This week’s meeting was at BHS with our Interact Club. Ken opened the meeting at 12:15pm with the Pledge of the Allegiance. Our Patriot song, The Grand Ole Flag, was led by Karen Chasse. Randy Forcier followed with the 4-Way Test and Rob Moody wrapped it up with a rather entertaining invocation
Our lunch today was provided by The Blue Elephant. (Yummy). Our President-elect, Bill Kany, introduced visiting Rotarians and guests. On hand were District Governor, Lawrence Furbish, School Superintendent, Jeremy Ray
and Principal Jeremy Siroux. Denis Elie’s wife, Amy, the school nurse at BHS, was also with us.
Announcements
Karen updated us on $100 raffles. One hundred thirty tickets sold and all are due this week, November 5th. On November 8th they are loading the truck for Crutches for Africa. Congratulations to Roland Eon for 27 years in the Rotary Club! Sue Gajewski won the 50/50.
Sergeant at Arms
Today’s Sergeant at Arms was Josh Ellis. Happy Dollars this week included Randy Forcier for his new baby, Ken Farley for a wonderful trip to Las Vegas, Brad Holt for UNE’s hockey opener, Bill Kany for actually stepping into the Tiger Gym, Steve Morin for a long Anniversary Weekend, Earl Goodwin for receiving a sports award, and Keith Jacques because he loves Biddeford. Earl Goodwin paid a threat dollar – he sold 63 raffle tickets, with 20 more coming in. Is anyone up to this? Fine levied were to Paul for a late Tack Report, Ken for keeping the club in suspense as to the new meeting place, Lori Jo for not signing her dues check, Karen for the bad opening song, all Biddeford Alumni for losing to T.A., and Amanda for being late.
Today’s Program
We met with the Interact Club this week. Ken talked about his first Rotary meeting he attended when he was in high school, which left a lasting impression on him. He is now the 94th President of the Biddeford Saco Rotary Club, which was founded in 1920. District Governor, Lawrence Furbish, spoke about “what is Rotary”. Rotary began in 1905 with Paul Harris. Now, in over 200 countries, there are 1.2 million Rotarians, in 34,000 clubs within 34 zones, worldwide. Our district, 7780, has 40 clubs and 1,600 members. Our U.S. home office is in Evans, Illinois, and has the largest number of Rotarians. There are 12,000 Interact Clubs in 133 countries. Rotary is hosting a contest to the Interact Clubs titled “What Does the 4-way Test Mean.?”
Dennis Elie spoke of fund raising. We do the $100 Raffle, Wine tasting, rotary Auction, we build the Rotary house, Polio Plus Bingo, and all of these monies are split amongst several things that go back into the community, whether it be charity, scholarships, international programs, etc…
Jackson Brown spoke about how we actually spend this money. $10-15k is disbursed by a charitable committee for people in need for medical costs, hard times due to unemployment, fire, and other hardships. Each President has their own “Pet Project” for their year, which is generally around $5000. We also do an “Adopt a Family” for the holidays, host a Christmas Party for the children and provide several scholarships for area students.
Rotary International
Paul Deschambault, who is in charge of our international projects, spoke about some of the projects our club has done. We helped provide clean water, medical care, housing, transportation and relief from natural disasters. We helped an orphanage in Cambodia, supported the Lingap Center in the Philippines, food shelter and education in Africa, relief from the earthquake in Haiti, as well as many others.
Ken thanked everyone for attending and closed the meeting at 1:30pm.
Thank you PP Steve Morin for recording the minutes and a THANK YOU to your beautiful wife for typing them.
