2018-03-19 Rotary Buzz - Noon Meeting
Speaker -Ted Gillespie
Topic -Kiva
Lou opened the meeting at 11:45 am.
Health of the Club – Elaine Hook had surgery last week, and is recovering in hospital. They will have the lab results in a couple of weeks and find out what further treatment is required. Betty Mayer is recovering at home following her fall and hip fracture. Paul has been busy delivering flowers to our ladies to lift their spirits.
Announcements:
- Gala Update - Lou will be getting the 50/50 license and coordinating volunteers
- David Taylor will be doing the wine sales
- Dan will do the Live Auction.
- Dawn is coordinating the Silent Auction and has about 50 items already. Dawn emailed Club members letters to request silent auction donations. Please let Dawn know which businesses you plan to contact for prizes. If you are thinking of approaching a business that you have not contacted in prior years please run it past Dawn first so we don’t overlap.
- No Bingo planned for this year’s Gala, but potentially some other fun activity instead
- Please start lining up your guests and get your tickets from Dawn or Dan.
- Dawn would like to know asap how many tickets you expect to sell so she has a tentative number of guests to plan for. This year’s Gala is at the Norsemen on May 5.
- Thanks to Dawn and the Gala team, and also to all members who are promoting the event, collecting auction items and selling tickets.
- The Rotary International Conference is in Toronto June 23-27. A few members from Camrose are planning to attend. Those who went to Atlanta last year found it inspiring and motivating. All members are encouraged to consider attending.
- We have 3 shipments of wheelchairs going to Mexico. 2 are leaving this week and the 3rd hopefully very soon. The first 2 are 60 chairs each, and the 3rd is 50 wheelchairs plus assorted walkers, crutches, and other aids. This is one of our biggest years yet. Thanks to Air Transat for shipping. And big thanks to Don, Carman and the rest of the team who collect the chairs, assemble them for shipping and get them to the airport.
Feature Presentation:
Ted Gillespie - Kiva Micro Loans
Ted has been a lender through the KIVA organization for about 10 years. KIVA works with a network of over 7,000 NGO’s in 80-some countries to provide an opportunity for financing to individuals and small business owners. In many countries, bank financing is not available to those who really need relatively small amounts of money to improve their homes or develop their businesses. Individuals and small business owners can apply for loans through local NGO’s. The NGO’s vet the applicant and if they are approved, will offer the loan through KIVA for people and organizations worldwide to lend the required funds. The minimum amount a lender can lend is $25.
KIVA operations are funded partially through a small administrative fee that is requested (but not mandatory) each time a lender loans funds. They also receive grant funding. Neither KIVA nor KIVA lenders receive any interest on the money loaned, however, the NGO will charge interest to the borrower to cover their costs of administering the loan. Interest rates vary widely, but KIVA monitors the NGO to ensure their rates are not unreasonable.
Our Club is looking at establishing an account with KIVA and making some loans, starting with an investment of $500. This would equate to 10-20 separate loans, depending on the amount. We may set up a “Group” and individual Rotarians can join the lending group. Further discussion planned for next week’s meeting.
Ted gave a $25 KIVA lending credit as a prize for a second draw of the 50/50 tickets. Paul Pedersen is KIVA’s newest lender! Thanks for your generosity, Ted.
50/50 – The pot is close to $600. Sadly, Tony Hladun drew the 7 of Diamonds. We are down to 11 cards!
- Meeting adjourned at 1:00 pm.
- Next meeting - Noon Meeting, March 26, 2018, 11:45 am.
- Club Assembly
- Topic – discussions on various Rotary business items