Los Altos Rotary Club eNewsletter "Rotator"

Los Altos Rotary Club

Home of the Annual Rotary Fine Art Show

February 4 2010

Writer: Steve Yarbrough - Photographer: Randy Gard - Editor: Cindy Luedtke

This Thursday's Program: Feb 11 2010 Tracie Murray / Sam Pesner LARC Annual Meeting and Art Show Preview

The street slopes gently downward to the Los Altos Rotary Club meeting place in Shoup Park. At the top of the street LOUIS BOREL was getting out his car and heading to the Thursday, February 4, 2010, meeting of Rotarians. He was greeted there by JOE LOCONTE, who was also headed down the hill to the weekly gathering. "Welcome to Rotary," Joe said. Louis smiled hugely and handed Joe a large brass padlock. "I never forgot this is yours," Louis said, "I'm returning your lock." Joe grinned and said, "Louis, you've had that lock since 2007. I'm going to put it my car right now! Thank you." It was a nice moment of Rotarian fellowship and a reminder of the honest spirit of Rotary.

The park where Rotary meets is named after Guy Shoup, a founding father of the Los Altos Rotary Club and its first president. Members can become Guy Shoup Fellows, just like a Paul Harris Fellow, by making contributions to the club‘s endowment fund, LAREF. Several of our members have done so. Talk to President TRACIE MURRAY if this interests you. It's another way to support the projects and spirit of Los Altos Rotary.

In honor of the Boy Scouts of America's 100th Anniversary two scouts from Troop 37, Steven Evans, a senior at St. Francis High School and Nick Forell, a junior at Monte Vista High School, led the club in the pledge to the flag. PAT GRAY presented the thought for the day by anthropologist, William A. Ward, paraphrased as: "Before you speak, listen. Before you write, think. Before you spend, earn. Before you die, give." Songmaster, MICHAEL STADLEN led the club with a rendition of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" that would have made Judy Garland cringe. Where was the scarecrow when we needed him?

Greeters today were KAREN FOX, STEVE BIANCHI and KAREN GREGURAS. President Elect DENNIS YOUNG introduced visiting Rotarians and Rotarians with guests.
DICK BLANDING introduced Bob Lee of Troop 37 and the Pacific Skyline Council who will be a leader at the Boy Scout's 2010 Jamboree. Also present was scoutmaster Rod Sinks of Troop 37, which was founded in 1918 and has been sponsored by the Los Altos Rotary Club since this club was founded. Numerous Los Altos Rotarians are former Eagle Scouts. Honorary Rotarian DAVE LUEDTKE, and Rotarian WARD WILDANGER, both former scoutmasters of Troop 37 also were welcomed. The editor noticed that sitting to the side, was another Troop 37 leader, BILL BALSON. He escaped introduction as he was not sitting at the same table and he was not in his Boy Scout uniform.

President Tracie presented the slate of nominees for the three openings on the LARC board of directors. They are KAREN FOX, CLYDE NOEL and CHUCK LINDAUER. She asked for nominations from the floor. Hearing none, nominations were closed. The vote for the new board will be held next week.

ANNOUNCEMENTS

JACK KELLY gave an update on the speech contest. He informed everyone why speaker number five from last week's event was not the winner. Jack explained that, unfortunately, he far exceeded his allowed time limit and was penalized too many points in order to prevail, even though he appeared to many to be the better speaker.
DAN O'DONNELL invited Rotarians to volunteer for the Rotacare Clinic food delivery and passed around a sign-up clipboard.
BILL PALMER announced that he is reviving the Partners for Elder Generations committee and welcomed participation and ideas for projects for seniors.
JOHN SYLVESTER reminded everyone of the wine and cheese party at PP STEVE ANDERSON's house beginning 6 p.m. on February 26. Bring a beverage or some finger food to pass.
TOM LISTON announced that the poker players are planning a tourney and invited interested members to contact him.
DAVE LUEDTKE, dressed as an overgrown Boy Scout, said he was preparing himself to become the Norwegian/Italian chef for the upcoming Cioppino Feed on March 12th and asked everyone to sign up on club runner or sign up on the clipboard. If both fail, one can contact any of the various committee members, including TRACIE MURRAY, JERRY MOISON, JOE RENATI, STEVE BIANCHI, or CINDY LUEDTKE to make your reservation. So far, Dave has 65 attendees, of which over 40 are not Rotarians. We need many more Rotarians to come in order to make this a success, especially since it is a fundraiser for the End Polio Now Campaign. Money raised will be matched by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to finish our decades-long effort to eradicate polio around the globe.
DAN HOLDEN plugged his talk for next week on ‘What it Takes Today to be College-Bound’.
FRANK VERLOT passed around the basket for Haiti relief and announced that last week Rotarians contributed more than $1,100.

FINEMASTER GETS APPLAUSE:

Well. sort of. KURT HUEG actually got a mild applause from one or two Rotarians in the hope that he would be swayed not to fine them. It wasn't effective because Kurt managed to raise money from many sources:

JACK KELLY paid $20 for his fine effort at the speech contest.
JOHN MCDONNELL paid for his daughter Molly's upcoming wedding.
PP ROY LAVE made good on a long-standing IOU.
CHUCK LINDAUER and KAREN FOX, as incoming board nominees, each paid to get themselves into the President's Club to join compatriot, CLYDE NOEL, who already achieved that status.
KIM COPHER contributed $60 for her birthday skiing trip.
DAN HOLDEN paid $20 for advertising his upcoming talk.
BUD OLIVER paid $25 for failing the Super Bowl trivia quiz.
SCOTT FLEMMING paid $25 for winning the Super Bowl trivia quiz. “Who dat?”

SPEAKER

In honor of the 100th year of Scouting, Past President DICK DHURING introduced our speaker Kent Downing, Scout Executive for the Pacific Skyline Council covering northern Santa Clara County and San Mateo County. Kent advised Rotarians about the history and depth of Scouting which currently operates three camps and serves 8,000 youth in this district. The Council, with an annual budget of approximately $2.2 million, is supported by eight full-time staff members and maintains service centers in Palo Alto and Foster City.

A mini survey of Scouting since its origin in 1910 reflects that Scouting was in operation in every state by 1912 . In the 1930's Scouts collected two million articles of clothing and supplies for the needy. In the 1940's Scouts focused on selling defense bonds and supporting the Red Cross. In the 1950's Scouts supported the United Nations relief efforts and planted six million trees. In the 1960's Scouts started the inner city Scouting program and honored the 500,000th Eagle Scout. By the 1980's two of Challenger's space shuttle astronauts were former Scouts. In 2009, in the local area, 149 youth earned the status of Eagle Scout.

Kent presented a short video on the objectives of Scouting and it's role in developing the leaders of tomorrow.

After fielding questions from Rotarians, Kent was presented a book plate by President Tracie which will be placed inside a book in his honor at a local school.