Meeting Oct 31, 2012
GREETER: Past Pres Capt Alan lead us in the pledge and gave us the inspiration that could be our club motto: "This is not the time for us to say: Someone ought to do that, but our words must be: We will do it!". Rotarian Joseph Abey 1961
GUESTS:
Past President of the Rotary Club of San Rafael, Don Violin, retired with the classification of Management Training.
Goran Kovacevic, Guest of Susan, MIS Risk and Security at VISA; Goran gave us a summary of his life and his delight in joining the US community after several very tough years in Bosnia. He lives in Marin with his wife and a young daughter and commutes to Foster City everyday for work.
Steve Thompson, F&A Director at Whistle Stop - Speaker
Joe O'Hehir CEO of Whistlestop, Speaker
Yvonne Roberts, Development and Marketing Director of Whistlestop
Krista Pelletier, Meals on Wheels Coordinator of Whistlestop
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Pres Herman congratulated Capt Olson on his successful fund raiser. Treasurer Trish gave a check for $2,500 to Call of the Sea for scholarships to underprivileged youth who will accompany Capt Alan's tall boat to LA
Past Pres Hank our co-chair of Community Services announced: Nov 14th is the St. Pat's Senior Lunch. There will be no meeting that week.
Past Pres Hank also reminded all to mark your calendar for a joint lunch with the Rotary Club of Mission San Rafael on Dec 20th at their usual meeting place. This joint meeting is to thank them for the participation of their members on our joint garden project at Timothy Murphy School.
Past Pres Dr Mike also reminded the Foundation Committee of the advisory meeting to discuss our funds at the Marin Community Foundation.
Our newest member Melody, who was sponsored by Past Pres Roland gave her three minute speech.
Melody was born in the Philippines Islands but came to US at very early age. She grew up in San Jose and went to college in san Francisco. She has done many community projects such as the AIDs walk, food deliveries and serving the needy. She sees Rotary as a means to be part of a group that is more active on an ongoing basis. When Rolando, who knew Melody as a business associate, asked her to check us out, she jumped at the idea. She loves our group and is especially impressed by the long term members who have done so much for our community. Melody works full time for Paychex, so the only times she can participate in projects are the weekend ones. Her boyfriend, who is lawyer, just finished working on the Disney merger. He will be moving to Marin and hopes to join Melody on hands-on projects. He is originally from Buffalo. (Brrrr!) Paychex provides payroll services for small to medium size firms in US. It is based in Syracuse (Brrrr! also) and is a public company.
GOODTIMES:
Dianne thanked Capt Alan, Bill R, Jim, Dr Earl, Farhad and David/Dianne Simpson (ex members) for their continued support.
Phil mentioned his travels to Sacramento and his teaching work with local law enforcement. This will be his last year.
Peter mentioned his travelling throughout New York as well as through the Rockies to celebrate his 30th anniversary.
Marlyn enjoyed the gathering with flying Rotarians in Palm Springs where they all had their planes on display in the main street! She serves as an arbitrator for the insurance industry. She is hoping to finish her last engagement in two weeks. She recalled flying into a hurricane once when in Mexico. When the storm was over, the only two building still standing were her hotel and a synagogue!
Past Pres Dr Mike mentioned his delight with the website now that he knows where all the information can be found.
New member and leader of our last Garden Project Paul mentioned the huge relief when they heard back her doctors that Phyllis, his wife, does not have a recurrence of the cancer that she fought so bravely 15 years ago.
Dr Earl mentioned the major task of choosing a final 15 candidates from a list of 100's for coming year of residency at the UCSF Medical School of Dentistry. He is glad that this is over for another 365 days.
Pres Elect Chuck announced he attended the last day of the Giants in San Francisco where tickets were going as high as $600 when his son-in-law bought them a week before. That day they could have sold each of the tickets for minimum $1,000!!! Maybe we can use this as a fundraiser scheme next year (Is this legal? Can the Giants do it again? Maybe the 49ers this year?)
SPEAKER:
Joe O'Hehir, CEO of Whistlestop and Meals On Wheels (MOW).
The MOW program is back after having left Whistlestop for several years due to funding issues. The present program is now a delivery-only system with 2 full time drivers and 6 part timers. They deliver to 265 seniors and homebound individuals for a total of 71,000 meals a year. The food is prepared by Revolution of Food who only use fresh ingredients. All the patients are referred by the County to MOW.
Krista Pelletier, who now coordinates MOW for Whistlestop, has had first hand experience with MOW when living in New Hampshire. She needs volunteers who can use their own cars and can work either a 9-5 shift or a 1-4 shift. Even just once a week will be a great help as they are really short handed. The Jackson Cafe where we breakfast is the heart of Whistlestop. All staff for the food services are culinary students of the Outbound organization. Our breakfast fees are subsidizing the daily meals that are served at lunch and dinner for seniors who are mobile enough to reach the facility.
Whistlestop has variety of programs including creative writing, exercises, arts program and even immigrant assistance with language issues for those in need of help. The building is fully owned by the non-profit and they can build up to five floors, their long range plan may include the construction of a facility to keep assisting all seniors including housing. The SMART train program will be within few feet of the building complicating access but providing transportation once completed.
In closing, it was suggested by our members to form a joint fund raiser with the other organizations that meet at Jackson Cafe. (Rotary Club of San Rafael Harbor, Lions Club, and BNI (Business Networking Inc)). Farhad will meet with those clubs as well as with Whistlestop team under Yvonne Roberts to pursue that possible community fundraiser. Once all the details are gathered, a formal proposal will be submitted to our club via Hank and Ken as Co-chairs of Community Services.