At a recent meeting we heard from Captain Justin Barter from the Salvation Army, who spoke to us about their annual kettle campaign (now 130 years strong). Captain Barter noted they are short volunteer bell-ringers and hoped members could step up for a shift. Rotary has been targeted for 9:00 to 7:00 Friday, 12/17, at Market 32 (Hubbard Avenue). Gwen Davis will coordinate Club volunteers. If you can help out for a two-hour shift, contact Gwen at mgouilette@msn.com. If you can't do 12/17 and want to volunteer otherwise, Justin Barter may be contacted by e-mail: justin.barter@use.salvationarmy.org.
Joan DiMartino is polling the membership to see if the Club should meet on Thursday, December 23, for a holiday luncheon at Mazzeo's. Please respond to Joan whether you will, or will not attend, and if you will bring a significant other. The Club needs to either secure this date or release it.
Please RSVP your intent to Joan DiMartino (joan.dimartino@gd-ms.com) by 5:00 p.m. Tuesday so she may give Mazzeo's a head count. If unable to attend, our luncheon meetings are also available live on Zoom. If you cannot be there in person, consider streaming the event via the following link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/84791340270?pwd=bm1zNkJPemF0MGJoLzZncW5KS3Judz09. Sometimes it takes a few moments to set up Zoom, so please be patient........ and please, if you've committed to attending, please don't neglect to attend unless there's a crisis.
Last week we heard from AJ Enchill, president of Berkshire Black Economic Council (BBEC), who spoke to us about the Council, a newly formed 501(c)3 non-profit organization. The BBEC aims to activate the following areas to improve the Black business community:
Growth and sustainability
Business education and mentorship
Economic justice
Marketing and media
Funding and investment
BBEC’s mission is to aid and advocate economic development with respect to education, neighborhood revitalization, arts and culture, business ownership, social programming, environmental justice, and recruitment and retention of business regarding the black business community. As goals, BBEC hopes to:
Get more businesses minority-owned certified
Be able to find the Black-owned businesses in the area
Help Black-owned businesses get more grant funding
Take suggestions from the community.
Since 2017 A.J. has performed constituent services and community outreach as the District Aide for State Senator Adam G. Hinds.
At our last meeting, president John reported that the Club board had authorized the donation of $1,000 to the 2021 Toys for Tots campaign. John noted he hoped to bump that amount up to at least $1,500 by targeting our last meeting's fines to the cause. As it turned out, the Club did better than that by raising $689 in fines, so there will be a $1,689 donation made to Toys for Tots.
The latest from our Auction Committee: Thank you for your continued support of the Rotary Auction! This year's theme matches our Rotary year theme: “Serve to Change Lives.” Donation forms have been distributed to the membership, so it's time to start collecting items. The Committee has scheduled an Auction Item Drive for our December 9, 2021 meeting. Members are asked to bring as many of their items to the meeting that day so that we can get them all collected, stored, and entered into the database with plenty of time. The auction is going to be Saturday, February 12, 2022 at Berkshire Hills Country Club. A blank donation form that you may use to collect even more great items for the auction was sent to members in a separate email. The form is also downloaded onto the Club’s website (“Home Page Downloaded Forms”). We'd love to be able to include as many local partners as possible. If you want to check to make sure that another member hasn't solicited an item already, you can view the updated item solicitation spreadsheet online [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1BCO96dhdXVnOL2yacSZUH0YW_UoVG6u9lyTBkVNn8FU/edit?usp=sharing]. Questions about items or the spreadsheet can go to Alex Reczkowski. Questions about sponsorships and ads should go to Ro
Because of Veterans Day and Thanksgiving, November is a crazy month for Rotary meetings - only two of them. At our last meeting we had already met Connor Soltaire (THS), but were introduced for the first time Mackenzi Ressler (PHS). Unfortunately both students also said their good-byes at that meeting.
No birthdays to celebrate this week but three Club anniversary: John Murphy 35 years as of 12/04/1986; Donna Palma 7 years as of 12/04/2014; Brad Felix 5 years as of 12/08/2016
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