Los Altos Rotary Club Home of the Annual Rotary Fine Art Show March 26 2009

President SETH MANNING chimed a full-house meeting to order promptly at 12:15 p.m..  
 
Arriving Rotarians had been met by greeters MEL KAHN, one of our newest members, DAVID CASAS, and GEORGE ZETINA (who apparently loves greeting folks week after week).
 
Past-President CINDY LUEDTKE led the Pledge of Allegiance and BARRY GROVES gave an “educational” thought for the day.  With the State short on money, Gov. Schwarzenegger spoke of leaving a week’s worth of food out for his dogs; they’d eat it all on the first day and have nothing left.  He mentioned that the Legislature seems to follow the same path when spending money. Concerned that someone would accuse him of comparing the legislators to dogs, he quipped that he would never do this, because he loves his Labradors..
 
Songmeister KURT HUEG sees St. Pat’s day coming (2010), and led us in “When Irish Eyes are Smiling”.
 
President-Elect, TRACIE MURRAY called on visiting Rotarians.  We had visitors from Palo Alto Monday club and from Menlo Park.  Our guest speaker drew a large number of guests of members; SETH MANNING, DICK DUHRING BOO BUE, KAREN GESSERT, GARY MAGGARD, BUD OLIVER, and MARGE BRUNO all brought guests.  PAUL NYBERG brought two and DAVE BERGMAN brought three.
 

NEW BLUE BADGE!!  President SETH called on JOHN CARDOZA to promote a new blue badger.  John called up KAREN GESSERT and her sponsor KENDRA GJERSETH.  Karen, our jovial winemaster (YOU figure the French spelling) from Vino 100 on Main Street has completed her Red Badge duties in almost record time, and has already become a very active member of the club.
 

ANNOUNCEMENTS
KENDRA GJERSETH announced that the progressive dinner is a sellout and will be take place on the evening of April 25, starting at DICK BLANDING’S for some wine and cheese and progressing throughout town the entire evening.
 
MARY MARLEY announced that the club will hold a Youth Awareness Protection Class on April 23 at 5 pm.  This training is required of all Rotarians, so, if you have yet to attend a class, please contact Mary.
 
DAVID SMITH reminded us again that April 25 has been designated by Rotary International as “Rotarians at Work Day,” and every Rotarian is encouraged to work on a community project that day. 

Our club will be painting the gazebo in Lincoln Park that day in time to spiff it up for our May Art show.  In addition, CSA (Community Service Agency) is way down in food donations, and we need volunteers to go to markets, greet shoppers on the way in and encourage them to buy something extra to donate to CSA on the way out.

As most of you know through President SETH's email to the club, PP BOO BUE was hospitalized with a 'mild' heart attack.  Latest word is they are still doing some diagnostic tests to see the extent of the attack.  Please continue to keep him in your prayers and thoughts. 

Per an email from TARP SHEPHERD:

Per our discussion yesterday at Rotary lunch, I would like the "Save the Date" notice to go out to our Rotary Club members via the Rotator to advertise our Annual Rotary Golf Tournament and BBQ Dinner event.

GOLF DAY:
DATE:                        Friday, June 5, 2009
PLACE:                      Golf Tournament at Shoreline Golf Links, Mountain View, CA.
Golf Registration:        9:00 am with first group teeing off at 10:00 am
COST:                       $75 per player (includes green fees, cart, tee prizes and awards, brown bag lunch and beverage)

BBQ DINNER:
Open to all Rotarians (attendance goal is 100+)
PLACE:                     Lakeside Cafe, 3160 N. Shoreline Blvd., Mountain View, CA 94043
Cost:                        $45 per person (includes BBQ dinner/dessert, soft drinks and water.  No host wine and beer)
TIME:                       5:30 pm to 11:00 pm

POKER/BRIDGE
Open to all Rotarians
Cost:                        $10 per person for Texas Hold 'em participants.  
TIME:                       Approximately 8:00 pm to 11:00 pm

A clipboard will be passed around for signups beginning April 30, 2009.  Start forming your foursomes and practicing for this fun and rewarding Rotarian Fellowship Event.

Contact any member of the Rotary Committee for information:  Steve Shepherd, Chairman, Bob Adams, Steve Anderson, Mona Armistead, Randy Gard, Roy Jones, Bob Rayl, Jack Kelly, Jerry Moison, Larry Chu, Baidra Murphy, Mel Kahn, Roy Lave, Cindy Luedtke, Larry Madsen, Scott Riches, and Steve Fick.

Thanks,

Steve  

The Rat Pack is Back at the Rotary District 5170 Celebration

As promised, here is more information about the Peninsula French Fair.  Partners for New Generations (PNG) is a recipient of their philanthropic effort.  For anyone who wanted to be in Paris for a day, this is the faire.  Check it out. 

RECOGNITION:
RICK GLAZE stepped up with some incredibly convoluted scheme to enliven the process of separating club members from their president club contributions.  A few Rotarians volunteered some fines.  JOHN MCDONNELL announced he had bought a new Buick and received a thank-you note from the Mayor of Detroit as the only person in America who bought a GM car that week. 

DAVE MAGGARD announced his anniversary.  KAREN GESSERT, having a very busy day, announced that she had an article published in the Metro, but that it was completely overshadowed by the article on LARRY CHU.  Although LARRY was available for a fine, Karen volunteered her fine and LARRY was off the hook
 
MIKE ABRAMS was about to be fined, but he had just scooted out to get ready to leave for Cambodia that night.  RICK then tried to fine COETA CHAMBERS, but she was out sick.  RICK called on a few others who weren’t around, and got frustrated enough to ask questions no one could answer. 

Since our speaker was a former tight-fisted state senator and congressman, RICK asked a few questions about fiscal responsibility.  JANE REED stuck up for various elected officials who are taking some heat for their spending ways, and then paid $29 to join the President’s Club. 

Favored guest, Sisi Weaver, was inspired to praise her longtime boss, other guest, Tom Campbell, as one of the most ethical politicians she has ever dealt with in her long years in politics.  Tom decided it was only fair to pay a fine on her behalf.  Rick asked some intriguing questions about our state finances, such as “where does California stand in terms of credit ratings by the bond agencies?”  Both GUY FARTHING and MARY MARLEY thought we were better off then we are (dead last among the 50 states).  WYATT ALLEN and ROY JONES showed strong knowledge of fiscal matters, but they were fined anyhow.
 
 

THE WEEKLY PROGRAM: TOM CAMPBELL
TOM CAMPBELL former state senator, former congressman, and former Dean of the Haas Business School at Cal (and current Business Professor there) stepped up to give us some sobering facts about the current revenue and spending problems we face at both the federal and state levels.   He presented a wealth of information in just 8 short pages (back to back). 

The first, and biggest point he made was that in the last year, under both Bush and Obama, the federal government has spent about 2.8 TRILLION ($160 billion tax “rebates” in July 2008; $350 Billion for the TARP rescue plan in Nov. 2008; the $789 billion stimulus bill in Feb. 09; 280 billion in Fannie Mae rescue in March 2009; 200 billion extra spending in the new budget bill; and 1 trillion of additional spending by the Federal reserve to buy mortgages and bonds from banks), without coming up with any revenue to pay for any of it.  All of this is being paid for by printing new money, adding 2.8 trillion so the current 8.3 trillion of money supply, for a 34% increase in the supply of money.  This will produce waves of inflation as the economy recovers.  Campbell suggests investing in “TIPS” (treasury inflation protected securities). 
 
Campbell pointed out that it is likely to expect that the current recession will end by late 2010.  There are many factors in the current economy that can help, such as the reduction in the cost of gas and stronger U.S. productivity.  However, Campbell warned that given recent actions, California will lag in the recovery and be in recession longer due to three ‘anchors.” 

First, California is pushing out new business with high taxes; the highest sales tax in the country, the highest personal income tax, and tied for the highest corporate tax.  Campbell fears business, and the executives who run them, will choose to go to places like Nevada, Texas, Oregon, or Florida. 

The other problem for new businesses and jobs is the heavy California regulatory structure, with several boards and commissions having overlapping jurisdiction to regulate (and over regulate) new business.  The final problem is the high number of lawsuits that businesses face in California, costing precious dollars and dragging down production. 
 
Campbell pointed out that the governor had proposed a solution 2 years ago in Proposition 76, which would have imposed across the board spending limits when revenues fell below benchmark levels.  This forces the legislature to either keep spending down, or find more revenue to pay for the expanding programs.  If this had been in place, the recent budget crisis would have been avoided. However, the voters rejected Proposition 76. 

Campbell suggests a more politically acceptable solution would be to phase in over 8 years a process where the legislature does not use “revenue projections” to create a fictitious balanced budget, but instead, bases the future budget only on the tax revenue actually collected in the past year.
 
Campbell pointed out that the new “national debt” will be over $9 trillion, and if we just kept it at that level, it would take 293 years for our descendents to pay it off.  For California, the projected “state debt” will take 84 years to pay off.  Campbell pointed out that the federal government can just print new money (increase the debt) to pay for programs, while California can not. 

The easy path of “printing new money” instead of cutting spending or raising taxes, leads the Federal Government to increase our debt much faster than the State. 
 
A somber meeting reached 1:30 and President SETH chimed the meeting to a close.

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