November 11, 2014 

Meeting called to order by President Vince Garcia at 12:30

Pledge: Rich Persoff

Thought:  Carl Pimentel shared “If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your troubles, you wouldn’t sit for a month.” Teddy Roosevelt

Correspondence and announcements:

There will be a presentation to the City Council on November 18th at 6:30 in the City Council Chambers for delivering a check to the City of Watsonville, which will cover the expense for painting the historic firehouse. This presentation will include the Firefighters Association, both Freedom and Watsonville Rotarians. This is our DDF project and we are encouraging all Rotarians to come and support our President with this presentation. – Trina Coffman-Gomez

Fundraising dinner for Second Harvest Foodbank at Shadowbrook "Community Tuesday", November 18, 2014

33% of sales for one night will be donated to Second Harvest. Just mention Second Harvest when making your reservation. – Steve Bennett

Pemakö Health Initiative - Afternoon Benefit with Indian Dance & Music. Catering by Aloke’s friends

Pacific Cultural Center in Santa Cruz, 1307 Seabright Avenue, Santa Cruz, CA 95062
Nov. 15, 2014 from 2 to 5 p.m. Admission is $25 at the door and tickets in advance ($20) through EventBrite. – Gloria Garing

Freedom Rotary Holiday party December 13, 5:30 p.m. at Codiga Center & Museum (Agricultural History Project) in S C County Fairgrounds bring gift for needy children - John Skinner

District Governor Ed Jellen will attend Board meeting next Tuesday before club meeting – 10:45 a.m. December meeting will be at Doug Feinsod’s home.

Casino Night 3rd Saturday - March 21, 2015

Detective:  Round robin style Vince fined Gloria Garing for dental work with former Rotarian Don Foster. John Skinner for setting holiday party on Gloria’s granddaughter event, Steve Bennett is happy for his job and being a Freedom Rotarian, Ben Post for fixing John’s computer but doesn’t know if it helped, Martin Guerrero opening a third McDonalds in Watsonville, Carl Pimentel being treasurer without Paul Vitali’s help, Trina honoring veterans everywhere, Vince for his trip to Solvang, and to Chumash Casino Resort

Raffle: Trina $5, D J Wrecker $5, Gloria $5, Doug $5

Program feature:

Speaking with us today about Santa Cruz Roller Derby Girls is  Sharon D Payne, D J Wreckers, and Just Slayin'

Just Slayin', also known as Deirdre Beach, signed up for SCDG bootcamp last winter and was instantly hooked on both the sport and the community of people within the league. She was elected to the serve on the SCDG Board of Directors as Co-Director during the 2015 season and is looking forward to playing a more involved role in the organization, continued growth, and local outreach of the league. Slayin' has worked in the Office of Research at UC Santa Cruz for the past 10 years. As Assistant Director to the Office of Sponsored Projects, her and her team are responsible for project proposal submission, award acceptance, contract negotiation and the administration of, on average, $150M in research dollars annually. In addition to Roller Derby, in her free time Slayin' enjoys spending time with her 13-year-old son, snowboarding, backpacking, and being outdoors as much as possible. 

Sharon D. Payne, also known as Eileen Hill, began playing roller derby in 2010 with the Santa Cruz Derby Girls. She started on a whim, going to tryouts mainly as moral support to a friend, then ended up loving the sport and the community of people involved. Sharon has been playing with the Bombshells, the All Star Travel Team for Santa Cruz, for the last three seasons, playing a part in Santa Cruz's journey to the Division 2 Championships and then to Division 1 playoffs this year. She served as co-captain of the Bombshells this year. Sharon/Eileen is a graduate of UC Santa Cruz and has worked for the Cabrillo College Foundation for 16 years, currently serving as the Associate Director. She keeps herself busy hanging with her husband and 10 year old son, working full-time, and playing roller derby. 

Def Jen Wreckers began her roller derby career with the Bellingham Roller Betties in Washington state in 2010. With no prior skating experience, she attended a roller derby boot camp, was drafted to a team at the end of the training camp, and loves the sport even more today than she ever has. Most recently, DJ transferred to the Santa Cruz Derby Girls, and plays on the Seabright Sirens. When she is not on the flat track, Jenni Veitch-Olson is a newer resident of Watsonville, and works as the founding director of a new full-day preschool program at United Presbyterian Church on E. Beach St. Her love of teaching, from college undergraduates to special education learners, drives her commitment to work towards education equality and accessibility to high quality options for all students. A graduate of Santa Clara University and the University of Wisconsin, Madison, she brings her training as a cultural historian to the Santa Cruz Heritage Food project, a research group that examines the history of local food in our county, and is involved in community-first networking organization, Watsonville Forward. If you are lucky, you will see Def Jen Wreckers roller skating throughout the Brewington neighborhood with her doberman ridgeback mix, Archie.  

History and Background: Modern roller derby began in 2001 in Austin, Texas. And has quickly spread world wide with well over 1,200 worldwide.The sport has evolved and grown exponentially and is becoming a thriving money maker. Our league was not far behind when we began in 2007 as the first all-female, full contact, flat track roller derby league in Santa Cruz. We did a lot of skating at the Palladium and on our streets and tennis courts as we all learned how to play roller derby as well as put the administrative work into creating an organization. We are now officially a full-fledged member of the Women’s Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA) it's like what the NBA is to Basketball and a now a 501(c)3 non-profit organization

League Members The league has grown to over 100 members who are comprised of skaters, refs, non-skating officials, announcers, and volunteers who are committed to furthering the sport of roller derby and giving back to the community. Each league member must serve on a committee and provide the administrative support which keeps the organization running, as well as work all of our home bouts to help create a great experience for our fans.

Referees and non-skating officials are essential in making the game possible and keeping our skaters safe. We have a robust junior derby program, called the Santa Cruz Derby Groms. We have nearly 40 girls enrolled, ages 10-17. We are proud of our junior derby program and the athleticism, female empowerment, and confidence we are instilling in these young girls. They are the future of roller derby. We now have 2 girls from the junior derby program graduated and joined our adult league. One girl became one of all-star jammers this year.

Our Boardwalk Bombshells is our All Star team which travels and competes internationally for rankings for the Women's Flat Track Derby Association. Last season we were made it the Division 2 international playoffs in Kalamazoo, Michigan and beat a team from Canada in an exciting overtime jam, a team from Ohio, and a team from Sacramento for first place and an invitation to the Championships Weekend in Milwaukee, Wisconsin to compete again Jet City Roller Girls from Washington for the Division 2 championship.  We unfortunately lost by ONE point. This season we moved into Division 1, competing with much higher level and experienced teams around the world. 

We played teams from Australia, Canada, Florida, Utah, Washington, New York, you can pretty much name any state, and we've played a team from there. 

We have moved up significantly in the rankings (from 65 at the beginning of the previous season and now 24)

Another important component of the Santa Cruz Derby Girls is that we strive to give back to our community in various ways. So, not only do league members skate and work to keep this volunteer run organization thriving, we also work to give back to our community. Since inception, the Santa Cruz Derby Girls have donated nearly $30,000 and over 800 volunteer hours to more than 40 local nonprofits, schools, and community groups. Proceeds from all of our home bouts benefit a local non-profit. As a league we also volunteer as much as possible, participating in blood drives, beach clean ups, and volunteering at various community fundraisers.

We hope we can give back to the community and our fans what they give to us through their support of the Santa Cruz Derby Girls

Even though it's the off-season, it doesn't mean you won't see the Derby Girls around.

We will be at the Taste of Santa Cruz at the Cocoanut Grove on Thursday, selling raffle tickets on skates! We are holding our annual Turkey Bowl, a bowling tournament at the Boardwalk Bowl in Santa Cruz on November 26th at 6:30. It's a great fun and proceeds help our travel fund. If you'd like to put a team together, email turkey bowl@santacruzderbygirls.org

We'll also be skating in Santa Cruz's downtown Holiday Parade in December 6th!

Our season will be starting up again in February. We don't have our dates set yet, but check us out at Santa Cruz Derby Girls.org or like us on Facebook to get the latest updates. 

Adjournment: 1:30 PM