The Rotary Club of Rochester will meet at the Even Hotel on Thursday, March 24, for a midday meeting. A virtual option to attend is also available (Zoom link). If you plan to join your fellow Rotarians for lunch, the registration deadline is Monday, March 21, at noon. Lunch is $20. Lunch is also available at the door for $25, or you can attend the meeting without eating lunch. Click here to register for the meeting.
Corey Bjornberg and Wendy Turri from the City of Rochester will talk about the Covid Wastewater collaboration between Mayo, Olmsted County, UMR, and the City of Rochester. They will talk about the uniqueness of this collaboration, COVID wastewater testing, the results, and how these results have been used.
The speakers:
Corey Bjornberg has been the Process Control Engineer for the Rochester Water Reclamation Plant since 2013. His primary role is to support the operations staff by evaluating process performance, improving efficiency and looking toward innovation to reduce costs. Prior to this Corey worked as a consulting engineer working on wastewater treatment plants in Minnesota and Ohio. Corey has his Bachelors in Civil Engineering and Masters in Environmental Engineering, both from North Dakota State University.
Since 2019, Wendy Turri has been the City of Rochester’s Public Works Director responsible for wastewater; stormwater; transit; streets engineering, streets maintenance, traffic, sidewalks and parking. Prior to the Director position Wendy held a number of different positions during her 40 year career starting at the City of Rochester, followed by a 30 year stint with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency and ending at the City of Rochester all in the wastewater field.
Join your fellow Rotarians at the March 31 Small Group Gatherings at three local restaurants: Victoria’s, Five West, and Purple Goat. Sign-up here to attend and you will be notified where your small group will meet to have lunch, socialize a bit, and discuss whatever is on the minds of the attendees. The Small Group Gatherings are being held in place of Rotation Day due to lack of hosts.
At the March 10 noon meeting, it was announced that the leadership of the three Rotary Clubs in Rochester, in tandem with the leadership of Cradle2Career, all agree that this is a good time for Rotary to re-engage with Cradle2Career. Cradle2Career is at a point where they need some additional community support and Rotary has the skills and people power to meet those needs! Throughout this year, there will be opportunities for Rotary to receive more information about the needs of kids, prenatal to young adult ("cradle 2 career"), in our community, how Cradle2Career is working with community partners to meet those needs, and ways in which Rotary can assist.
An immediate need that Rotary recently met was work to collate the "Kindergarten Ready!" cards. A group of volunteers representing all three Rotary Clubs met at the United Way Building the evening of March 15. Led by Claudia Tabini, interim director of Cradle2Career, these 10 volunteers collated 10 cards that had originally not been printed, in with the other cards, to make full sets. The Kindergarten Ready! cards are in English, Spanish, Somali, and Arabic. In two hours time, 500 sets of cards were completed! These cards will be given to parents of preschool-aged children to promote meaningful parent-child interaction through fun and age-appropriate activities.
Many Rotarians in our District have asked what they can do to help Ukraine and District 2232. There are at least four ways you can contribute:
Rotary International has approved Ukraine and surrounding countries for Rotary Disaster Relief Grants. These are funded from the Disaster Response Fund. You can donate to the fund here. All funds collected by April 22, 2022, will be directed to Ukraine.
White Bear Rotarian, Irina Fursman, a native Ukrainian, has been working for years with Ukraine. She has a non-profit, Global Synergy Group, set up to transfer funds from the US to Ukraine. Irina connected White Bear Rotary with District 2232 Past District Governor Sergii Zavadskyi, as a member of the District 2232 Coordinating Committee for Humanitarian Disasters. Their focus is on obtaining medicine and delivering into Ukraine. See the attached sheet for more on D2232 efforts. Irina has committed to sending any funds received by 2:00 pm each day directly to District 2232. You can donate to this fund hereor use the QR code.
District 5960 has a SHARE THE LOVE campaign going until the end of March - see separate article in this Moccasin Flower. Of the funds received by The Rotary Foundation in this Rotary year, approximately 50% will return to our District to use for matching grants next year. By contributing to the annual fund, you ensure there are matching funds available and could write a grant for Ukraine. Please contact Margie Horning, Grants Team Leader.
Other clubs in the district have contacts in Ukraine. If you do, please reach out and support those you know. I believe Winona and Prior Lake are doing so now. If you would be willing to share your contacts, please let Jim Hunt know to populate a database of all district efforts in Ukraine.
PLEASE consider donating now. The needs in Ukraine are significant and it will get worse before it gets better.
District 5960 announces its SHARE the LOVE campaign for 2021-22 to encourage giving to the Rotary International Foundation’s Annual Fund-SHARE for February!
Each year, Rotarians are encouraged to give to the Foundation’s Annual Fund which are the funds that come back to our clubs/district to utilize in grants. Plain and simple, the more we give to the Annual Fund, the more impact we can have in our communities and around the world. This year, the District set an achievable goal of raising $500,000 for the Annual Fund (we reached a record total of $471,834 in 2020-21).
The campaign has typically been held in February, but has been extended through the month of March. It's a great opportunity to give to the RI Foundations Annual Fund-SHARE. As always, Rotarians are encouraged to give something, regardless of the amount. After all, when we are all working together, our impact is much greater!
In response to the deepening humanitarian crisis in Ukraine, Rotary International has created an official channel for contributions to support the relief efforts underway by Rotary districts.
As a member of the Rotary Club of Rochester, there are three "To Do List" items to sign-up for the second and fourth Thursday meeting from now until the end of the year.
1. Sign-up to lead the four-way test
2. Sign-up to give a reflection
3. Sign-up to be a greeter
4. Sign-up for the visitor table / introductions
5. Sign-up to share your story by giving a member spotlight
Did you know that if you buy the majority of your gas at Kwik Trip, you could pre-pay for your gas AND help the club at the same time? A $100 Kwik Trip card immediately creates $5 for the club and any in-store purchases creates another 5% donation.If you would like to purchase Scrip cards, send an email to romnrotary@gmail.com with how many and what denomination you'd like. In additional to Kwik Trip, Scrip cards are also available to Apollo Liquor and Menards. The cards are purchased at face value, but the club receives 5% back from Apollo Liquor and Kwik Trip and 4% back from Menards. The club receives an additional 5% on purchases at Kwik Trip, other than gas, inside the store.
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The speakers:
Join your fellow Rotarians at the March 31 Small Group Gatherings at three local restaurants: Victoria’s, Five West, and Purple Goat. 
