rohingya massacre), the Philippines (Covid-19 and volcano), Somalia (drought), and the Chad River Basin (drought and terrorism). Most of these projects involve some of the most incredible population displacement events the world has ever suffered! Bill estimated that over 88 million people have been displaced recently, including 70 million as a result of armed conflict. Places like Syria present an overwhelming problem of population displacement. The conflict has been brutal for at least 8 years. Millions have been displaced. Rotary cannot function in Syria. All ShelterBoxes have to be sent directly from the factory.
ShelterBox has distributed over 1.6 million shelters in 100 countries over the last 20 years. It has received the U.S. Presidential Voluntary Service Award 7 times! It is four-star rated by Charity Navigator.
On a regular basis, our resident photo pro Warren Smith, submits pictures of what is going on at the weekly meetings. You can always find the most recent pictures at the websites photo journal called "Meeting Sighting" Please note that all the meeting photos for the entire Rotary year are at this location with the most recent on the last page.
Thanks for all the great pictures Warren!Link to Meeting Sightings. The most recent are on the last page!
...Not as hot as it has been. And the breeze was cool and comfortable. The afternoon sun hit the deck. But there was no need for sunscreen. Everyone wore a mask and many also disguised themselves with sunglasses and hats. Incognito was there order of the day. And if you did not have a mask, bright blue Rotary masks were on sale for $5.
The host had put out four bins -- one for birthday cards, another for canned and bottled drinks, a third filled with ice-cream sandwiches and one for trash. The hostess came round with napkins for all. And roll of paper towels sat next to a nearby planter. Everything anyone would need for a festive birthday celebration!
The birthday boy sat in front of a screen, intent on his Internet interactions as an adolescent with a game board. From time to time another guest would arrive, walking the trail around the house that was outlined with cautionary signs warning of steep and rough terrain. The order of the day was to pause in front of the wooden railing, look up to survey the party scene and figure out what password or hidden entrance might lead onto the elevated deck.
Once on board they all talked and talked and talked and talked: "Havn't seen you for a while!" "Yes, my hair is getting long." "I have begun sorting and storing photos from many years past..." "Who will want to keep all this stuff after I am..."
And upon arrival and before departure, everyone made sure to greet and fete the honored guest, "Happy 94th birthday, Del! Looking forward to many more...!
The doctor checks him over and says: "Sorry, I have some bad news. you have yellow 24, a really nasty virus. It's called Yellow 24 because it turns your blood yellow and you usually only have 24 hours to live. There's no known cure so just go home and enjoy your final precious moments on Earth."
So he trudges home to his wife and breaks the news. Distraught, she asks him to go to bingo with her that evening as he's never been there with her before.
They arrive at bingo and with his first card he gets four corners and wins $35.
then, with the same card, he gets a line and wins $320.
Then he gets the full house and wins $1000
then the national game comes up and he wins that too, getting $380,000.
the bingo caller gets him up on stage and says: "Son, I've been here 20 years and I've never seen anyone win four corners, a line, the full house and the national game on the same card. You must be the luckiest man on Earth."
"Lucky?," he says. "Lucky? I'll have you know I've got Yellow 24."
"Strewth," says the bingo caller. "You've won the raffle as well."
Nathan Thomas is a member of the Rotary Club of Raleigh Midtown, North Carolina
Whether in a primary school in a rural village near Kampala, Uganda, where students used to study by candlelight, or a medical clinic that lacked refrigeration to store medicine and vaccines, there is nothing like the celebration that takes place when solar-powered electricity is turned on for the first time.
Nathan Thomas, who was president of the Rotary Club of Raleigh Midtown at age 23 and will be a district governor in 2022-23, has witnessed the joy firsthand. “It’s absolutely incredible,” he says. “It’s a huge celebration. These communities are going from kerosene lamps or candles directly to renewable energy.”
Thomas, now 27, founded the nonprofit All We Are, which oversees the Solarize Uganda Now (SUN) Project. In the past five years, SUN has completed 32 LED solar installations at 26 Ugandan schools, two medical clinics, and a women’s center, and has installed three solar-powered wells. The work was done in partnership with the Raleigh Midtown club; the Rotary Club of Cincinnati; the Rotary Club of Nateete-Kampala; Districts 7710, 9211, and 6670; and others.
Thomas got involved with Rotary in high school in Findlay, Ohio, where he had the idea to repair computers and ship them to schools in a country that needed them. To find a partner, he emailed about 100 organizations across Africa. He received a response from a Pittsburgh-based group working in Uganda. He also connected with the Rotary Club of Findlay, which provided him with $1,500 in funding and helped him learn about organizing an international project. “Growing up in Ohio, I didn’t have many avenues to work on an international level,” he says. “I wanted to go out and change the world, but there was no book that said, ‘Here’s how you do it.’ ”
His first project taught Thomas that shipping is expensive. He visited Uganda for the first time when he was 18 and discovered there were more immediate concerns than refurbished computers. “I saw firsthand the challenges to provide basic needs,” he says.
While attending the University of Cincinnati, Thomas visited the Rotary Club of Cincinnati and began meeting regularly with club member Deborah Schultz, who became his mentor. Working together, they received a $2,000 grant from the club’s world affairs committee to install LED lights at a school and at a shelter for disadvantaged young women in Uganda.
“These communities are going from candles directly to renewable energy.”
Thomas earned a degree in mechanical engineering in 2015, landed a job in the Raleigh-Durham area, and joined the Raleigh Midtown Rotary club. He credits Rotary with guiding his efforts to help others on an international level. “I learned the best practices of international development through Rotary: buying local, training a local workforce, putting money into the local economy, and asking communities how we might be helpful,” he says.
The solar projects always start with a community needs assessment and with a strong partnership with Rotarians in Uganda. “It’s extremely important to build local trust,” Thomas says. “They’re there to help us with the needs assessment and to be culturally sensitive in our project design and implementation.”
Each partner institution pays a 5 to 10 percent share of the total capital expenditure, to be used for repairs and future maintenance of the systems. The installations cost about $7,500 apiece. Thomas plans to secure funding for 18 more solar installations by the end of 2020.
He has earned the respect of Schultz, who has been involved with Rotary overseas projects for most of her 30 years in Rotary. “He has endless drive and energy, but never rushes others,” she says. “He’s a natural leader and motivator.”
Thomas was born in Canada, the son of immigrants from India. He believes his background influenced his global approach to helping others in need. “Like many of us who are passionate about international projects, I believe that global DNA was really intertwined in my upbringing,” he says.
— ANNEMARIE MANNION
• This story originally appeared in the July 2020 issue of The Rotarian magazine.
Rotary Club of Santa Rosa Sunrise - Founded June 30, 1986
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