After graduating from college in 1992, CAL FIRE Unit Chief Shana Jones spent eight years working for private industry and private consulting firms responsible for timber management, Natural Resource Damage Assessment, and oil spill response before joining CAL FIRE in 2000 in the Resource Management Program as a Forester.  In 2004, she made the transition to Fire Protection as the Assistant Chief of Administration in the Santa Clara Unit and two years later transferred to be the Assistant Chief of the East Bay Division managing Fire Operations in Alameda, Contra Costa, Western San Joaquin and Stanislaus Counties.

In 2012, Chief Jones was promoted to the position of Northern Region Staff Chief of Management Services for CAL FIRE overseeing all financial and personnel management functions for the 12 northern CAL FIRE Units.  In May of 2016, Chief Jones transferred to the Sonoma-Lake-Napa Unit as the Unit Chief where she serves today.  In her current assignment, Chief Jones is responsible for overseeing all CAL FIRE functions within Sonoma, Lake, Napa, Colusa, Yolo, and Solano Counties as well as serving as the Department’s liaison administrator for the Contract County of Marin. 

Throughout her career with CAL FIRE, Chief Jones has been involved in curriculum development and has participated on many cadres, and working groups including the Advanced All-Hazards Incident Management (AAIM) and Area Command cadres.

For over ten years Chief Jones served on a CAL FIRE Type I Incident Management Team until promoting to Staff Chief in 2012.  Chief Jones has been assigned to various All-Hazard incidents throughout the State; most recently she served as the Agency Administrator for the October 2017 Fire Siege which spanned Sonoma, Lake, and Napa Counties, and the 2019 Kincade Incident in Sonoma County overseeing CAL FIRE Type I Incident Management Teams who managed the response to the fires.    

Shana holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Forestry from Humboldt State University; she is a Registered Professional Forester and has completed her first year of the Executive Fire Officer’s Program at the National Fire Academy.

The speaker for our July 30, 2020 meeting was Dr. Richard Mucci, a Rotarian in the Windsor Club. Dr. Mucci is a ‘retired’ physician. He was also the owner of Studio4 Wellness & Anti-Aging in Windsor from 2006 to 2009. Dr. Mucci’s subject was “Metabolic Syndrome,” sometimes known as Syndrome X. Metabolic Syndrome is a combination of risk factors for systemic disease, including abdominal obesity, hardening of the arteries, raised blood pressure, glucose intolerance, high triglycerides and low HDL, “proinflammatory state,” and prothrombotic state (abnormal blood clotting). Americans are often ‘metabolically unhealthy,’ which has led to declining life expectancy. The root cause of this syndrome is hormonal, that is, insulin resistance. Dr. Mucci told us that there are 160 million obese Americans. Obesity is a significant risk factor for a variety of diseases, including heart attack, stroke, diabetes and even cancer. Obesity was largely unheard of before the early 1900’s.

According to Dr. Mucci, we eat too much sugar and too many grains. He believes that the American medical community has given us misleading information about diet for many years. He provided historical detail which he believes establishes that the standard “food pyramid” overemphasizes grains, primarily to aid American agricultural interests. Grains are sugars, which are a key factor in insulin resistance. Dr. Mucci says that the American medical community’s condemnation of saturated fats is wrong. He believes that saturated fat is unrelated to heart disease. Most American heart attacks occur in people with normal or low cholesterol levels. Early studies, apparently ignored by researchers, showed that as cholesterol goes up, the death rate goes down.

Dr. Mucci endorses such low-carbohydrate diets as Paleo, Atkins, and Keto. These are high fat-low carbohydrate diets that fight insulin resistance by keeping blood sugar levels low, among other things. He mentioned the following dietary rules: eat unprocessed foods, avoid sugar and polyunsaturated fats, do not fear good fat, lose weight, eat proteins before carbohydrates, try intermittent fasting, and exercise. He also recommends using olive or avocado oil, eating nuts and seeds, and avoiding fruits other than berries (if you are insulin resistant). It is especially important to avoid high fructose sugar. We should also get a variety of blood tests to determine whether we are at risk for insulin deficiency. As always, talk to your doctor before you make any significant changes in your diet!

Thank you Dr. Mucci for the interesting presentation.

Rotary Disclaimer: Some of Dr. Mucci’s presentation is controversial. Speak to your doctor before you make wholesale changes to your diet.

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!

"Good afternoon dear Lic,. Ninoska Cerna, it is a pleasure to greet you.

I acknowledge the notification; it fills us with joy and hope that we are already in the final stages.

We are scheduling the staff that will participate in the trainings.

FRATERNAL GREETINGS."

August 2020

The year 2020 has brought monumental changes that have already included a global pandemic and a renewed call for social justice. We are reminded that we live in a constantly changing world, and Rotary is a reflection of that world.

We must be ready to listen and adapt, always drawing upon our core values of service, fellowship, diversity, integrity, and leadership. If we live these values and apply The Four-Way Test to all aspects of our lives, we will be prepared to lead at all times.

I am proud of how we have proven our ability to adapt. Faced with a pandemic, Rotary has not stopped. We moved meetings online and found new ways to serve. We turned the canceled 2020 Rotary International Convention in Honolulu into our first virtual convention. Each week, we are proving that Rotary is a flexible gathering that happens anywhere — in traditional meetings, on cellphones, and on computers. Rotary offers a way to connect for everyone who wants to, at any time, and will continue to do so.

Some have even told me that they enjoy Rotary's mix of online and in-person meetings more now than before! How can we build on this momentum and seize the opportunity to embrace change so that Rotary keeps thriving?

For me, supporting new types of clubs is key. They are no longer just experiments but a real part of Rotary today. In addition to traditional clubs, we have e-clubs, Rotaract clubs, cause-based clubs, and passport clubs. These help make Rotary more inclusive, more flexible, and more attractive to new members. Visit these clubs, exchange ideas and partner with them, and promote them to one another and to our communities.

We all agree that we need to grow Rotary, but sometimes we can get caught up in the numbers game and lose sight of the bigger picture. After all, an increase in membership is meaningless if next year, those new members leave our clubs. Let's grow Rotary sustainably. Rotary's flexible options for participation will engage members and show the community how we're different from any other club. Let's celebrate that Rotary is now less about rules and more about joining together in a variety of ways besides traditional meetings.

I recommend that each club hold an annual strategy meeting to ask — and honestly answer — if we are doing all we can for our members and if our club reflects the community we serve. We are taking this approach at the international level, too. I am proud that six women are serving with me on the RI Board of Directors this year, the most we have ever had. Let's keep Rotary moving in this direction at every level. We need more perspectives, more diversity, for Rotary to thrive.

It's fascinating to imagine how we will find new ways to adapt and stay nimble this year and beyond. But I am also inspired about what hasn't changed and never will in Rotary: the friendships, the networking, the ethics, and the service. Indeed, these are the values that make Rotary attractive to all.

As Rotary's founder, Paul Harris, said, we have to be revolutionary from time to time. Now is such a time. Rotary Opens Opportunities — countless ones — for us to embrace change that will strengthen us even as we remain true to our core values.

There is a world of difference between a problem and a challenge.

If a honeybee faces a giant hornet alone, the bee has a problem. But if the honeybee faces the hornet with a swarm of other bees, then it is the hornet that has a problem.

This is true in nature, but it is also the human predicament. So when the situation I confront is greater than the resources I have, then it can be termed as a problem. However, if the resources I have are greater than the situation I am faced with, then it is just a challenge. Sometimes we overestimate our problems and underestimate our ability to overcome them.

The COVID-19 pandemic seemed like a situation that might overwhelm The Rotary Foundation. But as things have progressed, we have not allowed it to do so. As of 4 June, we have funded 208 disaster response grants for $5.2 million and 169 new global grants at $13.8 million — all in three months. We have leveraged individual Rotarians' generosity with Foundation funds and in many cases other corporate funds to make projects larger and more impactful.

We never allowed the pandemic to overpower us. Indeed, history shows that Rotarians are a curious breed. We are visionaries, an idealistic lot that dreams big dreams of a better world. At the same time, we are resilient and able to withstand challenges that others might succumb to.

We were not idle during the pandemic lockdowns. We raised funds and did projects just as we would have if there had been no lockdown. We remembered that it's the same business that we always do — reaching out to people in distress — except the methodology by which we did it changed.

Our process of preparing and delivering the projects changed.

The way we communicated what we did changed.

The Rotary Foundation is more than 100 years old and has already weathered many storms — some of them mild and others devastating to the world. Thanks to the strength, sacrifice, and compassion of Rotarians and the level to which they have extended themselves, I believe the Foundation will continue to face the future with renewed hope and inspiration.

Our Foundation will emerge from this pandemic much stronger and more resilient as long as you continue to have trust and faith in it.