We held the kickoff meeting for the 2003 Sporting Clay shoot on October 17 to prepare for the sixth annual event to be held April 26-27, 2003, the last weekend in April. Basically, we will fine-tune what we have been doing for the last five years. Some of the tweaks are to get more adult shooters to accompany the Boys & Girls Club members on their shooting round, start the Saturday evening meal earlier, raise the price for unsponsored shooters to $80, have the environmental committee collect aluminum cans, and provide a first aid kit.

Don Day said he would not be able to ramrod the team doing follow-up to our solicitation letters. This is a key job that remains open. Would one of you that love sales please step forward? Also, Christy Berger, who had volunteered to do our marketing had to drop out of the club leaving another key position open.

We mailed four hundred solicitation letters in mid-December. Considering the season, we have had a good response, so far. Twelve businesses or individuals have replied and committed $2,925 plus an auction item. This compares to $5,800 at this time last year. The two corporate sponsors signed so far are Brannan Paving and Ruth Constant. Our first three station sponsors are Barbara Briggs, Victoria OMS Associates, and Victoria Business Magazine. Likewise, the three youth sponsors are Colonial Funeral Homes, Cole Cole & Easley, and Associated Engineers & Surveyors. The four auction sponsors are HRH Insurance, Cornerstone Properties, Harrison Waldrop & Uherek, and Victoria’s House of Lamps.

We have scheduled another key-player meeting on January 23 at the Boys and Girls Club on Hopkins Street. We will work out the details for the rest of the campaign. All interested parties are invited. Please, let Jack Whitmire know if you are coming, so we can arrange lunch.

For new members, our big annual fundraiser is a five-stand sporting clay shoot. Pairs of traps are placed at five stations and simulate upland game hunting including rabbits. Shooters practice on Saturday then attend a dinner and auction that night. There are two auctions—a charity auction of donated items and a Calcutta where the shooters are sold.

We sell sponsorships to the event. There are four levels of sponsors—corporate sponsor ($600), station sponsor ($300), youth sponsor ($200), and auction sponsor (any amount including auction items). Sponsorships is the largest revenue center followed by the charity auction. A raffle is another, smaller revenue source. The remaining revenue comes from entry fees, practice rounds, and games. ▲

With one half of the Rotary year behind us, we still have six months to Sow the Seeds of Love! So, much opportunity to serve others remains.

We will work hard with Jack Whitmire, Joe Truman, Tim Braaten and the Boys and Girls Club on our annual Clay Shoot. This is our big fundraiser of the year, and we need everyone to participate! From our share of the proceeds, we are able to fund several worthwhile causes in our community. See the Donations Committee report in this newsletter to see some examples of the funding that our club has executed.

Another exciting project is the Productivity Enhancement Program that we are hosting for the Russians. Please refer to Jim Westermeier’s related article. As our international president, Bichai Rattakul, stated, “When we reach across borders and oceans to collaborate on international service projects, we turn strangers into friends.” How blessed we are to be able to be a part of this program!

As we approach Rotary’s 100 year anniversary, our Centennial Project committee is working hard. They have been in meetings with the Parks Department to come up with a workable (and affordable!) project that will commemorate this milestone. If you would like to be a part of this effort, please get in touch with Mary Hodgkinson.

Finally, our club should be very proud of our growing membership. In a year that had no membership goals prescribed by RI, we have done remarkably well. I challenge the membership, especially past-presidents and past board members, to take a pro-active role in getting to know the newer members. It may have been 15 years since you joined, and you feel quite comfortable…but to a person who has been in the club for 15 weeks, the group can be a tad intimidating.

Loosen up, reach out, sit at a new table, and meet someone new. There are some interesting folks in the crowd! I hope you’ll get to know them. They probably have a few questions about the club and how things “work”. You are a wealth of information. Share it!

Thanks for all that you do and all that you are going to do in the last half of this Rotary year! ▲

Russians are coming for Productivity training Jim Westermeier

We're about a month away from the arrival of the Russian delegates—12 young male contractors. An interpreter will join the group in Victoria. We are making good progress, but still need help in all areas and much work remains to be done. We especially need help in setting up business training contacts and in underwriting civic/social events.

Overall project coordinator is Jim Westermeier, assisted by Mike Kinsey. Coordinators for the various areas are: Housing—Leslie de Soliz, Media—Bob Martin, Transportation—Gerald Parker and Peter Riesz, Civic and Social Events—Geri Schroeder, Business Training—Carole Parks and Annette Alonzo.

This is a wonderful opportunity for the three Victoria Rotary clubs to make a statement on the value of Rotary to the community and to the world. So get involved and find a way to help make this the best project we've ever undertaken! ▲

Donations Committee recommends nine grants Sally Covacevich

The Donations Committee received 27 applications for grants.

The chairman, Art Munford, called a meeting in November to review the applications and to select several not-for-profit organizations to recommend to the Board of Directors as grant recipients. Nine were submitted to and approved by the board. They were:

Salvation Army $1,500

Victoria County 4-H 1,500

Billy T. Cattan Recovery Outreach 1,500

Chandler Elementary 1,000

YMCA 1,000

Food Bank 1,000

Hope of South Texas 500

Mid Coast Family Services 500

Victoria Community Theatre 500

Total donations $9,000

Special thanks to Art and Cally, and the following committee members, Bobby Schaar, co-chair, Bill McLeod, Bill Ruddock, Neal Stevenson and for their time and effort in reviewing and selecting these groups. ▲

Macaroni Fest Thanks Joe Truman

I thank the volunteers and donors who helped make our "Sausage Booth" at the Macaroni Fest a success. Your effort helped earn over $1,200.00 for Rotary International's war on polio. Special thanks to Hans Kohler and the Victoria Country Club for their generosity and to Hayden Gregg, the Feedlot Steakhouse, for helping pull this event off without a hitch. Without your help none of this could have happened.

I, also, send out a big "Well Done" to our Rotarians who had a major role in make the Macaroni Fest the success that it was. A "well done" to Phyllis Hunt and the whole Victoria Chamber of Commerce for coming up with the idea for the festival and pulling it all off successfully. A "well done" to Terry Robinson and Peggy Cunningham, your hard work paid off. And "well done" to Hayden Gregg and Omar Rachid, you helped make the Macaroni Fest a fun event.

Once again thank you to the volunteers. I hope next year is as much fun. By the way, sausages and hot dogs are still available. ▲

If anyone knows of a good speaker or topic, please, let the program committee know (Pat Pachta, Bill Brown, Phyllis Hunt, Randy Grant, Fred Sanchez). Better yet, if any club member would be interested in taking a month at a time and be responsible for programs that month, we would appreciate their volunteerism. A program schedule is posted on our web site. ▲

Polly and Harold Vick did a great job with the Christmas party. The band and carolers were both great. The decorations carried out the theme, Sow the seeds of love. Thank you, Sally Covacevich, for gathering all the items and showing us how to assemble them.

Attendance was up this year. There were about 170 Rotarians and guests there. Our club had the most attendees followed by Northside then Sunrise.

Look in the scrapbook on the web site and you will see a lot of smiles. ▲

Our high hopes of seeing a bonanza from our partnership with the Victoria Community Theatre to raffle a vehicle fell when we had not sold enough tickets to cover the minimum cost. We needed to sell 800 tickets to cover the cost of the vehicle. A week before the drawing we had only sold 400 tickets. The vehicles (Choice of Ford Mustang or F-150) were not as appealing as we had thought. On the day that we sold tickets in front of Wal-Mart we sold only 12 tickets. ▲

Ken Nathan celebrated 40 years in the Victoria Rotary Club by retiring from his Club Secretary post. He has been the Secretary since 1975. He has more years of perfect attendance that any other member of the club—39 years at the beginning of the Rotary year.

So, the back of the meeting room will look unfamiliar for a while. Vance Riley has volunteered to replace Ken.▲

Club took an active part in Toys for Tots Sally Covacevich

This year the Community/Human Development Committee worked with the Blue Santa and Toys for Tots Programs to provide volunteers and money to purchase toys for the needy. December 3 was the kickoff campaign with a program given by Chief Braaten and Dexter Eaves at our Rotary meeting. Later that evening, Peggy Cunningham had her first annual "Toys for Tots" party inviting all fellow Rotarians to participate in this worthwhile event. ▲

Rotarians Give Salvation Army a Helping Hand Sally Covacevich

Fifteen Rotarians and their family members volunteered for the bell ringing on Dec 7, 14, and 21 at Moody's Post Office on Sam Houston. One of the primary goals with our participation in Rotary is to develop camaraderie among our members.

Thanks for Sowing the seeds of love to the following Rotarians:

Dec 7th John Lenihan, Ann Castner

Mike Luster, Sheila Westerholm

William and daughter Nicole Weempe

Dec 14th Randy Grant, Laura Smith

Joe Truman, Bill McLeod

David Cooke, Topsy Spellmann

Dec 21st Robert Clegg, Dinah Mills

Mary and daughter Liz Hodgkinson

Sally and son, Alan Covacevich ▲

Victoria Rotary Club Receives an A+ from Rowland Elementary Sally Covacevich

On December 19th, Jerry Trevino, Sally Covacevich and Cally Fromme in absentia received a thank you card in appreciation for the donation money toward Rowland Elementary's Reading Program. Diane Dabney, reading teacher coordinator, has purchased books for the second graders which will be presented to the students on their birthdays. On the inside cover of each book, Mrs. Dabney has included a "Happy Birthday" note to the student from our club.

To further enhance the reading program adults are needed to read to the children. If you can spare some time, consider volunteering to read at some time during the school day. This even includes the noon hour. ▲

Six join Victoria Rotary Club in the fall quarter

                
             David Cooke                     Wondra Chang                   Derek Cox       

               
             Tami Brown                        Libby Meek                    Rodger Keele

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