Minutes of Feb 24, 2014 Meeting

Posted by Susan Hazlett

Rotary Minute - Gordon Vandyke

The Rotary Minute was presented about the news as reported in The Star (Feb 22), regarding the health workers doing polio innoculation in Karachi and trying to overcome prejudices. Gordon says he is glad to be Canadian and especially glad to be part of our diverse Rotary Club.

Announcements

David T sent out a draft of website guidelines - please respond with your comments.
David T still looking to fill some director positions for next year. Please contact him if interested.
SBMB Law held a Client Appreciation Dinner last weekend and our club made a presentation about the club and Rotary in general. Thank you to Richard Housen for the opportunity and a special thank you because all the proceeds of the event will be donated to our Club!
Reminder May 9 - International Night at Le Parc. Get your tickets from Richard. Each member is expected to buy/sell/give away 4 tickets. $100/pp
Cyril reminded everyone about the June 17 Joint Golf Tournament with Newmarket Club at Cardinal. Tickets $175/pp includes lunch, dinner, golf fees, golf cart. There will be prizes and a silent auction. Sponsorship opportunities are available. See Cyril if interested.
Susan issued a reminder for Out of the Cold Program. Donations will be accepted until end of March. Please bring in your donations of warm clothing, blankets, toiletries and give to Susan. Ted had a wonderful suggestion for any member who travels - take all the free sample shampoos, soaps from your hotels and they make a perfect single use donation for the homeless.
Jason says auction letters for 2014 will be ready shortly. Start thinking about partner charities and people/organizations to approach for items.
Ted reminded the group about the Progressive Dinner on March 15. Your secret envelope will be ready by March 10. The after-party will be at Hira's.
Nash announed that March 3 meeting will be a working meeting about membership enhancement. It will be an important meeting and all should plan on attending.
David called a membership committee meeting following tonight's meeting.
Nash announced that there will be a get together arranged to celebrate Mark's recent marriage. Details to follow and congratulations to Mark!

INDUCTION PRESENTATION

Always an important moment in Rotary is when we welcome another member into our Club. David Obadia was Master of Ceremonies for the induction and formal welcome of our newest member, Maryse Francella. All members stood in line as is custom and personally welcomed Maryse into our Club and the Rotary International family. Welcome Maryse!!

SPEAKER - FRED MANDRYK

Fred is from the Bowmanville Club and had a very passionate and interesting presentation for us tonight about Kids Against Hunger. This is a great opportunity for members of any club to put in some "sweat equity", as he calls it, for a very worthwhile project. The basic principle is getting club members, volunteers and high school students to pack dry food into bags, pack the bags into boxes, then into skids, then they are wrapped and shipped to anywhere in Canada or the rest of the world where is a need.

Fred explained that this initiative started about 10 years ago with a billionaire who wanted to do something after visiting an orphanage in Honduras. He says 1 child dies every 6 seconds in the world from hunger related causes.

Fred says it costs $0.26 per bag which contains high protein and supplements and will feed 6 children. At Bowmanville Club's first event, they sent 28,000 meals to Haiti at a cost of $8,000 and part of that cost was the initial set up and equipment costs. Now that all the systems are in place, they are offering our club and any other club the use of their equipment should we want to organize our own event.

On April 4, the Bowmanville Club is having another event and inviting 100 students to a local gym and their goal is to pack 40,000 of these bags. Bowmanville would love to have any other clubs or individuals to participate with them on April 4. Any Interactors or Rotaractors are also most welcome!

Fred says so far, over 1 billion food packages have been distributed. He hopes to have more food packing events take place at the District Conference in October and perhaps even the convention in Toronto!

Further to some questions, Fred says that the club or people packing decide where the food packs go and that there is NO COST for transporting the food packages around the world. A company from Guelph (connected to World Vision) handles all the transportation for free. Further, food packages are distributed to local food banks in Canada and around the world by partnering with other organizations like schools and orphanages).

For more info, please visit http://www.kahcanada.org/

NEXT MEETING - March 3 at Sheraton re Membership Enhancement