This Thursday, November 21, 2024, the Southern Rensselaer County Rotary Club will be hosting its weekly meeting at Moscatiello’s on Route 4 in North Greenbush. Joining us will be Ryan French and he will be speaking “Disaster Response” in our local area. As usual if you are unable to join use in person you may do so remotely using the Zoom Link on our calendar page of our website.
Entree choices for the evening include; Antipasto Salad, Eggplant Parmesan, or Spaghetti and Meatballs. Looking forward to seeing everyone this Thursday.
This Thursday, November 14, 2024 at 6:00pm the Southern Rensselaer County Rotary Club will be holding its weekly meeting at Moscatiello’s on Route 4 in North Greenbush. Joining us as or guest presenter will be Lisa Jackson from the Schenectady Rotary Club. Lisa will be presenting on the very successful Cornhole Tournament that their club sponsored as a fund raiser for the Schenectady City School District. We will also be having representatives from the East Greenbush Central School District joining us as we begin to plan our potential Cornhole Tournament to raise money for a community room for members of the East Greenbush Community. We will do our best to make sure that Zoom is up and running if you would like to try and join us remotely, however due to the large expected turnout we may have some audio issues with Zoom.
Minutes Southern Rennselaer County Rotary Meeting November 7, 2024
Attended by: Roberto Martinez, Phil Kellerman, Carole Heaney, Jim Leyhane, Kevin Leyhane, Dick Drumm, Pat Bailey, Peter Brown, Deb Brown, Ray Hannan, Chris Bystroff, and Andy Leyhane. Ruth Russell joined in via Zoom.
Next week’s speaker will be Lisa Jackson from the Rotary Club in Schenectady.
Roberto welcomed everyone. The pledge was conducted.
Speaker Bob Connor was introduced by Phil Kellerman. Bob spoke about the history of Juneteenth. Bob specifically talked about General Gordon Granger as the man behind Juneteenth and James Montgomery, abolitionist warrior, as major contributors to advocating for the recognition that blacks solders made to the Union effort and the freeing of slaves, resulting in the Juneteenth holiday.
Bob was kind of enough to offer the sale of three of his books and proceeds were donated to our water project. $152 was raised via the sales.
In regular business, Roberto mentioned that Murray was moving Rotary memorabilia and other items out of storage. These items were previously on display at Quigley’s restaurant where we used to meet.
Concerning our Rotary water project, Peter reported the good news that a bank account had been established in Kenya. The next step is payment for the hydro geological survey.
Phil provided a tax status update by saying he had submitted to the IRS the application for reinstatement of 501c4 status and the financial filings for the past 4 years. He credited Terry for doing the bulk of the work.
A speaker has been selected for December 5th. Phil said that he is seeking a speaker for December 19. However, a live meeting will not be able to be held at Moscatiellos since they will be booked during the holidays. A decision will be made as to how to meet that day.
Roberto said that a CNY Rotary member orientation was held October 22nd. Carole said that she learned a tremendous amount as she attended the P1 part as she is a relatively new member. Jim took P2 and Roberto took the graduate part.
It was announced that the Scotia Rotary Club was making available washable menstrual kits to be distributed to girls all over the world who do not have access to menstrual products.
Club members decided to once again adopt a family for the holidays via Circles of Mercy. Roberto said that we needed a leader to spearhead our efforts to collect holiday gifts for the adopted family.
The Shelter Box annual event is to be held November 14 at 8 pm EST at ShelterBoxUSA.org/virtual.
Roberto said that the Rotary Foundation is embarking on a large fundraising campaign to build the endowment to over 2 billion dollars to enable the Foundation to issue district grants.
CYN is sponsoring a youth exchange at the CYN Rotary Conference in Albany, April 4-6, 2025. They are looking for a donation of $500 from each club in the district, and want a response by the end of November.
The Legacy Brunch will be held on Sunday, November 17th at the Doubletree in Binghamton, New York.
The Rotary Presidential Peace Conference will be held February 20-22, 2025 in Istanbul.
The Rotary International Convention will be held in Calgary June 21-25, 2005. It will be in Minneapolis in 2028 and in Chicago in 2030.
In other business, Deb Brown said the she and Peter will host the holiday party on December 12 at their house. Arrangements are being made to order food from La Bella in Valatie. A sign up sheet will be handed out at next week’s meeting.
Pat said she is interested in helping to organize a defensive driving course at the Nassau free library.
Jim announced that he still has soap to sell to raise funds for the club.
Roberto mentioned that Hoffman’s Car Wash may have tickets for car washes that we can sell to raise money. He will talk to Murray about this.
This Thursday, November 7, 2024 at 6:00 pm the Southern Rensselaer County Rotary club will be holding its weekly meeting at Moscatiello’s Restaurant on Route 4 in North Greenbush. Joining us a this week guest presenter will be Robert Connor. The title of his presentation will be “Post-Election Nonpartisan Special, Regardless of Results: Juneteenth as a Hopeful Symbol of National Unity.”
If you are unable to join us in person you may do so using the Zoom link located on our calendar page. Entree choices for the week: Rustica Salad with Chicken, Baked Sausage and Peppers, or Cheese Ravioli. Looking forward to seeing everyone this Thursday.
Due to the Halloween Holiday the Southern Rensselaer County Rotary Club will not be having its weekly meeting. We will be returning to Moscatiello’s next Thursday at 6:00 pm for our weekly meeting. Joining us that night will be Robert Connor, and he will be speaking on “The History of Juneteenth”. Entree choices will be Rustica Salad, baked sausage and peppers, or cheese ravioli.
This Saturday the Rotary Leadership Institute will be holding training sessions in Albany, NY. at the First Unitarian Universalist Society of Albany located at 405 Washington Ave, Albany NY 12206 from 7:30-3:30. To register use the link below.
Meeting Clipboard 10/24/24: Present: (8) Pat Bailey, Peter Brown, Debbie Brown, Dick Drumm, Murray Forth, Ray Hannan, Jim Leyhane, Andy Leyhane Guests: Tom and Cindy Leonard On Zoom: (5) Dean and Doris Calamaras, Charlie Foote, Carole Heaney, Roberto Martinez
President Roberto Martinez called the meeting to order Theme for the year: Grow membership, do good in the world, leverage social capital and have fun!
Program: October 24 is World Polio Day. To commemorate Rotary’s efforts to eradicate polio, a video of an interview with Dr. Martha Lepow (now deceased) hosted by Dr. James Leyhane was resurrected from our archives and shown. Dr. Lepow was part of the group developing appropriate methodologies to mass produce the Salk Polio vaccine. By the spring of 1954 vaccines were available to all school aged children in the US (with parental consent) In 1988 the effort to eradicate polio world wide became Potary International’s signature effort. Additional partners included World Health Organization, UNICEF, Centers for Disease Control.. The Gates Foundation joined this effort in 2013. We are “this” close!!
Meeting Notes:
Moving things out of storage: Murray will empty the unit to avoid November rent and will bring contents to the next meeting for distribution to anyone who wants any of it. Remaining contents will be disposed.
Global Grant update: Peter reports the only “missing piece” is the establishment of the bank account to which funds will be deposited. All other questions have been satisfactorily answered
Tax status: no update
Membership: a new process is outlined at Rotary.org/join to make it easier to contact interested potential members
Albany Waterway updates: Peter announced that the DOT study published recommendations regarding I-787 do not include the Albany Waterway project. Letters to DOT regarding this glaring omission are encouraged.
Speakers for the upcoming year are needed; contact Phil with your potential speaker suggections;
Oct 31: NO MEETING….Halloween Nov 7: Post-Election Nonpartisan Special, Robert Conner, guest of Phil Nov 14: School and Community Literacy and Heath Wellness Center, Lisa Jackson from Schenectary Club will outline their project. Representatives from East Greenbush BOE and Administration will also attend Nov 21: Richard French on disaster response, guest of Ron Annis Nov. 28 THANKSGIVING no meeting Ded 5: Phil arranging for a speaker Dec 12: HOLIDAY party and silent auction at the Brown’s
RLI NEA Seminar District 7180 November 2 from 7:30-3:30 at the Unitarian Universalist Society of Albany, 405 Washington Avenue, Albany. Club will cover $70 cost.
CNY News: CNY Rotary conference April 4-6 in Albany. The district is hoping to have 50-60 Exchange Students attend and are asking clubs to donate $500 to support this effort (respond by end of November)
FundRaisers: Cornhole Tournament…..info from our November 14th program will help shape this event Café Cappriccio: Andy and Jim… hoping to involve Columbia HS support as this will help fund the Community Room Soap….ongoing…See Jim L
This Thursday October 24, 2024 the Southern Rensselaer County Rotary Club will be holding its weekly meeting at Moscatiello’s at 6:00pm. The presentation for the meeting will be a focus on World Polio Day. A video taped interview with Dr. Martha Lepow will be shown as part of the presentation. As usual if you are unable to attend in person you may do so remotely using the Zoom Link located on our calendar page of the website.
Entree choices will be Antipasto Salad, Chicken Limon, or Portabella Mushroom Ravioli. Looking forward to seeing everyone this Thursday.
Tomorrow’s in person meeting has been canceled and the meeting will take place exclusively remotely on Zoom. The Zoom Link can be found on our calendar page. The reason for this move will be explained during the meeting. Dean Calamaris will still be our presenter and he will be joining us via Zoom. Looking forward to seeing everyone remotely tomorrow night.
This Thursday, October 17, 2024, the Southern Rensselaer County Rotary Club will be hosting its weekly meeting at Moscatiello’s at 6:00 pm. Joining us will be SRC’s very own Dean Calamaras. Dean will be speaking about the novel “The Baron of Second Avenue”, a book that he wrote the forward for. As usual if you are unable to join us in person you may do so remotely using the link located on our calendar page.
Menu choices for the evening include: Antipasto Salad, Chicken Lemon, or Portabella Mushroom Ravioli. Looking forward to seeing everyone this Thursday.
On Thursday, October 10, 2024 the Southern Rensselaer County Rotary Club will be meeting a Moscatiello’s at 6:00pm for our weekly meeting. Joining us this week will be Dr. Jonathan Newell, a professor at RPI. Dr. Newell will be speaking on the topic of “Imaging the Body’s Interior with Electricity”. Due a number of conflicts we are unsure if we will be able to make this presentation hybrid so please try to attend in person if you are able. You may still try to join us remotely but we can’t guarantee that the link will be up and running at this time. Looking forward to seeing everyone this Thursday.
Southern Rensselaer County Rotary Club 