Happy New Year! Welcome to the second decade of the 21st Century!
It seems ages ago that we had our last Club meeting, on December 17th, but George Foster brought us an interesting program. Lucinda de Lormier of the Heiling County Library made an interesting presentation about the Nevada County Libraries’ adaptation to technology, and their ability to supply materials in such formats as DVDs, audiotapes, CDs and good old-fashioned books. Ebook downloads are in the works for some point in the future. The Q&A period also brought attention to the current debate about privatizing library staffing. An interesting program! Thanks, George!
Allan Rogers and Ron Knaus presented the Club with a nicely framed copy of a Nevada City newspaper issue from 1935 announcing the first meeting of our Club. Tom Coleman is looking for a good place to display it at the National Hotel. Thanks to Allan and Ron for preserving this bit of our history. John Hensley reported some good news and some sad news from San Jose del Cabo, Mexico. After some 25 years of partnership with us, the local Rotary club there has dissolved. However, our good work goes on and John reported on the donation of a wheelchair to the local hospital. If you are interesting in working on our partnership with the Cabo community, talk to John or International Service Chair Carolyn Inglis. We also had reports on our work for the Salvation Army bell-ringing project. Although a scheduling mishap cut our service from two days to one, a generous donation from George Rebane should be sufficient to keep the bragging rights in Nevada City for our annual competition with the Grass Valley club as to who can raise the most for the Salvation Army. Thank you, George, and thanks to Gayle Denney for organizing our participation! Cathy Wilcox-Barnes also reported on our annual cooperation with Women of Worth to buy gifts for a local family in need. Truly the holiday season brings out the best in our Rotary community!
In sad news, Pete Brost reported the passing of long-time club Treasurer Noel Carter, who fell from his roof during the recent snowstorm. A celebration of Noel’s life will be held at the Grass Valley Elks Lodge on Sunday January 17th at 1 p.m.
In addition to our usual 50/50 raffle, we also raffled off 4 bottles of wine left over from the club wine-tasting fundraiser. That raised an additional $25 toward the proceeds from that event which, though still being tallied, should exceed our $1,000 goal for our first effort. The Club Board recommends that PE Eleanor continue this project next year. If you have any interest in participating, let me know.
Our next meeting is this Thursday, and the program is to be presented by Brittany Juergensen of the staff of the Sierra Nevada Conservancy. She’ll have an update on this new agency’s programs to conserve open space and other natural resources in the Sierra Nevada, while promoting local economic activity. Should be an interesting program. See you for lunch!
