In writing my last message as your President, I went back to review what I’ve shared with you these past 11 months…together, we had such a great year and I feel more ready than ever to “pass the baton” to the capable hands of Denise Wadsworth.
I would be lying if I said “I won’t miss being President of such a noble organization” and I’d be lying if I said “I won’t miss being in the limelight”. All year, our club got recognized in the Tribune and the Outlook and I became the spokesperson of the Club, sharing my passion for what we do and inviting guests to learn who we are and what we do. That passion will continue beyond my Presidency, membership is key to our growth.
I know that I will miss leading the club! Past Presidents might wonder if “I’ve gone off my rocker”, I’m sure all of you felt the same way I feel today, just 4 weeks shy of my “roast” I do know that I will miss being your Chief. Even with all the responsibility attached to the role of President, there is a wonderful sense of accomplishment that I take away and I encourage each and everyone of you to consider becoming President of this great organization at some point in your Rotary career.
But before I share what my next Rotary chapter will be, we still have 4 weeks together and we have a few more things to complete. We have the brochure that needs to be created and printed. We have the job descriptions to collect from committee heads. You know who you are, if you have not turned yours in yet, please do so by June 15. The VIP membership committee needs to meet. The Mini Grants Committee needs to meet. We have some members who are still waiting for their induction and we have to recognize more Paul Harris fellows. We have still our fundraiser coming up in two weeks that will allow our entire organization to come together in the public eye and show the spectators a wonderful weekend celebrating classic cars in the beautiful Lacy Park.
Our programs this month will be: June 8 – Artistic Director of the Pasadena Playhouse, June 15 – Steve Garrett – Adopt or Perish – Utilizing Social Media and June 22 – Member Crafts Talks. This month, we will be recognizing a member who has gone above and beyond their role to fulfill their role as our 3rd Bill Steele Award. June 8 we will unveil who that will be. We will also recognize our SMHS Interact Club Cabinet Members on June 8.
While we celebrated our youth and our teachers last month through our RYLA, Rotary Students of the month and our mini grant recipients, this month we meet organizations who have been awarded a grant from our community and capital projects committees. Our one fundraiser, the Motor Classic enables us to raise the kind of money we need to give back to these great organizations. There is still time to purchase tickets, in fact every Rotarian should take it upon himself to send the link to our motor classic to 10 friends and make sure you get 2 additional guests at the event on June 11th. www.sanmarinomotorclassic.com
I’d like to thank a few members of our club who have gone above and beyond their call of duty, one such person has been the Charities President for the past 3 years, you all know who I’m talking about. Debbie Herbert has done a phenomenal job as Charities President with her expertise as chairmen of other BOD’s, she has kept the group calm even amidst tension related to sensitive topics. Debbie, I’m grateful that you stayed one more year under my leadership to help with this role. I want to thank Paul Brassard who stepped into the role of Secretary on our BOD – taking notes is not an easy task – so I do appreciate the time you have put in. I also want to thank Chris Datwyler who from behind the scenes is responsible for so much when it comes to database and website management and overall look.
All of our accomplishments were made because of each of you, I’d like to recognize all of you here (in no specific order):
Michelle Cox –Chair of the Community Grants Committee
Aaron Gil – Co-chair of the Academy Appointees, International Projects Co-Chair
Calvin Lo and Mary Johnson for their chairmanship of the Mini Grants Committee
Scott Kwong and Courtney Rushing for leading our SMHS Interact Club
Dream Team (Terry Petrillo, Lois Matthews, Barbara Bice, Jean Brodhead, Roberta Gundersen, Kathleen Marangie and Ruth Mayeda, Sue Spence) for their amazing Chili Cook Off
Greg Johansing for his work with administration making sure our room is set up and cleaned up this past year.
Dennis Kneier – for his continuous dedication to Rotary and service as Treasurer for our club’s Board.
Will Bortz and John Harris – for their work on Foundation and making sure all Rotarians contribute to the Paul Harris Fellows Program and we get 100% recognition each year.
Jean Brodhead – for her work on the Rotary Readers Program providing literacy and love for reading to kids and schools
Adam Chang – for his work on the 4 way speech contest earlier this year.
Tony Chou – for his work with the vocational services committee, serving our youth and future career plans as well as his part in the Annual Rose Court visit at the Huntington and at our lunch.
Lois Derry – for working with the library to fund our gifts of books for our weekly speakers as well as to serving as our Remembrance Chair
Georg Eittinger – for documenting our Superbuild project with a video memorializing our efforts this past year.
Rob Feidler – for your work with our RYLA student selection and camp counseling as well as your work with the volunteers at our Motor Classic event
Shody Chow – for your calm and able recommendations and direction on our international projects and getting as much as we did done this year.
James Folsom – for your annual support of our Rose Court visit at the Huntington Gardens, we love your show – we should have you show your ghoulish show at Rotary one day
Steve Garrett and Bill Payne – for your able scheduling of our programs all year long, an arduous task indeed.
Bill Payne and Aaron Gil – for the pleasantly formal and amazing program honoring Academy Appointees.
Bill Payne – for your work on our Global Scholars Program.
Fang Ho – for your work with the Motor Classic Committee, making sure we are on task
Mary Johnson – for your support of re-invigorating the SMHS Interact
Debbie Herbert – for your continued work on the TLC committee and our annual 4th of July Parade
JP Mainguy – for your work with the Foundation committee and support to Chris Datwyler with our website
Lucille Norberg – Social Committee Chair and continued support of all we do at Rotary.
Grace Yang – for her work as Social Committee Chair
Andy Salter and Mitch Lehman – for your continued support by giving Rotary a voice all year long in the Tribune online and in print form. We hope to see more of you at our noon time meetings.
Len Therrien for offering sage advice to me and for your work on our website
Ken Veronda for your humorous writing of the Rotoscope each week
Russ Osmonson for your work on the meet up gatherings this past year and the R2R gatherings with other Rotary clubs.
Bob Houston for your work with the 4th of July Parade and the Little League coordination
Thank you to the rest of our membership that may not take an active role now, but I know they did at some point in their Rotary career – without you attending each week and sharing with us your stories, our Rotary family would not be the same. Thank you to Bob Almanza, Chuck Miller, John Wallace, Warren Weber, Mary Weber, David Zeidberg, Linda Wah, Cal Taylor, Roberto Tostado, Greg Thompson, Fritz Sears, Orville Houg, Steve Talt, Steven Huang, Richard Sun, Eugene Sun, Fred Sohl, Donald Scott, Jo Schmall, Chief Mario Rueda, Howard Topp, Robert Redford, Charlie Rasmussen, Karen Paciorek, John McClurg, Sherman McQueen, Greg McGinley, John McDonald, John Incontro, Cindy Collins, Hai Sou Chen, Matthew Lin, Dennis Magridichian, Thomas Maimone, Ching Louie, Richard Lord, Jesse Hong, Sammy Gin, Debbie Fogerty, Jon Crowley, Stu Cypherd, John Donovan, Eugene Dryden, Shawn Chou, Hai Sou Chen, Jason Chau, Kaili Chang, Wray Cornwell, Marvin Carlson, Joseph Chang, Erick Block, Emile Bayle, Andy Barth. Mark Chen, Bob Eichel, Stephanie Duncan, Chris Norgaard, Alex Cherniss, Dan Maljanian
Thank you to all the Rotarians who shared their Rotary Moment with the club this past year.
Thank you to all the Rotarians who volunteered to tell a joke, and to lead us in song and pledge and invocation.
Thank you to our newest members this year Kaili Chang, Jane Wang, Maziar Yarahmadi, Cindy Collins, Joey and Myron Hung, Chief Mario Rueda, Teddy and Nicole Basseri, Kathleen Marangi, Jesse Hong, Jonathan Duong for your hard work as you move from yearling to active blue badge and your support of our programming.
Thank you to my Board of Directors and Officers: Lee Mothershead, Isaac Hung, Debbie Herbert, Mike Driebe, Dennis Kneier, Molly Woodford, Fary Yassamy, Denise Wadsworth, Will Bortz, Paul Brassard, Bob Nafie, Fang Ho for your support all year long as we discussed some tough subjects.
Special thanks to Isaac Hung – for your dedication to the Foundation committee and continuous support of area President’s and mentor to me as I had questions throughout the year.
Thank you for all the wonderful support I had from many of you before taking office, sharing me your views on the Do’s and Don’ts. Thank you to all the people who supported our 5 year vision planning, to all the members who joined our VIP Membership Team and to those who sat on our vision planning team.
All that is said above, my next Rotary chapter will be to Co-Chair the Mini
Grants Committee. I will be joining the Foundation committee and learning more about international projects and will return to the Membership Committee as well. I also will serve with the past 5 Presidents on the nominating committee for President Elect Elect after Fang Ho. Oversee Awards for our club so we can secure the Governor’s Bell two years consecutively. As you can see I’m not going to go M-I-A and will be just as involved.
