THE GALLIPOLIS ROTARY CLUB

Attending included Shawn Siders, Debbie Saunders, Margaret Evans, Shirley Doss, Lou Ellen Werry, Chuck Clark and Gordon Amsbary.

The first order of business was a request from Shirley Doss for the club to reappoint and confirm Resty Alonzo as the club’s representative to the Gallia County Council On Aging board.  Shirley moved this request which was seconded by Debbie Saunders.  The motion carried.  Congratulations, Resty!

Treasurer’s Report—Shawn distributed the new financial reports for the club noting the receipts from the BEF Festival now show in our checking account.  The funds raised with the Kindle raffle have been disbursed to benefit the middle school libraries in Gallia county.  All club liabilities have been paid with the exception of the ice cream/tent rental bill from the Festival.  After some discussion the motion to accept the financial report was made by Shirley Doss and again seconded by Debbie Saunders.  Motion carried.

Christmas Dinner—Shirley led the discussion regarding the planned Christmas dinner and ornament exchange which will be held on Tuesday, December 14th, at the Merry Winery.  Our meal will be catered by the Park Front Diner which has been catering at the Winery this year.  A signup sheet will be distributed during upcoming meetings regarding the menu choices.  The club will provide some appetizers and members are encourage to donate toward any wine to share.  A formal invitation will be extended to our Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar, Elaine Householder, and her family to join in our festivities.

Books for Rotary Reads—Margaret Evans proposed the club purchase at least one new children’s book for each first grade class we read to each month.  After some discussion it was recommended that Shirley Doss compile a books list for this effort.

Membership Approved—The board approved the membership of Lee Bauman of Wing Haven in Vinton.  Lee will be inducted on November 9th.

Program Schedule—Shirley Doss reported the finalizing of the program schedule for the balance of the Rotary year.  This schedule will be posted to our web site and blog as soon as possible.

The meeting was adjourned.

Club President, Lou Ellen Werry, opened the morning meeting of the Gallipolis Rotary Club welcoming members and guests.  Our guests included visiting Rotarian Bob Olesen, from Tiffin Rotary, a guest of Ken Porada,  and Shelly Booth from Ohio Valley Bank, who is our program speaker today.

RI Convention—President Lou reminded members the Rotary International convention this year will be in New Orleans, May 21-25, 2011.  There is a $40.00 per person savings for registrations that are booked before December 15th.  More details are available on the RI convention website.  Click the link for more information.

Rotary Reads—Next week is the start of a new month and we will be reading in the first grade classes of the county schools next Wednesday, November 3rd, at 8:10 am.  Emily Dailey, project chair, reminded members to contact your school so they know you are coming! A big thanks goes out to Shana Booher, for volunteering to read at Addaville Elementary this month!  Emily has a big box of books and Chuck Clark will have new labels printed next week!  If you’ve never read to the first graders, consider volunteering for this great project.

Club Board Meeting—Lou Ellen reminded members this month’s club board meeting will be held this Thursday, October 28th, at 4 pm at the Municipal Court offices.  President Lou said the agenda is full and there is a lot to cover.  Members are reminded that attendance makeup credit is given for attending a club board meeting and Red Badge members are REQUIRED to attend at least one to pass to the blue badge!

Split-The-Pot—Rotarian Jim Morrison ran STP for our meeting today and strong ticket sales ran our small pot up to $9.00 today!  Jim asked our speaker, Shelly Booth to draw the winning ticket which was held by Margaret Evans!  Our winner missed pulling the Queen from the ‘ever shrinking’ deck of cards by drawing the nine of hearts for the $50 large pot.  Margaret assessed the Foundation Fine against anyone who was NOT wearing green today.

Fellowship—PDG Mel Simon celebrates a birthday this week and Mel chose the Mystery Singer Option for his donation.  Our Mystery Singer was revealed to be none other than Margaret Evans who provided an excellent rendition of Happy Birthday for Mel.  Fellowship Maestro, Gordon Amsbary, provided some historical trivia and was ‘Fact Checked’ by Ken Porada.  Gordon offered some PC humor and a brief language lesson.  He concluded with some words of wisdom.

Program—Our program chair for the morning was Dave Nadler who introduced our speaker, Shelly Booth from OVB.  Shelly presented an interesting overview of the mortgage financing market comparing the house values and average household incomes from the 1960’s through to the present.  She next presented the steps the mortgage approval must take from application to closing.  Our members enjoyed the opportunity to ask a number of questions concerning the mortgage business.  Thank you, Shelly and Dave, for the interesting program.

Next week’s program chair is Kevin Petrie.  Be sure to check on our club web page and our blog site for the program assignments for the balance of 2010.  Have a great week!

Dictionary Project—Project Chair, Debbie Saunders, thanked the Rotarians who helped out with this year’s dictionary distribution last Friday in the fifth grade classrooms in all Gallia County classrooms.  It was a great success and the Rotarians who helped in the project had a good time. (more…)

Spectacular weather and ice cream craving crowds came together to make the 40th annual Bob Evans Festival one for the record books as the major fundraiser for the Gallipolis Rotary Club!  Exhausted Rotarians met on Tuesday morning to trade stores from the festival.  President Lou Ellen Werry opened our meeting and welcomed our special guest today, Amy McGuire, a guest of John Ellison.

Dictionary Project—Friday, October 15th is Noah Webster’s birthday and the date of our annual dictionary distribution to the 5th graders of Gallia county!    President Lou briefed members reminding everyone the ‘Label Party’ to attach the club sticker to the dictionary will be held this Wednesday at the OVB Annex from 4 pm – 5 pm.  Distribution at the schools has been pre-arranged by Project Chair Debbie Saunders, and Rotarians are advised to arrive on time at the appointed school. (more…)