Hi everyone. Hope you are all enjoying a lovely weekend. David Hulme gave us a quick update on the funds raised at the "Tom Sainsbury" night with the final amount of total funds raised, exceeding $24,000.00. Peter Vossen then went on to thank the hard work of everyone on the committee involved and commended them for their efforts and also thanked all of the sponsors involved. What a fantastic effort not only by Rotary but also all of the community that supported the event.
Leonie Tisch gave us a quick overview of her involvement in sitting on the 2023-2024 Nominating Committee for Zone 8 to select a candidate as a Rotary International Director. 13 Rotarians sat on this committee to select a director to serve on the Board of Rotary International for 2 years being 2025-2027. The chosen director will also represent Zone 10.
President Jane Belton gave us an overview of the upcoming Regional Council Elections. Jane has sent out all of the information by email to everyone and encourages members to take the time to read it and vote. Please feel free to contact Jane if you have any questions.
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Our speaker for this evening was Debby Bell from Cure Kids. Debby gave as an interesting talk about what Cure Kids and how one of their main focuses now is "Big Research for Little Lives".
Currently 40,000 children under the age of 14 are hospitalized every year for poverty related conditions.
One of the biggest health issues facing Kiwi Kids is Acute Rheumatic Fever and Rheumatic Heart Disease.
Pasifika children were over 100 times more likely to be hospitalized with Rheumatic Fever than children of European or other ethnicities, while Maori children were 40 times more likely. The research that Cure Kids are doing is designed to help reduce this.
- Designing and testing a vaccine that will have broad coverage of Group A Strep.
- Faster more accurate diagnosis.
- Ways to deliver monthly injections that can prevent Rheumatic Heart Disease.
As an example of their amazing research, Cot deaths in New Zealand dropped by a third due to research funded by Rotary.
Debby said that it is only with the support of enlightened Rotarians that we will be able to keep the pressure on, change history, and the future health of our children and grandchildren, well into the future.
As a club, we have always put a big emphasis on raising money on Red Nose day, through the sale of cupcakes.
Debby thanked us for this as a club and Maz McIvor presented Debby with a "cheque" for $2521.00 which was raised on our last Red Nose Day.
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Our good sort for this week was Lynette Stanley for the fantastic work she did in juggling guests and tables for the Tom Sainsbury evening. Well deserved.
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Just a reminder that it is coming close to planting time for Spud in a Bucket - Labour Weekend, and don't forget that if you don't want to grow a spud, you might like to donate a bucket to someone.
Fantastic idea!
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So the clues for last weeks mystery Rotarian were as follows:
I was milking a herd of cows by myself at the age of 13
I won a Rotary essay writing contest.
I was joint dux of my secondary school.
I had the pleasure of trying to figure this one out and it really had me scratching my head. I firstly went through our list of members and tried to eliminate those that I thought were probably classed more as townies than someone who might be milking cows at 13. Sue Whiting was one of those I eliminated first as with her past life being involved more in the beauty industry, I just could not see her up to her elbows in "green hand cream" supplied courtesy of the cows. I then started looking for a "clever cookie", to be the winner of an Essay writing contest, but especially to be joint Dux of their secondary school. I must admit that I ended up having to phone quite a few members to try and figure this one out and having lots of laughs along the way, often being told that they were at the opposite end of the schooling spectrum. I thought I had cracked it when I rang Beth Taylor, but I may have left her somewhat traumatized after dredging up memories of her being very bright at school, but there was always this one girl who just beat her every time, and she always finished second.... sorry Beth.
Anyway it came right down to the evening of Rotary and I was still trying to figure it out and I was looking around the room when I spied my final candidate and made the bold call of naming David Parker.... and I was right!!!
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Lots of things coming up for us to help with over the next few months, so keep an eye on the newsletter and help out where you can. Could be a good opportunity to bring along a friend who may be interested in what Rotary does. 😊
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