Submitted by Will Arscott 

 

 

We are at the Saskatoon Club this week and only a couple of members came late as they went to the Delta Bessbourgh thinking that the meeting was there. This was a discussion meeting regarding the new team system instituted for this year. The tables were set in a rectangle shape as is normal for a discussion meeting. President Paul presided. Eighteen members were in attendance.

 

Greeter                        Informally greeted each other    

Cashier                        Wayne Palmer

Visitors and Guests   No visitors or guests were in attendance

Grace                           Wayne lead us in singing the Rotary Grace

Set-up                         Al  Morton and Wayne McGillivray had organized to get our club banner and name tags from the Delta Bessbourough

 

O Canada was led by Wayne McGillivray followed by members singing the Rotary grace.

 

 

The five Rotary clubs are undertaking a joint New Citizen Ceremony. The date of May 13^th has been set. It will be an evening function at the Travelodge. These ceremonies have been a project of the Nutana club for some time. Generally it is expected that the sponsor will pay for the new Canadian and one guest. This is a cost of $50 per inductee based on a meal cost of $25. How many inductees does our club wish to sponsor? Gary Rusu and Peter Zakreski are each sponsoring five inductees. President Paul announced that we have tied with the Nutana Club and each club is sponsoring twenty-one new Canadians at the event. President Paul is finding out when your sponsorship money is required and to whom it is to be paid.

 

The Rotary Club of Saskatoon North is undertaking a clean-up of Rotary Park on Saturday, May 11^th. They would welcome participation of all the clubs. A show of hands indicated there are a lot of our members who would be willing to participate. Our numbers will be given to Brenda Banbury so the MVA can set an appropriate clean-up area. A formal sign-up sheet will be available at a future meeting.

 

There will be a Red Cross Luncheon held on April 17^th. This year’s event will honour the work of two of our members, Elaine and Peter Zakreski. Tickets are $75. It would be great if we could have our members represent Rotary and our members at this event. (You will note that this is the noon of the day of our Badge, Shield and Star Dinner.)

 

To date our club’s contribution to the Rotary Foundation Share Fund stands at between $1,100 and $1,200. This is a contribution of about $25 per member. In order to qualify to receive district grants we need to increase this to $50 per member. We need another $1,200 in contributions before June 30^th.   We could go without district grants for our projects but it would be better if we could qualify.

 

The Rotary International grant for the project in Uganda has gone out. There is more on this item later in the Rotateller.

 

Adventures in Technology (AIT) is taking place at the end of April. The lead club for this year’s event will be the North Club. Jack Brodsky will be coordinating our volunteers. As usual we will need van drivers, billets and other help. Expect a sign-up sheet to be coming out soon.

 

Shelter Box Avis Hardy announced the contribution of $500 from a member of our club give us to ‘hero’ status with Shelter Box. Our club would qualify for Hero Status at the bronze level if another $700 was donated before the end of June. If you wish to contribute please see Avis or donate online

 

Next Meeting March 11: This will be a speaker meeting with information on a new Hospice program for Saskatoon.

 

 

We opened the meeting with a round of Happy and Sad dollars. The weather seems to be affecting our club and there were several comments made about it. Wayne McGillivray was predictably happy about the success of the Husky men’s hockey team.

 

 

 

One of our new members Parm Sharma is from Nepal and has brought us a project to consider.   This project was presented at the meeting by Dave Sundby and Parm, who arrived towards the end of the presentation, answered questions posed by the members.

 

The plan would be for us to sponsor a meal program in a rural school in the mountains of Nepal. It was explained that Nepal is a country with a caste system. It a poor country but the people in the lowest caste - the so-called ‘untouchables’ experience particular hardship. Many families survive on the equivalent of about $1,000 per year. Education is the way for the children of these people to pursue a better life. It is often difficult to get the youth to attend school. It is proposed that by setting up a lunch program in the school we can improve school attendance and improve the eventual outcomes of the children.

 

Parm has a particular village in mind that is quite isolated although it is on a major road by Nepal standards. There has been some work done in this village already. In recent years a new school was built by Japanese tourists. This is where the program would take place. There has also been a Rotary Club from Denmark involved in doing work in the village.

The plan would be to provide a lunch to about 75 students through the school year of about 210 days.   It is suggested this could be accomplished at the low cost of only $1,550. It was pointed out that this seems like a very modest sum to provide meals to so many students for so many days. It was explained that the diet would be lentils, and rice and wheat. The cost includes a stove and gas cylinders for fuel.

 

The project could be funded with payments of $500 every four months. The World Community Service Committee is in favour of this project. There is a local Rotary club about 20km from the school and we would seek their involvement. In order to make our contributions tax-deductible we would have the money paid to that Rotary club and they would pay the expenses of the program. The actual work would be done by the teachers in the school. Some members expressed the opinion that the project would require the support of the Rotary club at the other end. There was some discussion about the political climate in Nepal.

 

There was considerable support for this project to go ahead. Peter Zakreski has already contributed $200. The new school year begins in April so it would be good to get this project going quickly. Parm will be visiting the area but was waiting for interest from our club before proceeding on the ground in Nepal. Overall there was a lot of support contingent on proper diligence in setting up the project.

 

 

Pictures were passed at the meeting showing new shelving and desks supplied to the schools in Malawi.   The desks are labeled courtesy of Dave Sundby.

 

After considerable effort over an extended period the Rotary International Funds were finally released for the Joy’s project in Uganda. The club knows the huge efforts made by Maureen Torr and Earle Newton to get this done. They are to be congratulated for their effort and persistence. From our club’s perspective this was a huge success. The $2,520 seed money we provided became $82,505 USD once all the matching and other grants were added.

 

As a club we are fortunate to have individuals that are passionate about the international projects we sponsor. This gives us reason to believe our efforts are targeted and effective. We have so many good projects such as Malawi, Joy’s Project and now the Nepal Project. In each case they work because someone in our club has really stepped up and cared about the project.

 

 

The committee proposes to undertake our service at the Friendship Inn on a semi-annual rather than an annual basis.

 

As mentioned above, Adventures in Technology will take place at the end of April and there will be a call for volunteers.

 

The King George reading program will get underway soon. Several members have volunteered to read with kids.

 

We need to develop a plan to work with our High Schools to promote rotary. Our club has been assigned to promote Rotary in three Saskatoon High Schools, they are Bishop Mahoney, ED Feehan and Tommy Douglas. All three of our schools are RAP schools. We may do some of our work through our RAP workers.

 

There will be a proposal coming forward for us to improve dishwashing facilities at Westmount school.   This will not involve the purchase of a dishwasher but rather improving the sinks in the kitchen area.

 

 

Vic Dubois reported on behalf of the committee. A pamphlet promoting membership in the Lions Club was brought forward. Peter Zakreski came across this and was impressed by it. The committee will be discussing whether we need something similar for Rotary.

 

The five club promotion project is going ahead. The purpose in to create an ‘in touch’ system using social media. It is planned that Kaitlin Cholowski will provide expertise to this initiative.

 

 

Wayne Palmer distributed a statement through January 21^st. He went over a very few items where costs have been different than expected. Exchange rate haves cost the club more funds as well as a couple of additional expenses. In all there were pretty minimal departures from budget. Members are welcome to contact Wayne for a copy of the statements.

 

 

We have a regular meeting scheduled for that day. It is scheduled to be a discussion meeting. It is also the date of the citizen event at the Travelodge. The club was asked how they wanted to handle this meeting. Three choices were given. There was almost no support to re-schedule the meeting. Some people wanted to hold it anyway as it did not conflict in actual time. Some of the members thought it should be cancelled in favor of the evening event. In the end the decision was made to hold our regular meeting.

 

 

The club wants more purely social events. Three ideas were brought out for consideration. The first would be a steak night. The second would be a river trip on the Prairie Lily likely in June, July or August. Finally some members wanted to have another night at the races as we have had in the past.  Watch for announcements of one or more of these events.

 

 

President Paul ended the meeting by asking members what they liked about the current meeting structure what they might not like. Dave Sundby and Gary Emde both expressed that they liked the two meeting per month format (with no meetings in July). A big Bouquet was presented by Steve Wilson for President’s Paul’s efforts to move the reorganization forward.

 

 

Adjournment