Bulletin Volume 84 No.32 February 25 2013

Rotary Club of Sale Rotary District 9820 Incorporated

Last Meeting – Club Night – February 25

Club Night

Acting President Daniel opened the meeting and welcomed guests, Zac Roberts and his mother Anna. (Zac and Anna were invited by Alan Lewis to tell to us about Street Soccer.)

Daniel then invited PE Adrian to tell us about the District Conference that was held on the preceding weekend. Adrian clearly enjoyed the conference and gave us a detailed report - a summary appears at the end of this Bulletin.

David Strauss reported that our ongoing task with Blaze Aid meal support is progressing well and Daniel thanked David for his commitment to management of the roster.

Rachel distributed brochures encouraging employees to take advantage of free workplace health checks, as part of the Work Health program to improve the health and wellbeing of all Victorian workers.

Street Soccer

Zac Roberts, who is thirteen, spoke to us about Street Soccer in Sale. Portable fencing is erected in open space, such as a car park, to allow a soccer game to be played. It is well organised and growing but needs a sponsor to help gain official recognition, secure funding, become incorporated and obtain insurance cover.

David Strauss offered the netball court at Sale City Football and Netball Club as a possible venue (David is President of that Club).

Those present at the meeting all agreed that our Club be the sponsor. Alan will work with and assist the Street Soccer group to further its aims.

Next meeting 4 March –Adrian’s European Extravaganza – Relish at the Gallery – 6:15 At our next meeting Adrian Rijs will tell us about the wonderful river cruise he and Louise took last year, in Europe. Adrian has thousands of photographs but has chosen a just a few of the best to show us. Adrian has also produced an advertisement to promote his talk. Chairperson Keith Miller Sergeant Rod Exton Welcome Noel Langley Set up Keith Miller Relay for Life – raising funds for Cancer Research – Saturday 23 and Sunday 24 March

Adrian Rijs asks that members of our team, Sale Rotary Ramblers, register as soon as possible online -  www.relayforlife.org.au  

Contact Adrian 5144 6769 if you have any questions about the relay

Rotary Junior Community Award 2013

It is now time to begin working with young people who wish to participate in this year’s Award. The Award involves year 6 students, who are around 10 -12 years old. Students are presented with the Award after undertaking a range of community and personal activities. It is a little similar to the Duke of Edinburgh Award, which is for older students. The Award is not competitive and is suitable for students of all abilities and helps develop understanding and skills. The Award was the idea of Mitchell River Rotarian, the late David Hawkey, who passed away three years ago. It was first trialled in 1997. The Award was very successful last year – you will remember our Award night on November 19. Assisting young people with the Award is rewarding for Rotarians. If you would like to be involved in this exciting program, speak with Rod Exton. From a small beginning in our District the Award has now spread to Rotary Clubs in overseas.

Rotary Junior Community Award

The Rotary Club of Sale presents…

“An evening at Laurels”

An exciting fundraising night

Saturday May 4 2013

Laurels Function Room – Sale Racecourse

International Women’s Day – March 8 Friday next week is International Women’s Day and Rotary around the world is holding many events to honour women. Women have only been able to be members of Rotary since 1989 but have made a remarkable contribution since that time, holding positions such as District Governor and Club President. Sometimes days like this may seem unnecessary in our country where women have equality and freedom but it is not so for the majority of women around the world. International Women’s Day is an opportunity for us to think about just how much remains to be achieved so that women everywhere can have the lives we view as normal. International Women’s Day began in 1911 and was strongly celebrated in the communist world – it is a public holiday in Russia and many other countries. The day was to demand that women, “have the right to work, to vote and that there be an end to discrimination”. It was adopted by the United Nations in 1975 and that is when it began to Russian poster for International Women’s Day

be recognised in Australia. There are 136 official events being held around Australia to mark the day. Our Club will honour women at our meeting on March 18.

The road ahead… Monday March 11 Labour Day Holiday – no meeting

Monday March 18 Celebrating Women

Saturday March 23 Relay for life Sunday March 24 Monday March 25 At ‘Tara’– the home of David and Judy Tulloch – Stratford Presentation night for the Williamson-Rotary equestrian bursary

Monday April 1 Easter Monday – no meeting

Monday April 8 Club Night

Monday April 15 A work in progress

Monday April 22 Neville Gibbons OAM – Anzac Day

Saturday May 4 A night at “Laurels”

District 9820 Annual Conference Adrian Rijs Geelong 22-24 February 2013

1. The conference started on a sad note when we were informed that Jared Dunscombe, one of the cyclists of the Ride to Conference team, had died after he fell off his bike and was hit by a truck on the morning of the last day of the ride. The team raised $66,000 and a total of more than $750,000 in the 12 years it has been going.

2. Prior to the official opening ceremony of the conference at 7:30 on Friday night, there was a Food of the World banquet available for those who had registered.

3. There was an early start for Club Presidents and Presidents Elect and their partners on Saturday with breakfast at 7:15 in the Mercure Hotel where incoming District Governor, Tim Moore, introduced himself and his charming wife, Jane.

4. The conference then started in earnest and following the Vales and Reflections which recognised all those Rotarians and their partners who had been called to Higher Service, there was an address by the RIPPR (Rotary International President’s Personal Representative), PDG John Iriks from Perth. We were then treated to our first keynote speaker, Dr Tony Gregson AM, who delivered a Vocational Service address on Svalbard and the Doomsday Vault, a story about the seedbank in Norway and his role in taking some Australian seeds from the Horsham seedbank there for safe storage. Tony’s address was followed by the inspirational story of Gabrielle Condello who was the key person in founding our District’s only Rotaract Club and then John Caruana spoke about MUNA – Model United Nations Assembly.

5. International Service provided our second keynote speaker, Max Walker. Most people would be familiar with Tanglefoot’s ability to speak and entertain. Max has written several books and brought a carful of them to sell at half price. He autographed all the books he sold that day and donated the money raised, $4,500, to Disaster Aid Australia for which he is a patron, as well as for ROMAC (Rotary Oceania Medical Aid for Children).

6. The third keynote speaker was Ian Risely who spoke about The Rotary Foundation. This was a very informative talk and I’ll briefly mention some points that Ian raised.

Ian expects polio to be eradicated within the next 5 years and he made the following observations:

• There were 223 cases of polio last year • 2 in the last 55 days • 17 in the corresponding period last year • The trend is in the right direction • At the outset of the Polio Plus project, WHO thought it was an impossible goal • Rotary International may be nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize as a result of this

work

When the polio project comes to its conclusion, a new project will be selected from the following:

• Peace and conflict prevention/ resolution • Disease prevention and treatment • Water and sanitation • Maternal and child health • Basic education and literacy • Economic and community development

Ian also touched on a few other areas and one in particular that struck a chord was philanthropy. He said that the measure of a person is how they contribute to the lives of others. Donations to Rotary Foundation are tax deductible.

7. The keynote speaker for Community Service was former director of Victoria Health Services, Beth Wilson AM. She was a real gem and had the audience in fits of laughter as she explained her role in resolving complaints about health services

8. The final keynote speaker for the day was Andrew Simmons who showed the audience some simple ways to stay fit. Saturday night celebration of Rotary was a dinner at the Pier Restaurant in Geelong with the theme Bollywood to Hollywood. It was an entertaining night with good food, music, dancing and catching up with many friends. The RC of Frankston Long Island members, along with Grant Ellers, dressed as Buddhist Monks and managed to collect about $1200 with their begging bowls for Carla Spring’s project.

9. The following day we were straight back into it with another Vocational Service presentation, this time by Professor Jeffry V. Rosenfeld AM who presented a fascinating account about the development of an Australian Bionic Eye.

10. There were plenty of other things happening including presentations by the Dutch GSE Team members and the exchange students. Awards were presented to the different Clubs for achievements in certain areas such as Bulletin presentation (won by Phillip Island & San Remo), golf awards, membership awards (won by Casey), Conference attendance awards, and of course the Australian Rotary Health achievement award which our Club has now won for the fourth consecutive year. Only the Pakenham Club has won it more often (6 times) and the Mornington Club, which initiated the project to research SIDS, has equaled our total, although the shield does show some anomalies.

11. One of the final items on the agenda was the announcement of next year’s District Conference. DGE Tim Moore revealed the best kept secret at the conference, no leaks, the District Conference next year will be in Bendigo on 14-16 March. Tim is a fun-loving person and I can highly recommend that you reserve these dates to attend this conference. Tim plans to send each Club a DVD of the film clip his Club (Berwick) produced to promote this district conference.

I enjoyed this conference immensely but must say that my memory of previous conferences is just as good and I look forward to attending DG Tim’s conference in Bendigo with as many RC of Sale members as possible. I can’t remember which Club it was that won the Conference attendance award but they had 17 attendees out of a Club with 26 members. Let’s see if we can win it next year as well as the ARH award.

PDG Peter Newman was awarded RI President’s Service Above Self Award which is Rotary’s highest honor for an individual Rotarian. The award recognizes Rotarians who have rendered exemplary humanitarian service with an emphasis on personal volunteer efforts. It is an internationally competitive award granted to a maximum of 150 Rotarians in a year.

The motto for the Rotary Year 2013-14 is, Engage Rotary, Change Lives.

The Rotary International President will be Ron Burton.