SPOKES VOL. LXVI NO. 18 November 5, 2019
Our greeters this morning were Kathy Brickley and Bob Boerma
President Odland opened the meeting with “America the Beautiful” and Art Ayers provided another inspiring invocation including our most prayerful thoughts those of our club suffering at this time including former member Dorothy Lockwood and Dan Liehr’s sister, both undergoing cancer treatment.
Guests:
Our Guests this morning included prospective new members Brian Kurtz and Stiffin Davis, Kerry Hagy from the Center of the Arts, Assistant Governor Diane Chenault and our speaker Jim Marcoux.
Spotlight: South Haven Center for the Arts
Kerry Hagy from the Art Center spoke to us about the grant that we provided to the Art Center which they used for Professional Development for local art teachers, including session on using recycled material, jellied print making and soon meditative doodling. This PD provides time for the teachers to make a connection with their colleagues and plans are to bring in art teachers for neighboring schools to make even more connections.
We presented a check to Kerry and her Rotarian Board members Paul Hix and Barry Winkel to fund this program.
Announcements:
- We are pleased to announce that Nick Tuit was the winner of a raffle at the Rotary District “Golden Trowel” award dinner and will donate the $250 to our scholarship fund..
- November 21st is our Chamber ABO at the Moose Lodge with the Moose. Sign up is being passed around.
- December 10th is our Holiday Party at the Yacht Club
- December 17th is the Open Door Dinner at the Methodist Church
- December 21st is our day to do the Salvation Army Bell Ringing
- Blessings in a Backback next stuffing will be on November 8th at 1:15 at Lincoln School
- We have new member applications from Mike Livovich, Steffin Davis and Brian Kurtz. Anyone with concerns about any of these prospective members are urged to speak to their sponsor before consulting Board members.
- Splash Pad ribbon cutting on November 15th at 1:30 PM.
- Glenn Pietenpol statue dedication on Saturday, November 23rd at 11:30 AM
- The Rotary Foundation is offering a matching grant for donations to their foundation over the next few weeks. A quick way to get to your Paul Harris award!
Songs:
Jim Davis drew two less than outstanding songs to lead today.We began with “Cuddle Up a Little Closer” The music was written by Karl Hoschna, the lyrics by Otto Harbach. The song was published in 1908. From the Broadway musical Three Twins when it was introduced by Alice Yorke.[1]
Ada Jones and Billy Murray had a huge success with their duet recording of the song for Victor Records (catalog No. 5532) in 1908. They also recorded the song for Edison 9950, Zon-o-Phone 5175 and Indestructible 876.
Our second selection, “Balling the Jack” a popular song from 1913, written by Jim Burris with music by Chris Smith. It introduced a popular dance of the same name with "Folks in Georgia's 'bout to go insane." It became a ragtime, pop, and trad jazz standard, and has been recorded hundreds of times by many prominent artists.
We finished with one of our favorites, “Roll Rotary, Roll”.
50/50
Ted Weber had the winning ticket (surprise) but drew the Ace so he could let the pot grow util the next time he has the luck ticket. Bill Roberts won the $2 prize.
Fines:
- Rosalie Plecharty missed her “Getting to Know You segment and introducing our speaker.
- Dyanne Chenault announced that she is always delighted to visit our club. It’s one of her favorite clubs to visit.
- Kaleigh Eddy paid for her birthday that was last week.
- Tom Fleming announced that his daughter is turning 44 this week – and that it is Big Ten Tuesday.
- Pete Swanson is celebrating his son’s birthday.
- Jim Marcoux is celebrating two son’s birthdays and the birthday of a grandson.
- Dan Thompson’s son, who is in the Navy, is celebrating a birthday.
- Dan Leihr reminded us to VOTE today!
- Kevin Schooley invited us to attend the school play this week end, and thanked the wrestling team for helping decorate downtown last week.
- Dene Hadden invited all to watch the SHHS Volleyball team compete in their District tournament Wednesday – and hopefully Thursday night at the high school.
- Barry Winkel paid a finme for appearing on National TV.
- Dyanne Chenault invited us to an afternoon of patriotic music at the Mendel Center on Sunday.
- Bob Copping had an interesting story of what food is served a cannibal’s dinner.
- Jean Stein’s son has a birthday this week.
- Mark Odland noted that many Rotarian’s worked on decorating the bridge last weekend.
- Larry Wittkop is excited the #1 MSU (in basketball) is playing #2 tonight.
- Jeremy Burleson invited all to the Seeds of Hope Dinner which funds the Ward 1 scholarship efforts, this week, at the college.
President Odland introduced our speaker this morning, Jim Marcoux from the Greater South Haven Area Community Foundation
Jim briefly reviewed the foundation’s history, beginning when he made the first presentation to Rotary, way back in November of 2004. At that time the foundation was just getting off the ground and had zero money. Since that time the foundation has grown to the point that it is now accredited by the National Council of Foundations. This is a long and stringent process that requires continued accreditation. We are one of the smallest foundations that is accredited in the country.
Because of the hard work of the volunteer board, the Kalamazoo Community Foundation which holds funds of local groups and funds raised before the advent of our foundation has determined that we are now strong enough to handle our own and other local funds. Recently those funds have been or are being transferred to our care. Once complete, our endowment holdings will total more than 2.2 million dollars. There are more than 20 endowments with money held by the foundation.
The Foundation has also received bequests from the Pietenpol and Simon families and look forward to additional bequests in the future.
In 2018 the foundation gave out $33,000 in grants plus another $4,000 in Youth Advisory Committee grants administered by high school students.
Our finance and investment team keeps close tabs on our funds and endowments have earned 8.1% return over the last several years.
In the future the foundation plans to focus on getting additional funds held by Kalamazoo back to South Haven, grow current endowments and work on securing additional bequests. They are also starting the recertification for the National Council on Foundations and joining the Michigan Council on Foundations.
President Odland thanked Jim for his informative presentation and congratulated him on the foundation’s growth over the last 15 years. He presented Jim with one of our valuable speaker’s pens.
We closed the meeting with the Four Way Test.
Next week’s program: Pete Swanson will introduce Donna Zeppiero from the Van Buren Humane Society
Greeters: Jeremy Burleson and Melinda Gruber
Editarian: Dene Hadden