President Arnold Oliver rang the bell to kick off the meeting at 11:59am followed by the invocation by Dave Hartman. President Arnold then led the Club in the pledge and song, Grand Ol’ Flag. During the tune of R-O-T-A-R-Y we mingled and greeted one another.
Lisa Stephens-Musick invited Arnold Oliver, Will Gardner, Glenn Tarter, and Glen Tole to the front to celebrate their birthdays.
Durning the Sunshine Report, we celebrated that John Deason and Walter Coppage were in attendance for the meeting. We also celebrated that Shirley Craft is in remission, but will start chemo treatments in the coming weeks.
John Deason shared the news that the construction for the zip-line began this week at Rotary Park.
The brag bucket this week featured brags on the club from both John Deason and Shirley Craft for all the prayers and support during their treatments. Carla Dowling bragged on her nephew who is an All-Star Baseball Player. (For how much money he is making for the club someone should invite him to the meeting and buy his lunch!)
We had the pleasure of honoring the youth of the month this week. Jon Dearolf introduced Isaiah Maldonado. Isaiah is going to be a sophomore at Old High this year. He is on the football team and his favorite subject in school is Spanish. He is very active helping out in his household, in school, at the Boys and Girls Clubs, and at church. After high school he plans to join the military or attend Vernon College for welding. We were honored to have him join the meeting.
Dave Hartman then introduced the program, Wichita Falls Chamber of Commerce. The program was given by the CEO of the Chamber, Ron Kitchens. Mr. Kitchens has been with the Chamber for six months. He started off the program with his personal history. He attended college to play football, but in the first week he had a career ending knee injury. After one semester of college he started a successful convenient store business, he ran for city council 3 times and become Mayor by age 23. He learned at an early age the importance of people to a community and that communities need more and better jobs to flourish. In Wichita Falls with the Chamber Mr. Kitchens is committed to bringing in more and better jobs. This will spread the tax burden, provide a stronger economy, and improve the schools, police, and fire departments. He described that companies were always seeking out the best options for growth and that it is important for the Chamber and City to brag and tell our story. These companies need to understand the why they should grow in Wichita Falls. This includes companies looking to move to Wichita Falls as well as the companies that already exist here and can develop more jobs in our area. He ended the program discussing the new newsletter that is starting this week that is released every Thursday with all the great local news in the community. If you have any questions in regards to the Wichita Falls Chamber of Commerce Mr. Kitchens would be happy to for you to reach out at any time.
The meeting was brought to an end with the presentation of the speakers gift, a book that will be placed at Barwise Middle School followed by the Four Way Test.