SPOKES VOL. LXVII NO. 23                                                                              December 15, 2020

 

http://www.southhavenrotary.org

 

We began our virtual meeting with the Pledge of Allegiance and a Christmas season invocation by Art Ayers.

 

Our guest this morning was Dorothy Lockwood

 

Announcements:

  • Reminder to the crew working this week’s Thursday Night Dinner.

  • Bob Stickland was pleased to announce that all of the slots are filled for the bell ringing this Saturday!

  • Jeffrey Dick noted that the model train display has been very successful with lots of visitors.  It remains open from Wednesday through Friday evening and Sunday afternoon.

  • Our next meeting will be on January 5th.  Enjoy the holidays!

A Touch of Humor

Bob Copping updated us on his latest weight loss program and the resultant medical condition he suffered.

Member Spotlight

Korky Ingersol (Wayland) was born in Washington DC on Thanksgiving.  He grew up in Kalamazoo where he attended Loy Norrix High School and then attended Michigan Tech.  He had to turn down a scholarship to MIT as the draft board had him in their sights.  Instead he joined the Navy.  Shortly after leaving the service he married Linda and during their 49 years of being married have raised three children.  Korky began working for Walker Consultants, a civil engineering firm and worked for them for 30 years.

50/50 and Fines

Our big cash winner this week was Tom Fleming while Ryan Kurtz walked away with an imaginary $2 bill.

 

Fines were charged to:

  • Bob Stickland announced the celebration of his son’s birthday on the 23rd and on the 22nd the birthdays of his Sister-in-law and his lovely wife Delores

  • Jean Stein also celebrates a sister-in-law’s birthday along with birthdays for her great grandson and herself!

  • Steve Miles has birthdays for his nephew and grand niece.

  • Korky Ingersol acknowledged his birthday and anniversary.

  • Nick Tuit celebrated the birthday of his granddaughter.

  • Bill Roberts is pleased to celebrate the birthday of his lovely wife Jan.

  • Kevin Schooley’s daughter Katherine has a birthday this week.

  • Tom Fleming and his son both celebrate birthdays on the same day this week.

  • Jeffrey Dick was hit with fines for having his picture in the paper at least twice.

  • Larry Wittkop lead us in a very fast birthday song.

 

Dan Thompson called our club assembly to order.

 

We began with the election of officers for the 2021-2022 Rotary year (and for the immediate position of Vice President for the current year.

Nominations were moved and seconded for the following positions:  Bill Roberts - President;  Mary Sue Lyons - President –Elect and Vice President; Rhonda Wendzel – Secretary; Bob Straits – Treasurer.  In addition board members were nominated.  All positions were elected by voice vote.  Congratulations to our new officers!

 

 President Thompson reviewed membership numbers for the District, Rotary in general and our club.  While numbers have declined in most clubs, we have bucked that trend, increasing our numbers over the past few years.  He noted that we have changed what will be our breakfast menu to lower membership costs and he also reminded us that we each have, or should get, a blue “Membership Folder” that helps explain Rotary to prospective members.  He also shared our “elevator speech” that provides a succinct description of what Rotary is all about.

 

The next topic was the financial position of the club.  Dan reviewed the three parts of our books:  Operations, which is money used to operate the daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly and annual expenses we incur.  Those costs typically run about $30,000 a year and are paid for via dues and our share of the weekly 50/50 and fine money.

 

The Projects account is where money is deposited from most our various fund raisers and is paid out in grants and donations to non 401(c) organizations and groups.

 

The Rotary Charities account is where money is donated from various donations and some fund raisers and given to 401(c) organizations.  Currently that account includes $8,000 donated to the club from the estates of Dale Lewis and Richard Averil.

 

Our president then reviewed our connection to the Kenya Hospital project.  We have a signed MOU agreement and have committed $5,000 to projects connected to the hospital.  This commitment is the latest in a long list of projects we have been involved in with Marty Graber goinf all of the way back to donations that built additional rooms to the local school building.  Art Ayers and Marty spoke briefly about the current projects and the help being provided by a number of organizations.

 

Our next topic concerned meetings going forward.  We will continue Zoom meetings for the foreseeable future.  When we go back to in person meetings we will meet at Peace Lutheran Church with a continental breakfast with an honor system (max $3).

 

Our last topic concerned the possibility of establishing a Rotary endowment, beginning with the money we received from the Lewis and Averil estates.  Establishing an endowment means that we would encourage donations directly to that endowment, possibly from estates, and then using the returns from the earnings of that endowment for future projects.  Simply investing the money as a savings account of some kind would allow us to spend the money on a project sooner than we would if we had to wait for an endowment to grow big enough to provide that kind of money on a yearly basis.  Mark Odland mentioned that we currently have an endowment agreement with Lake Michigan College now about 17 years old.  The current balance of that endowment is about $170,000 and provided ten scholarships this year.  President Dan asked members to email him thoughts about opening an endowment to him.

 

Tom Ruesink invited all members to join a “Coffee Zoom” social gathering on Thursdays at 10:00AM.  Invitations will be emailed over the next couple of days.

 

We closed the meeting with the Four Way Test


  • NEXT WEEK:  We will meet next on January 5th.  Topic TBA

  • Editarian:  Dene Hadden