Marana Rotary Club Meeting Oct 13, 2015

Today’s meeting of the Marana Rotary Club was called to order by Secretary and President Nominee Jo Holt, who filled in for vacationing President Mary Straus. We sang a rousing rendition of “This Little Light” led by songmaster Clint Kuntz, who had John Dooling actually lead the song. Way to delegate, Clint!

 

Club members discussed our recent event, the Service Above Self awards dinner, held last Friday. John Dooling felt that the 2015-2016 Marana Man of the Year (Police Chief Terry Rozema) was definitely a cut above last year’s choice. Hey, wait a minute. That was Mr. John Dooling himself!

 

And we all send our very best get well wishes to Past President Alice Rigney and to PDG Randy Brooks.

 

Monthly meeting of the Board. All members are welcome to attend. Contact Mary or Jo for meeting time and place.

 

The RC of Dove Mountain has invited us to attend their evening meeting (at 5pm at the Highlands Clubhouse) featuring speaker Saad Allawi from the Oro Valley Rotary Club on “Anger in the Arab World; What Should the West Do?”

 

Rotary Foundation Day includes a seminar at PCC from 9am to 3pm, and dinner at the Omni, reception at 6pm, dinner at 7.

 

Also 11/7 marks the end of the Edward Jones Bag-a-Thon food collection drive (Oct 1 – Nov 7) with Maeve Johnson’s annual Pancake Breakfast from 8 – 10:30am. You can help support the Marana Community Food Bank by dropping off food at the Edward Jones office at 3005 W Ina Road, Suite 101.

 

Nov. 7^th is a very popular day! The Tucson Walk to End Alzheimer’s begins at the UofA at 9:15am. You can join the team “Burning Daylight” organized by former President of Marana Rotary, Kim Holaway, and her husband Dave, who is currently fighting this disease. Register or donate at www.tucsonalzheimerswalk.org.

 

El Tour de Tucson day! Club members, along with Teacher of the Year Kathleen Neighbors’ Interact students from Tortolita Middle School, will be aiding riders at Tangerine Rd and I-10. Contact Tony Hunter to volunteer.

 

Dan Contorno had his Rotary pin again today! Sergeant at Arms Javier Teran did not! And in spite of this statistically unlikely event, the laws of physics have not been reversed, and the universe continues to expand!

 

We were very pleased to have a return visit by Mr. Tom Hopkins with Habitat for Humanity, who described Habitat’s Neighborhood Partnership Program. Building new homes is a powerful tool that helps families and communities, but it’s only one tool that Habitat is applying toward reviving neighborhoods. Tom talked about how Habitat approaches a neighborhood in distress by first adopting a listening posture with residents in a targeted neighborhood. Instead of asking “What do you need?” Habitat is asking “What are your dreams for your neighborhood?” Tom told us that it’s not unusual for residents to ask why anyone would want to work on their neighborhood. He talked about the lack of trust found in distressed neighborhoods, where there is often little or no trust of outside helpers and of other residents. When there is no trust, there is hopelessness. Habitat is engaging other partners to show residents how to form neighborhood watch groups, to clean up vacant properties, and to build new homes. Tom told some wonderful stories about how a sustained presence of Habitat in a targeted neighborhood changes lives and restores hope and pride to the residents. We thank Tom for a truly inspiring presentation!