Submitted by Will Arscott 13^th July, 2016

 

July 11th MEETING RECAP - REGULAR MEETING AT THE BESSBOROUGH - The Rotary Year Ahead with newly minted President Jack Brodsky.

 

The meeting was presided by President Jack

Greeter - Unknown

Cashier - Paul Gauthier

Grocery Cards - Gary R who seemed to be doing a brisk business. Bring a cheque next meeting and make him even busier.

Set-up - Al Morton

Visitors and Guests - Adriana Van Duyvendyk

 

O Canada - Without Wayne McG present or any canned version it was led by Adriana.

 

Grace - Al Morton reminded us how important hope is. Without hope Rotary work is impossible. Service above self requires that we be prepared to plant a tree in the hopes that others may benefit from the shade it will provide.

 

Visitors and Guests - Adriana

Our two Rotary exchange students were present - Sammi and Tristan (Meewasin). As below this will be the last meeting they attend as exchange students.

 

Wayne Palmer was also recognized as it was his first meeting as a full member of the club.

 

 

Maureen Torr was present prior to the meeting to say her goodbyes to the club as she heads off to visit her Home of Hope project in Uganda. The club wished her a safe and successful trip. A picture of her was taken with the current Saskatoon Express with her project on the cover.

 

Regular board meeting will be held this month at the Saskatoon Media Boardroom at the regular time.

 

The Rotary five-club golf tournament will take place on August 17^th. The golf and dinner is $120 and the dinner only is $35. There is a sign-up sheet available or call Dave Sundby. Thanks to the two or three people who have offered prizes and more prizes would be most welcome. They need to know who is coming by August 10^th.

 

The District Governor will be visiting us at our regular meeting on August 22^nd. The club would like the best turnout possible.

 

Reports for district grants are now due. The report for RAP is underway led by Paul Gauthier. The report for the Malawi project will have to wait until Peter Z returns from his visit there.

 

There will not be another meeting until the event at President Jack’s on the 27^th. Jack would like to see all of us there. Jack is supplying all the food and refreshments but requests a donation of $20 or more to the Rotary Foundation. (A donation to the Rotary Foundation of $1,000 that night will qualify you for the special tour of Jack’s wine cellar.) [Again, there is a regular board meeting this month.]

 

The next meeting of the 100^th birthday committee is to be held Aug 30^th.

 

We had a very successful President’s dinner at the Saskatoon Club with good attendance. President Jack again thanked Bev for her work through last year.

 

 

 

 

 

Because it can be hot a shift of four hours is a reasonable contribution in a single day. They particularly need help during the busy time which lasts from about 5pm to 9:00pm each night. If you are in town and can help it would be much appreciated. To sign up for a shift please contact Peggy Clark at (306)974-6018 or peggy.clark@shaw.ca

 

 

 

 

 

Regrettable the CornFest project will NOT proceed this year. We may try again for next year getting started earlier in the year. In the end there was a concern that we did not have sufficient committed labour with only 60% of the slots subscribed. Very likely we will need to bring in a partner in order to have sufficient labour to carry the project.

 

President Jack thanked the committee of Gary R, Paul G, Wayne S and Peter V for the work they did towards this project.

 

 

 

In their final week in Saskatoon both students Tristan Necaster and Samuli Niinisaari attended our meeting. Tristan is sponsored by the Meewasin club. He spoke first:

 

Tristan reported he had an amazing year culminating with a final trip to a camp at Flin Flon. He leaves for home on Thursday to begin his University education. He wants to study physical education and then has several careers in mind including law enforcement. He reported how difficult it was to leave all the friends he had met in Canada, particularly the other exchange students.

 

Our exchange student Samuli spoke second and also spoke of his trip to Flin Flon. He was driven all the way to The Pas by Joanne F for another exchange students grad. He was nervous attending the grad but had a good time.

 

He reported the camp with all the exchange students at Flin Flon was really great. They did outdoor activities and water sports. He reported unbelievable fishing success [it is a well accepted practice among the Rotary fishing people that the Four Way Test does not apply to discussing fish almost caught or released]. Most important, Samuli reported the camp allowed for unstructured time so the exchange students could just enjoy being together as a group for the last time.

 

When it came time for students to start leaving it was emotional and difficult. They have all promised to stay in touch but the reality is that they will never be together as a group again.

 

Since the Flin Flon trip Samuli has been to Emma and Waskesiu Lakes with Joanne F and her family. Now he has lots of bits and pieces to finish up before he boards a plane Friday morning for home in Finland. He reported his experiences here couldn’t have been better.

 

Samuli believes he gained much during his year. Firstly he got a grasp of English in a way that otherwise would not have been possible. He also believes the range of experiences has broadened him and his understanding of the world. On return to Finland Samuli will get back to hockey. He has two more years of high school followed by one year in the army. He does not have to decide his eventual career for a while yet but he knows he wants to travel again.

 

After Samuli spoke Joanne Fisher spoke most glowingly about having Samuli as a guest and what a fantastic model he was for her boys. She spoke of Samuli in the same glowing terms that Past President Bev had when Samuli stayed with her and Vic.

 

Tristan and Samuli were thanked by President Jack and he pointed out that we all gained by their visit.

 

There will be a ‘going away party’ for Samuli at Joanne’s house on Thursday to which our members are invited. Since the meeting an email has been sent to all members with the details. Our club was indeed blessed to host Samuli for the past year.

 

 

Sergeant at Arms: Dave Sundby

 

It was a rather longish Sergeant’s time and happy and sad dollar time and lots of tickets and money was turned in. Unfortunately, it was impossible for your scribe to record all of the fines or happy and sad dollars so if you were missed that is just the way it goes sometimes.

 

- Samuli was fined for telling fish stories that made our fishing members jealous.

 

 

 

 

- Wayne P paid $10 happy dollars for being a new member.

 

- Jim Weber paid several happy dollars for the Puerto Vallarta Rotary opportunity having its first director’s meeting and receiving its first request for a loan. It is being called the Rotary Opportunity Fund rather than a bank in order to not fall under Mexican banking laws. He also put in happy dollars for the article on Maureen T’s project that mention Rotary at least six times. [Jim must have brought far too much money to the meeting.] He put in sad dollars for the CornFest not going ahead and forgetting to wear his Finnish hockey jersey to Samuli’s final meeting.

 

- Drew B. put in a happy dollar for serving on the birthday committee. Scott Byers put in a happy dollar for their participation in the Corporate Challenge and announced that this year’s event would benefit RAP. Will A demanded the sergeant fine Scott for not reading his Rotateller and knowing that the club had had a meeting on that very subject.

 

- Jack put in a sad dollar for forgetting the maps to his house at home.

 

- Will A put in a happy dollar for Peter Whitenect being at the meeting and obviously progressing well. Peter responded with a happy dollar of his own. He is about to start exercise rehab and says he plans to be golfing before the end of the season. Peter was also happy about his granddaughter completing, at age 12, her first 10km in 56 minutes.

 

- Avis put in a very happy dollar to have her daughter back after a successful foreign trip and a very scary attempted landing in Saskatoon when the landing was aborted due to a shear wind. The landing back in Calgary was thankfully uneventful.

 

- Gary R put in a happy dollar for Samuli’s visit and for our new president. Joanne F. Also put in a happy dollar for Samuli.

 

- Maureen T. Had left ten happy dollars for the article on her Home of Hope in Uganda.

 

 

 

Due to meeting length only part of Jack’s talk was completed at this meeting. More will follow at a future meeting. Jack began be again thanking Past President Bev and last year’s Board for all their work. He started a brief review of the new board and their responsibilities.

 

Jack was sad that we were unable to undertake the CornFest project but the key might be in increasing our membership which has to be a key undertaking of the new board. The other key area is in PR and making the larger community aware of what we do locally and internationally. There are other issues like keeping our website current and maybe expanding in social media.

 

President Jack’s intention is to have the meeting start promptly at twelve with the ringing of the bell followed by O Canada and grace. He wants the meetings to end promptly at 1:15. Jack finds our club to be a great group of like minded people and believes we should try to have more social events.

 

The board and its responsibilities:

 

- The 100^th birthday celebrations and the visit of the RI president. This includes a legacy event likely in Rotary park.

- Mark is also undertaking a review of our by-laws as some of them may not be operative in a much smaller club (example: limits on terms in positions of service).

 

- preparing the budget and maintaining financial control

- budget may need to be reviewed if income from corn project or RibFest was included. Out current projects are the Badge Shield and Star Dinner, the golf pool and the Enchanted Forest as well as some smaller things such as grocery cards. We should not have a budget problem this year as we were budgeting a surplus of $5,000 for this year.

 

- Just getting into her new job. Probably the least visible but most important job in the club. Getting up and running quickly and doing a great job. The club is very lucky Heather accepted this position.

 

- Coordinates our international commitments. Jim Weber is the contact for Becas and the Rotary Opportunity Fund in Mexico; Maureen Torr is the contact for Joy’s Home of Hope in Uganda and Peter Zakreski is the contact for the Hope for Malawi project.

We are also the hosts of this year’s Adventures in Technology which will be coordinated by Steven Wilson. There is room for additional members to become involved in each of these projects.

 

- Joanne Fisher spoke to the King George project. For a number of years we have helped with a Christmas market at King George School to benefit the community. This year we are undertaking to create a community space within the school by remodelling a room for community use. The cost of the undertaking will be about $5,000. 65% of the school is aboriginal so space will feature a large canvas teepee and a reading nook. In this project we will be partnering with SCAYAP and others. We also need people to serve on a local community committee. Joanne had a meeting with the people at the school to get started but the project will move slowly til the fall when the school people are back.

 

Jack is delighted to have Bill step into this position. If he does it as thoroughly as he did the programming job last year we should see results. Bill’s aim is to induct one new member every month. However this is ultimately a project of the whole club. Who do you know that would be a good fit for out club? Let’s all make an effort in this area.

 

Dave has agreed following his time as ADG that he would come back on the board and this is most welcome.

 

...... And then it was 1:15 and Jack, as promised, ended the meeting. Stay tuned for more in future meetings ....

 

 

 

Next Meeting:

 

July 27th BBQ Social at Jack Brodsky’s Acreage

(maps are on Jack’s printer!)