10 Reasons to Join The Cody Rotary Club
About Our Club
The Cody Rotary Club was founded in 1949 by residents determined to serve their local and global communities and have fun. You can experience our club's "excessive hilarity" at our annual Cody Rotary Show. The services we perform and the friends we make along the way are hallmarks of the Rotary Club in Cody, Wyoming.
Thursdays, noon, at the Holiday Inn, is the place to be! For a club known to top each other at the Rotary show, our regular meetings are informative and always upbeat. Laughter truly is the best medicine, and even our "sick" jokes are healed with the good humor and camaraderie of our club members. Spontaneous singing has also been known to happen, sometimes by members with talent!
2. SPECIAL EVENTS
2022 Was the launch of our first ever Cody Cares Fundraiser. The club as well as local businesses volunteered time to help clean up our town. We also do a Highway clean-up 2x a year. Rotarians annually help at the prestigious Buffalo Bill Art Show to support two great local entities: the Cody Country Chamber of Commerce and Buffalo Bill Center of the West. Plus so much more!!
3. SPEAKERS
You heard it here! Speakers at club meetings are authorities on what is happening in education, medicine, business, military, politics, local causes, and topics of the day.
4. COMMUNITY OUTREACH
Annually we sponsor the Christmas tree mulching program, donate dictionaries to local third grade classes, provide new shoes to kids in need, help with Special Olympics, sponsor a road clean-up for the Belfry Highway, contribute to Cody Cupboard, support low-income families at Christmas, help with Habitat for Humanity houses, provide scholarships to graduating Cody High School seniors, and more. In 2017, we completed a four-year project to build an all-access playground at Mentock Park. We encourage members to propose public service projects and often support those projects with manpower and money.
5. INTERNATIONAL SERVICE
- Arenal Water Project: To provide fresh drinking water to Arenal, Guatemala, in South America, we partnered with Cody Presbyterian Church and Presbyterian Living Waters for the World, to coordinate, build and house a fresh-water pump system. Of equal importance is to protect and train the residents to maintain the system to keep it working.
- Guatemala Wheel Chair Project: In 2008/09, the Cody Rotary Club raised money and delivered 260 wheelchairs to residents in Guatemala who could not walk without assistance
6. INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
Situated 50 miles from Yellowstone's East Gate, Cody, WY, offers charming western hospitality to all visitors and we happily host visiting Rotarian teams touring the United States. We've hosted foreign exchange students from many countries including Austria, Argentina, Italy, Brazil, India, and Poland, as well as sent Cody High School students abroad to such countries as France, Sweden, Argentina and Germany. In 2008, we hosted the District 5440 District conference where exchange students from all over the world converged in Cody.
7. INTERACT
Interact is Rotary International's service club for young people ages 12 to 18. Interact clubs are sponsored by individual Rotary clubs, which provide support and guidance, but they are self-governing and self-supporting. The Cody Interact Club meets at Cody High School and completes at least two community service projects each year.
8. SOCIAL EVENTS
We love a party! Each quarter our Social Committee designs unique get-togethers for socializing, from backyard barbeques to Trolley Christmas caroling, Valentine dinners, or a trip to Theatre in the Round. Two club favorites: the Promotion/Demotion Party, which is held shortly following the end of the president’s term in June to celebrate the outgoing president.
9. CIVIC PRIDE
The Cody Rotary Club "Service Above Self Award" is presented each year to one or more deserving non-Rotarians to honor work they accomplish in our community that exemplifies Rotary's motto "Service Above Self."
10. PHILANTHROPY
The Cody Rotary Foundation is a separate IRC 501(c)3 entity. The Foundation’s board is entrusted with growing the principal as well as generating revenue for charities of the club.