President Sandy Lane brought the meeting to order at 12:15 PM at Purkey’s Pink Apple with Dave Wilson leading the Pledge of Allegiance and Dave Wilson giving the Invocation.

 

 

None since it was a club assembly

 

 

Ad Buck – Ron Furman - Mehoopany United Methodist Church meatloaf dinner Sat Sept 28  Take outs 3-4 PM, Dinner 4 PM. Smashed red potatoes, gravy, Harvard beets, peas, applesauce, homemade pies and desserts.  $11.00 per person.

 

 

Please pay your club dues for 2019-2020 as soon as possible if you have not already done so. Thank you if you have already done so. Cost is $135 for period July 1, 2019 through June 30, 2020. 

 

 

The next Flash Meeting will be tonight Thursday, Sept 19, 2019 at 5:30 pm at Bogey’s Restaurant.

 

 

 

The next meeting will be Monday evening Oct 7 at 6 pm at the Tunkhannock Library.

 

Ann Way has dropped off the tickets at the local sites, so tickets are available for local purchase.

 

Posters and rack cards are now available. If you take them to sites, please let Ron know where you have taken them to avoid duplication of efforts.

 

Ron sent around a volunteer sign-up sheet, but if you are not at a meeting, please contact Ron directly. You can ask family to help at the Festival.

 

Sandy indicated that vendor spaces are now full.

 

Sue Kelly has tickets to sell to your family & friends.

 

 

Fri, Sept 20 6-8 PM at Shadowbrook will be the first Fireside Chat.  There will be a cash bar and light appetizers. It will be a learning opportunity for new and senior members. 17 people are signed up.

 

Glenn Holcombe and Ann Way are working on a trip to Boyerstown on Sat Nov 2 to the antique car museum and a train ride with dinner on board. The bus would leave Tunkhannock at noon and go to the 3 Dog Garage (free entry) with 80-90 cars (mostly Ford related), followed by Coldbrookdale Railroad trip ($75 per person) with 2 hr ride with dinner on the train.  Glenn will do a detailed e-mail through Club Runner with details and menu.  It was suggested that maybe the Club could make a donation to the Garage charity since admission is free. Ann is looking into the bus costs.

 

See the Sept. District newsletter for information on the various events and activities happening in District 7410. Please support our fellow Rotarians at other clubs in our District for their fun upcoming activities/events.

 

 

Rotary Leadership Institute is coming up Oct 26 at Lackawanna College in Scranton from 7:30 AM to 3:30 PM.  It is a BOGO opportunity.  For every 2 members paid for by a club, 1 will be refunded after they attend the course.  According to the RLI website, the cost is $100 per person. Pres. Sandy noted that the club will pay the cost for any Tunkhannock Rotarians who wish to attend (let Sandy or Elaine know if you would like to attend).  The Graduate course offered will be on the “ABC’s of Fundraising for Your Club or District”.

 

 

Elaine shared the budget numbers for Aug 2019 that she presented to the Board on Sept 17. She also shared the amounts for our Tunkhannock Rotary Foundation 501c3, most of which represents donations for Fireworks and the Festival.

 

Also, a Grant account was set up to deal with District Grants, including the new District grant we have received for the inclusive playground swing for Lazybrook Park. This project will be undertaken in the spring when the weather is suitable.

Prior to adjournment, Ruth Gorski led the recitation of the 4-Way Test by the attendees.

 

 

 

It will be the 3rd Sat of Oct, headed by Norm Werkheiser. Please sign up to help and meet at 9 AM meeting at the Fireplace Restaurant parking lot.

 

 

The 2019-2020 final budget was adopted by the Board at its Sept 17 meeting and was available for members to view at each table.

 

 

Sandy will order dictionaries for the 3^rd graders at Middle School (150-200 children) and she is looking for a new chair for 2020. We need to put stickers in the front of the books for distribution in the Oct/Nov time frame.  Sue Kelly volunteered to chair it this committee going forward.

 

 

The Nominations Committee comprised of Sandy Lane, Mike Markovitz and Terry Detrick will be building a slate of candidates to be presented to the membership the first meeting in Nov prior to the formal election of Officers at the Annual Meeting the first Thursday of Dec. Please let Terry, Sandy or Mike know if you are interested, especially to serve as President for 2021-2022 (Pres Elect 2020-2021).

 

 

Committee Chair Patty Ehrenzeller had proposed that we support the Methodist Manor Fall Open House/Fair but it was too late to do so this year.  So plans are to put it on our agenda for next year for a $100 donation for their Fair day.

 

 

Jodi will be meeting with Jocmel Rotary Club to help get final paperwork on our Global Grant. We put in $10K, District $30K and Rotary Foundation (RF) will match $30K.

 

Sandy and Carol described the RF donation process and how 50% of the money donated comes back to the District after 3 years.

 

 

Our $135 annual dues have not changed for approximately 20 years. Sandy presented a table that details what we pay out in dues to RI and District compared to what we take in in our $135 dues. As of this year, our dues do not cover what we are paying out in RI & District dues nor club administrative costs. Sandy polled the membership and opened the floor to discussions.  All agreed we needed to increase the dues.

 

There was some discussion on how to deal with the fact that the club pays RI and District dues in early July, but many members do not pay their dues until much later.  In fact, approximately 1/4 of our members owe dues for 2019-2020, so the club has had to pay for them without the Club receiving their dues money yet. One possibility discussed is to move the dues deadline to April 1-June 30 with a possible discount value and then a penalty added if dues are more than a certain number of days late (the way that our real estate taxes are handled).

 

It was suggested that all dues plus administrative costs (guest speakers lunches, guest speakers gifts, unreimbursed activities such as Fireside chats, membership events, etc) be added up and a number proposed by the Board for a fair dues to cover everything.  This will entail an amendment of our club Bylaws, which will need to be done anyway, since we need to adopted the new Rotary Club Constitution and Bylaws generated from this Spring’s Council on Legislation.