Rotarian friends,
With the new Rotary year beginning July 1st, this is generally an opportunity to not only reflect on the past year’s activities but also to look forward with new vision toward the opportunities of the upcoming year.
However, where we are today is not even close to what we all envisioned for ourselves, our families, our communities or the world’s circumstances. The global pandemic, the recent racial upheavals, the political polarization and the resulting economic turmoil has collectively made the world a terrifying place, to be sure. The future is not entirely certain and the ‘new normal’ may not resemble the ‘old normal’ many of us have experienced in our lives.
So, this new world we are experiencing is going to require that we as Rotarians step up together and show that we are “people of action” who use “passion, energy, and intelligence to make a difference in our local community and our world.”
Incoming Rotary International President Holger Knaack chose the 2020-2021 theme, “Rotary Opens Opportunities”, reminding us that Rotarians choose to see the world through a lens of hope and work to “be the good.” That is a pretty optimistic outlook and one we all aspire to.
Internationally, as Rotarians we can take great pride in knowing that we have participated - both financially and through volunteerism - to help prevent polio, reducing worldwide cases by 99.9%. Now, members of our organization are working, both locally and internationally to help find, fund, and implement efforts to reduce the spread of COVID-19. These are significant contributions to the world and, as Rotarians, we should be proud of these initiatives.
As you are all aware, our Club, THE ROTARY CLUB OF ROCHESTER, has been finding ways to stay connected with online meetings and social get-togethers. And these type of activities will likely continue for awhile, until we can safely open back up with face to face meetings. Although we are currently unable to serve the Rochester community in some of the ways we have in the past, as things start to open up we will be looking for ways to help rebuild our personal relationships as well as increasing our involvement in the community .
Several of you have asked me what my plans might be for the upcoming year. Due to the current and unclear circumstances we now have, I will be challenging the leadership of our club to work on the following issues:
- We need to figure out how to pull together to reconnect our members with each other so we can take advantage of our collective talents and interests.
- We need to focus better strategies on recruiting and retaining membership, which has been dropping for several years.
- As part of that effort, we will be exploring opportunities to share our efforts with Rochester’s other 2 Rotary Clubs as we look to the future in a changing world.
- We need to strengthen our collective commitment the Holiday Classic Basketball event - our signature 3 Club event. This has been a 32 year, Million Dollar impact on the community’s youth programs.
- With our planned Chocolate Festival cancelled for this year, we need to rebuild our funding for the many initiatives funded thru our Rotary Club Foundation.
- It goes without saying that it’s important for all of us to continue to financially support our Club, our TRCR Foundation and International Rotary commitments. FYI, our upcoming July Board meeting will include a review of a very tight 2020 budget projection.
- And last, with the unknown schedule for reopening Mayo Civic for meetings, your Board will be considering options for a new permanent location for our Mid-day membership meetings. So stay tuned for that discussion.
There’s a lot to do here, so let’s get to work!
I am grateful to have the opportunity to work with you all over the next year as we rebuild and strengthen THE ROTARY CLUB OF ROCHESTER!
THANK YOU ALL.