The speaker for our meeting on June 25th was our own President Marty Behr. Marty provided us with a summary of the amazing accomplishments of our club this year. Marty gave special recognition for the members of the Board of Directors and all of their hard work and dedication. He also recognized and thanked a number of club members who went ‘above and beyond.’ We had an interesting year, starting off with a massive wildfire that required large portions of Sonoma County to evacuate, followed a few months later with an unparalleled pandemic. Speaking of pandemics, we were the first club to start Zoom meetings and we have continued these meetings since mid-March. We had great and stimulating programs, engaging social projects, and fun social activities. We have had a net increase of 3 members this year. We have remained active with our service projects, including the Redwood Empire Food Bank, Vicki’s Garden, the West County Homeless Shelter and the Sonoma County SPCA. We have also continued to work under the expert guidance of Leroy Carlenzoli at the Women’s Recovery Shelter and on other property improvement projects. We have donated over $25,000 as a club to various charitable organizations this year.
Our club has continued its dedication to International programs. We sent 4 students to Japan on the SRKSEP program and provided over 900 people with dental and eyeglass services on our Nicaragua Eye/Dental Mission. And, sometime this year or early next year, our Sabalos Surgery Center will go online! Through Marty’s perseverance we amended our club and foundation bylaws and finalized a credit card program for breakfasts. Our Elsie Allen Interact Club is thriving, thanks to Past President Merle Hayes and others. The Interact students have also participated in some of our service projects, including work on Vicki’s Garden! And, we have set up a Service Fund in the Foundation so that we can improve our long-term giving plans.
We also significantly improved our Rotary Foundation donations. Our total goal was $15,250; we donated $67,863 and rank 3rd among the 47 clubs in our District! Beyond Amazing!
Marty gave special thanks to ‘Rotarians of the Quarter’: Roy Johnston for his fantastic administrative and organizational skills, Merle Hayes for her dedication and advocacy for the Roseland Interact students, and Peter Hoberg for his all-around IT greatness. He is the virtual meeting guru, and much more.
We had a wonderful year, despite the fires and pandemic. Marty, thank you for all you have done for this club, not only this year but throughout your Sunrise career. You can now take a bow and enjoy life again as Past President Marty – but not until Wednesday!
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!
1. This Thursday from 4:00 to 4:46 PM have your masks on and start Marty's Debunking off with a Drive~by high five at his home:
509 Oak Vista Lane Santa Rosa 95409. Honk, wave, cheer his year and be ready for the first special surprise of the evening. Look for our Rotary Wheel sign on the corner of Oak Vista Lane and Oakmont Drive.
2. Safely drive home and tune in the Zoom of Zooms's starting at 5:00 PM. Onee in zoom.com.us, our meeting number is 658 267 980 with password "sunrise" THIS MEETING ID IS THE SAME FOR OUR REGULAR MEETINGS.
3. Find a comfortable seat, pour a favorite refresher and be ready to discover just how far and wide we have travelled with Marty holding the gavel!
In lieu of any debunking fee this year, you may consider a donation to the Club Foundation Community Philanthropy Fund.
Please call or email me with any questions you may have.
Ni Ketut Kartika Dewi is a member of the Rotary Club of Bali Ubud Sunset, Indonesia
Image credit: Kadek Raharja
Living in paradise can make it easy to overlook privation, says Tika Dewi. Growing up in Selasih, an emerald haven of rice paddies and ravines in the interior of Bali, Tika was 10 years old before her family got their own toilet. Villagers bathed in a river. “Shoes were a fancy thing,” she says. “One pair was enough for one year, and if we were lucky, they lasted three years.” Her father, a minibus driver, operated the community’s diesel generator, which powered the family’s television, which — as one of only three in the community — was a magnet for neighbors and friends.
“Bali has a strong social culture,” says Tika, president of the Rotary Club of Bali Ubud Sunset. “We take care of each other. We trust each other. Balinese put honesty first. Even with strangers, we never think badly about other people.”
After Tika and her husband, Kadek Raharja, joined Rotaract in 2008, they got involved in local projects: He trekked through rugged terrain to assist Rotarians who were constructing gravity-fed water systems for subsistence farmers in remote northeastern Bali; she gathered clothing donations for the families and, with baby in tow, helped out at a weekend school library run by their Rotaract club.
“Before the water project, every morning the women walked two hours each way to get a bucket of water for the whole family,” says Tika. Rotarians have completed 17 projects, including the gravity-fed water systems and wells. “Now these women are thinking about other things to do to improve their family life,” Tika says.
Tika joined the Rotary Club of Bali Ubud Sunset about three years ago and has embraced her club’s environmental awareness campaign, which is centered on waste separation. Despite the Balinese philosophy of harmony with nature, litter — single-use plastics in particular — is a serious problem on the island. “It is so sad to see our river and our riverbank full of plastic,” she says. “It will be a long effort to deal with waste management here, not a short project.”
Her zeal for helping people has not gone unnoticed in her club of 18 members, who nominated her to be club president. “I had never thought about it. It’s an honor," she says. “The question I asked of all the members was, ‘Do you really trust me?’” There are plenty of reasons they do.
— BRAD WEBBER
• This story originally appeared in the June 2020 issue of The Rotarian magazine.
Rotary Club of Santa Rosa Sunrise - Founded June 30, 1986
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