Meeting at Quigley’s Restaurant
593 Columbia Turnpike
East Greenbush, NY
February 8, 2018

Members Attending (9): Roberto Martinez, Murray Forth, Pat Bailey, Debbie Rodriguez, Peter Brown, Debbie Brown, Monika Annis, Terry Brewer, Ray Hannan.

Guests (6): Kelly Walborn, Olivia Sterantino, Erin Sterantonio, Denise Prinzo, Dan Annis, Chris Jones.

Announcements/Business

OPENING — President Roberto Martinez welcomed members and guests. (There was an insufficient number of members in attendance to convene an official meeting.)

MEMBERSHIP REPORT — Terry Brewer, point person on the District 7190 Membership Committee, reported that he and Ray Hannan were among 31 people attending the latest District membership workshop, representing 19 different clubs.

INDOOR GOLF EVENT –– The scheduled February indoor simulator golf event at Burden Lake Country Club has been postponed due to an insufficient number of reservations. It may be rescheduled for March.

BOWLING FOR VETS — The annual fundraiser is scheduled for Sunday, March 4, at the East Greenbush Bowling Center. Participation will carry a lower price this year, $15 for adults and $7 for kids 12 and under. We have 16 lanes reserved for two sessions, 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. and 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. Members are asked to sell lane sponsorships (we can sell more than one per lane) at $100 each to club members, local businesses or other organizations, etc. See Murray Forth, Terry Brewer, or Jim Leyhane for details. All members have been sent a PDF of the event flyer to use in spreading the word.

MIRACLE LEAGUE DINNER — The event, scheduled for the Greenbush YMCA, will be held this Sunday (February 11) with the assistance of SRC, Rotaract, the Y, and Kiwanis. Several SRC members have volunteered to help prepare the meal.

ROTARY HOME COOKING — Next up in the member-hosted series will be “A Greek Evening” at the Calamaras residence on Saturday, February 17. The menu will include leg of lamb, roasted potatoes, green beans a la Grecque, Greek salad, and — but not limited to — homemade baklava and other assorted sweets. Drinks and hors d’oeuvres at 5 p.m., dinner at 6. If interested, please contact Dean or Doris ASAP at 518-477-4694.

REQUEST FOR SUPPORT — The Greenbush Youth Soccer League (GYSL) emailed us a request for financial support for its effort to build a facility. Roberto said the request  could be referred to committee. However, Murray noted that the GYSL is a private group and suggested we may not want to become involved because we then could be buried in similar requests.

NEXT MEETING — 6:15 p.m. Thursday, February 15, at Quigley’s. The speaker will be Jim Neidermeier, principal of Tech Valley High School.

PROGRAM: 2 speakers on cancer-related topics

Olivia Sterantino, a student at Maple Hill High School who is planning to be a short-term Rotary Youth Exchange student, is raising money for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS). Her goal is $10,000, and she is competing for a $1,500 scholarship and the title “Student of the Year.” (Click here for details on the latter.) The deadline for fundraising is March 1.

Olivia said she has a personal connection to the fight against leukemia. Her grandmother has had the disease, as have one of her best friends, since the age of seven, and her Spanish teacher’s daughter. She said money raised will go to research, medical bills, transportation for treatment, and other related items. The leukemia survival rate today is about 50%, and Olivia has adopted the motto “Cures Today, Not Someday.”

She notes that many LLS-supported therapies also are being used to treat patients with rare forms of stomach and skin cancers. They’re even being tested in clinical trials for patients with a range of cancers including lung, brain, breast, pancreatic and prostate cancers. And, some of the drugs are being tested for patients with other non-cancerous diseases such as diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis and multiple sclerosis.

Monika Annis introduced Kelly Walborn, Olivia’s aunt who 30 years ago was a Rotary Youth Exchange student in Sweden, Monika’s homeland. She said while she was there she went to a hospital alone by taxi and was diagnosed with tonsillitis, a major life event for a teenager. Her experiences there taught her resilience and to be independent, attributes she has needed throughout her life, especially since 10 years ago, at age 37, she was diagnosed with breast cancer.

Kelly spoke about the “spoon theory” — everything we do has a cost later. At the time of her diagnosis, Kelly was balancing both a fulltime job and fulltime studies for an MBA degree. After treatments, the cancer returned and, at one point, she had considerable collateral damage from the drugs and treatments.  Her career was on hold, she had not yet finished her MBA, and her company was sold. Kelly could not travel or drive a car during treatments.

After three years, Kelly had a third cancer diagnosis and faced a crisis, but after discussion with a social worker she decided to meet things head-on and take control of what she could do. She now is a breast cancer advocate on a national level. She is also a hospice volunteer and trains other volunteers. She participates on several boards in Albany and Hudson. She has been successful in getting grants through 3M, which had purchased her company earlier.

“Bowling for Vets,” one of our major annual fundraising events, is coming up fast. We need the assistance of every SRC member to spread the word. You can do that by posting this flyer on your workplace bulletin board, on your social media accounts, and/or by sharing it with everyone you can.

CLICK HERE  to download a printable PDF of the flyer for sharing/posting purposes.

You’ll note we have lowered the prices for both adults and kids, and modified the hours of bowling. Because of the price reduction, we definitely will need to sell as many lane sponsorships as possible to club members, local businesses, and other supporters of Rotary. Please see Murray Forth, Jim Leyhane, or Terry Brewer for details on how to accomplish that.

Thanks for your assistance!

This week’s frigid temperatures seem to confirm Punxsutawney Phil’s Groundhog Day prediction of six more weeks of winter, but at least the National Weather Service is forecasting no snow on Thursday.

That’s a good thing because we have an interesting dinner meeting scheduled for 6:15 p.m. at Quigley’s. In addition to meeting Olivia Sterantino, a Maple Hill High School student who is lining up a short-term Rotary Youth Exchange adventure, we will hear Kelly Walborn, a three-time cancer survivor, speak on “Depths to Surviving, Thriving, and Paying it Forward,” courtesy of Monika Annis.

We’ll get our winter culinary fortification with a menu featuring beef tips in mushroom gravy, antipasto salad, chef’s choice of side dishes, bread, dessert, and beverages. As always, the cash bar is available.

Please help dinner coordinator Debbie Brown plan for sufficient food and seating by letting her know no later than Tuesday evening if you plan to attend, and if you plan to bring a guest. Her email address is mdbrown@nycap.rr.com.

Here’s who already has signed up:

Pat Bailey
Terry Brewer
Debbie Brown
Peter Brown
Bill Dowd
Murray Forth
Julius Frankel
Ray Hannan
Phil Kellerman
Roberto Martinez
Becky Raymond
Debbie Rodriguez
Olivia Sterantino (guest)
Mrs. Sterantino (Olivia’s mother)
Kelly Walborn (guest)

Please ignore the flyers sent out earlier today seeking publicity for our upcoming “Bowling for Vets” fundraiser.

As it turns out, we may be able to obtain even more favorable pricing for the event which should serve to attract more families and groups to participate.

We’ll send out a modified flyer as soon as the event organizers nail down the final final details. Thanks for your cooperation.

SRC’s first indoor simulator golf tournament of the winter, scheduled for Saturday, February 10, has been called off.

Event coordinator Murray Forth made the announcement today, citing poor registration figures. He said there is a possibility the event will be rescheduled for a later date at Burden Lake Country Club.

Meeting at Quigley’s Restaurant
593 Columbia Turnpike
East Greenbush, NY
February 1, 2018

Members Attending (13): Roberto Martinez, Murray Forth, Pat Bailey, Debbie Rodriguez, Peter Brown, Debbie Brown, Dick Drumm, Julius Frankel, Bill Dowd, Phil Kellerman, Ray Hannan, Terry Brewer, Jim Leyhane.

Guests (1): Sue Goold Miller, Brookview Station Winery & Goold Orchards.

ANNOUNCEMENTS/BUSINESS

OPENING — President Roberto Martinez welcomed attendees. He also “treated” us to photos of the aftermath of his black-ice car accident on his steep, winding driveway. All airbags deployed, one tree was damaged, one vehicle was caved in, but no one was hurt.

ROTARY HOME COOKING MENUS– Next up in the member-hosted series will be “A Greek Evening” at the Calamaras residence on Saturday, February 17. The menu will include leg of lamb, roasted potatoes, green beans a la Grecque, Greek salad, and — but not limited to — homemade baklava and other assorted sweets. Drinks and hors d’oeuvres at 5 p.m., dinner at 6. Then, on Saturday, March 24, the Brewer residence will be the site of a “Cocktail Social” open to all Rotarians and family members. Terry says the time frame will be 6 to 10 p.m., and cost will be $10-20 per family. The evening will include a beer tasting, a wine tasting, and team trivia. Please be sure to contact Dean Calamaras ASAP if you are interested in attending the February dinner, and Terry if you are interested in the March social. … Two other events, neither of which have specific dates or themes yet, will be in April at the Forth residence, and in May at the Martinez residence in cooperation with Jim Leyhane.

INDOOR GOLF TOURNEY — Murray Forth reported that registration for the scheduled February 10 event at Burden Lake Country Club is very weak. At this point, we have only four teams signed up. Consideration is being given to moving the event to March.

BOWLING FOR VETS –– Jim Leyhane reports that plans are advancing for the March 4 fundraiser at the East Greenbush Bowling Center. A principal recipient will be the Bell Top School’s project to purchase a support dog to be trained for a military veteran in need. Other funds will go to various veterans-related efforts. Bell Top is issuing a challenge to other schools in the East Greenbush Central School District to participate. In addition, the new Rotaract club we are sponsoring at the UAlbany School of Public Health plans to participate. Bill Dowd is creating a flyer for the event and will distribute it to the club members. We will need to sell lane sponsorships, and will need desk volunteers to work the event. See Jim if you are available.

CLYNK CONTAINER REDEMPTIONS — Bill Dowd reported that he expects to have plastic collection bags and barcoded stickers available for members at next week’s meeting to get the fundraising effort going. He also will provide a “cheat sheet” to all members explaining the process of collecting and redeeming bottles and cans at local Hannaford supermarket dropoff stations. A supply of bags and stickers also will be provided at the Third Thursday breakfast meeting on February 15.

PEDIATRIC CATARACT PROJECT — Project lead Sean Williams of the Granville Rotary Club notified us that the project to which we contributed has gotten under way in Bangladesh. Click here for details.

YMCA MIRACLE LEAGUE DINNER — Organizer Shannon Romanowski still is in need of volunteers to help with the Sunday, February 11, event at the Greenbush YMCA. It is a cooperative effort of the Y, SRC, Rotaract, and the Kiwanis. She needs people for a variety of chores at different times, including food prep, serving and cleanup. If you can help, please email Shannon at sromanowski@cdymca.org or call her at 518-477-2570, extension 1200, as soon as possible.

MISCELLANY — Rotary is planning a “World Affairs Seminar” at Carroll University in Wisconsin in June. Earlybird registration deadline is February 28. Details of the event and registration requirements are available by clicking here. … We received a thank-you note for our financial support of the Freedom From Fistula Foundation. … We again will address the committee restructuring process at our February 22 meetings. Roberto will send out a note to members asking for people to indicate the committees on which they would like to serve. … We will have a Maple Hill High School student,Olivia Sterantino, participating in a short-version Rotary Youth Exchange visit to a country to be decided. Because it is a short-term visit, SRC will not be required to host a student from abroad as a quid pro quo. Olivia will attend our dinner meeting next week. … A reminder that we still have various items of club merchandise for sale — freezer tote bags, branded mugs, shirts, etc. See Roberto or Murray if interested. We also have received a $250 grant from the District to help with the tote bag project. … Terry Brewer and Ray Hannan will attend the next District Membership Committee workshop, scheduled for next Tuesday, Anyone else who is interested in participating is asked to contact Terry.

NEXT MEETING — 6:15 p.m. Thursday, February 8, at Quigley’s The speaker will be Kelly Walborn, a three-time cancer survivor.

PROGRAM: “The Evolution of Brookview Station Winery”

Pat Bailey introduced our guest speaker, Sue Goold Miller, co-owner of Goold Orchards and its companion Brookview Station Winery in Castleton.

Sue described the operation of the 108-year-old farm founded by her grandparents. It has evolved from being strictly an apple orchard to growing all types of fruits and adding a winery operation 12 year ago.

She and her husband, Ed Miller — the winemaker — recognized the financial need to diversify their business and taught themselves from a book how to make basic wine. They started by making a wine called Whistle Stop White from their estate-grown apples, producing a modest 350 bottles with the help of a U.S. Department of Agriculture startup grant. In a quirk of timing, they received the grant and their state winery license on the same day.

The passage of the state’s Farm Winery Bill and subsequent relaxation on some state regulations have helped the business grow, as has the addition of such cold-weather-hardy grapes as Frontenac, Marechel Foche, and Marquette they now grow. Ed also makes a variety of wines by purchasing stock from other providers, usually from throughout the Hudson Valley region, and sometimes buying other producers’ wines and tweaking them to make a different expression. They also now make a varieties of hard ciders.

Marketing is a major part of becoming known to consumers, and Brookview has employed the use of such things as dogs and historic local sites on their labels. They also have won numerous medals in wine judgings, although Sue noted that care must be exercised in entering competitions because of the prohibitive costs of some of them

She said consideration is being given to adding food to the farm’s tasting room offerings, and discussions have been held with a variety of chefs. She also recently catered a wine dinner for 35, and may do more such events.

Sue finished her presentation by leading us in a tasting of several Brookview beverages such as the Whistle Stop White semi-dry apple wine; Pomona a semi-sweet wine made from apples and pears that are crushed together then fermented; a Frontenac, a Moonlight Marquette red, and several ciders.

Last March, Steve Williams of the Granville Rotary Club in Washington County visited us to seek support for his effort to obtain a Rotary Global Grant in support of the “Bangladesh Pediatric Cataract Surgery Project.”

Steve described the workings of the Ispahani Islamia Eye Institute and Hospital in Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, a country with large numbers of persons suffering from vision maladies that he last visited in 2011. A previous project, carried out in conjuncti0n with the Dhaka West Rotary Club and the Burnt Hills-Ballston Spa Rotary Club in 2010, supported an extensive screening program that resulted in 560 cataract operations being performed.

Steve sought the Global Grant to support the purchase of a state-of-the-art optical cataract instrument for the eye hospital to replace its outmoded sonar imaging technology; to underwrite cataract surgeries on at least 150 children, and the training of eye specialists in the new technology to be able to continue the program.

SRC agreed to contribute to the latest, $50,000 effort that required partnerships between one or more Rotary clubs in the country benefiting, and one or more clubs elsewhere. Rotary Global Grants go to projects that are sustainable (i.e., demonstrating an immediate impact, providing specialized training to help the beneficiary area continue the work, and some form of ongoing financial support).

Now, after nearly a year of fundraising and administrative work, Steve says, “I am delighted to advise you that, after a number of small procedural holdups in the transfer of funds to ensure that this project can commence in Dhaka, the following took place:

“The funds which your clubs have so generously provided for this project have been transferred to the project account of the host club Dhaka West … $33,833 which comprised the funds pledged by (clubs in) Districts 7190 (Greater Capital Region), 7150 (Central New York), and 3281 (Bangladesh) plus The Rotary Foundation’s 100% match of the district pledges and 50% match of the eight clubs’ pledges. Added to the $9,500 from (pledges by) seven District 7190 clubs, plus Dhaka West’s own pledge of $6,667, the project’s total of $50,000 is now available for the project to proceed.”

Steve has promised to update as as the cataract surgery project goes forward.

We may not have mentioned it earlier, but we will have a tasting of wines from Brookview Station Winery as part of this Thursday’s dinner meeting at Quigley’s.

If this gives you further incentive to attend when winery owner Sue Goold Miller of Goold Orchards and the winery attends as our guest speaker and you haven’t sent in your RSVP, please be sure to let dinner coordinator Debbie Brown know first thing Wednesday morning so she can phone in our final attendance to the kitchen staff at Quigley’s.

Please, no later than noon Wednesday, to mdbrown@nycap.rr.com!

• The official obituary for beloved fellow Rotarian Richard Hodge, most recently of the Colonie-Guilderland club. Please note the memorial service details.

Richard G. Hodge Jr. of Lake George entered his eternal rest on January 9, 2018, at the age of 82 following a long illness. He was the son of the late Richard G. Hodge Sr. and Villette Jones Hodge.

Richard was a much beloved friend to many in the greater Capital Region, and his commitment since at least 1976 to Rotary International, both locally and globally, was unmatched. He was a member of four different Rotary clubs, had served as a Rotary Assistant Governor and Rotary Foundation coordinator, earned his Paul Harris Fellow Plus 4, and had traveled internationally on a Rotary mission to Zimbabwe, Africa. He also was active in Rotary’s effort to eradicate the polio virus, and was an inveterate “polio plunger” each New Year’s Day in Lake Georhge for at least 12 years in support of Rotary’s polio eradication campaign.

As an individual, Richard was as fine a person as one would ever hope to know. His dedication to helping others was legendary, and his determination and commitment to the numerous community projects he engaged in earned him the highest regard from his friends and fellow Rotarians. He was the epitome of Rotary’s motto: “Service Above Self.”

In particular, Richard was deeply active in the Gift of Life, a Rotary project that provides lifesaving heart operations to small children from around the world. He served as the treasurer of the regional Gift of Life for many years, and personally assisted in saving the lives of numerous children during his tenure.

These acts of kindness garnered Richard many Rotary awards, both from local Rotary clubs, from Rotary District 7190, and Rotary International. Recently he was recognized regionally with the “Over 40 Award,” a token of esteem for his involvement in community efforts to improve humankind. Richard especially enjoyed bowling with the Thursday Mixed Bowling League at Hometown Lanes in Mechanicville.

A celebration of his life will be held on Wednesday, February 7, from 5 to 7 p.m., with a time of sharing at 6:30 p.m. at the Catricala Funeral Home Inc., 1597 Route 9, Clifton Park. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in his memory to the Gift of Life, PO Box 2749, Glens Falls, NY 12801.

Many of us have met Sue Goold Miller as customers at her Goold Orchards/Brookview Station Winery in Castleton. On Thursday, we’ll all have the opportunity to listen to Sue take us behind the scenes for an inside look at the bustling business.

In keeping with the frigid temperatures and the concurrent need for comfort food, our menu will include sausage and peppers, antipasto salad, chef’s choice of sides, bread, dessert, and beverages.

As always, please be sure dinner coordinator Debbie Brown knows if you’re planning to attend — and whether you’re bringing a guest — the dinner meeting. Email her at mdbrown@nycap.rr.com no later than Tuesday evening if you’re not already on the reservation list below:

Pat Bailey
Terry Brewer
Debbie Brown
Peter Brown
Bill Dowd
Dick Drumm
Murray Forth
Ray Hannan
Phil Kellerman
Jim Leyhane
Roberto Martinez
Sue Goold Miller (guest speaker)
Debbie Rodriguez