Paula McCandlis - Invocation Minister of Fun and Games!!
June 12, 2023
Opening Welcome:
President Paul rang in the meeting at 12:30PM. In his opening comments, he cited a poem about happiness, focusing on being happy in the moment. He also noted that there will be no meeting next Monday because of the boat excursion to Sucia Island.
Rick Kaiser provided the music, a stirring piece composed for the Rotary Club of Sebu, Philippines.
Paula McCandlis gave the invocation. She noted that this is the anniversary of the Supreme Court’s decision in Loving vs. Virginia, which overturned restrictions on interracial marriage. She compared this with the current struggle for LGBTQ+ rights.
Club and Committee Announcements
June 8, 2023 Board Briefs:
President Paul Grey opened the Board meeting with a special thank you to outgoing board members Peter Theisen,Shauna Naf,Felicity Dye and Andy Day for their service. Andy is leaving our Club to move to Leavenworth to be near his daughter and her newborn. He will be replaced by Rick Kaiser.
A Leave of Absence request was received and approved by the board from Dominique Zervas for 6 months, due to her heavy workload.
The meeting continued with 2023-2024 planning and a membership discussion.
Gear Up
RCOB apparel,including polo shirts, dress shirts, vests and hats is now available. These are items that every Club member simply must have in his/her wardrobe! Besides looking great, Club members will be contributing to branding for the RCOB, as well as supporting our Club's Foundation, which will receive part of the proceeds. Here is the clothing catalog, with the Order Form on the last page:(Click Here) Fill out the order form, turn it into Vinson Latimore at a meeting or email a scanned copy to embroidery@choicesscrubs.com.
WE MOVED TO THE SYRE STUDENT CENTER - SYRE THEATER AT WHATCOM COMMUNITY COLLEGE. HERE ARE THE DIRECTIONS.
The buildings address is 235 W Kellogg Rd. But this is not where you park. There is no parking off of Kellogg Road. You must enter parking off either Eliza Ave or Cordata Parkway. You are looking for the YELLOW lot (look on light poles for Y2 or Y3).
Enter from Eliza Ave: the driveway between Kellogg Rd and Westerly Rd has a driveway into the campus, follow that about 200 yards until it slopes down, park in the area between the three buildings.
Enter from Cordata Parkway: Just north of the WTA station and Cruisin Coffee before the round about is Orca Lane, take Orca Lane around the first two buildings until you find a large parking lot between three buildings.
You will still receive an email from Sandee each week prior to the Monday 12:30 meeting if you are unable to attend in person (you can start logging in at 12:00 for short socializing) with the link for that privacy-protected meeting. If you have n done so, please download the Zoom app on your computer (you need a camera and microphone on it), iPad or phone. There is no cost to you. If you cannot do either, you can also call in. On the invitation, there are US phone numbers you can call and enter the meeting ID number also indicated on the invitation.
Lunch is $17.00 for soup, salad and bread buffet. We must notify them by Wednesday at NOON the week prior to the Monday meeting as to the number of members attending. We are sending out meeting "Invites" weekly and members are asked to sign-up ASAP. You can also sign-up by going to the event section of our website at bellinghamrotary.org. If you sign up to have a meal at the meeting, you will need to pay the $17 even if you don't wind up attending the meeting after the numbers are turned in. If you plan to attend but not eat, PLEASE indicate that on your sign-up so we don't overorder meals and still make sure there is enough seating.
The Club will collect payments prior to the meeting or at the door by Venmo, check or cash.
We urge members of the RCOB to set up a Venmo account for ease in payment of Meeting lunches, Happy Bucks, Minister of Fun, Dues or donations to the club. Our account is @RCOB- Bellingham. If you do not have a Venmo account you can set up an account with your computer then download the app. on your phone (just Google "Venmo" and you will find all the information you need) You then attach it to a debit or credit card (a fee on your end) or attach to your checking account at no cost. Payment will be sent directly to the RCOB checking account. When you use it for the first time it may ask you the last 4 digits of the RCOB phone number which is 0282. Give Sandee a call if you need help. 360-734-5532
Other payment options are to bring a check in the correct amount to the meeting made out to RCOB or cash in the exact amount to speed up the payment process. There is also the option to pay by PayPal. We have a QR Code that you scan and simply click to pay thru paypal.
Website and Phone App instructions:
Here is a tutorial on how to login for the first time. (Click here) Go to belling mrotary.org first. In order to login you need t know your user name and password in your Clubrunner account. The user name is Your first name.Lastname.264 unless you have changed it. Example: Sandra.Lindhout.264 the password is initially set by Clubrunner at 264 unless you have changed it. Sandee can see your Username from her computer but not the password. She can also change your password for you from her computer at your request if you run into problems.
Once you have originally created your User Name and Password you can download the ClubRunner Mobile app on your phone:
Please contact Sandee at 360-734-5532 or rcob@comcast.net if you run into any trouble.
Guests:
Steve Ban introduced our speaker, State Senator Sharon Shewmake
Mark Knittel introduced Jessica Wolf.
John Moffat brought Bob Kunzel.
Mike Plenkovich introduced David Korb and Paul Pelot.
Shauna Naf brought her mother, Sue Parsons.
Jan Marchbanks introduced former member and her nephew, Aaron Booker and his son Augustus Booker.
Members on Zoom: Steve Hager, Loch Trimingham and Monty McAllister
Presentations:
As part of our monthly Take a Vet to Lunch program, Mike Plenkovich introduced David Korb, describing his 5 years of service in the Navy, as well as his education and some of his varied work experiences. David talked about his experience in the construction industry and other fields, underscoring his ability to rapidly learn new systems and his interest in solving complex problems. His CV was distributed to Club members.
Steve Ban introduced today’s speaker, state senator Sharon Shewmake, who titled her talk An Economist Goes to the Legislature. Sharon was educated at Duke University, UC Davis and Vanderbilt University. She has been an economics professor at WWU since 2013. She served in the Washington state House of Representatives from 2019 - 2023 and then was elected to the state senate. Her four plus years in the legislature have been quite an education, but also quite rewarding, developing new relationships with people all over Whatcom County.
She described economics as the study of choice and her focus at Western has been to explore how economic research can help to guide public policy. In her presentation, she initially focused on abortion policy, a clearly controversial topic. She talked about efforts to reduce abortions, by providing easy access to birth control and sex education vs. policies that restrict or ban access to abortion. There are multiple problems in assessing outcomes, since the communities and populations may not be comparable. However, researchers were able to develop strategies for comparing outcomes for women in different comparable communities before and after the Supreme court’s decision in Roe v. Wade. These comparisons clearly showed that allowing abortion had increased women’s financial health, while later partial or complete bans caused greater financial hardship for women.
Of all the issues facing the legislature, she has focused on the shortage of housing and the rise in homelessness. She was able to show an inverse exponential relationship between the shortage of housing and the rise in homelessness. She discussed various ways the legislature could change policy to promote construction of more housing and reduce the cost of building. Her talk was so packed with information that there was no time for Q&A. President Paul suggested that perhaps we could invite her back for questions.
Closing
President Paul thanked the many members who helped with the meeting and asked that everyone help with the cleanup. He rang us to adjournment at 1:35PM.
