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May 22
Anita Stangl
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June 5
Dr. Catherine Julliard
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Next Week...
May 22
"Alliance for Smiles"
Anita Stangl
Upcoming Meetings...
May 29
"UCLA Chancellor"
Gene Block
June 5
"Medical Trauma Systems
in Cameroon, West Africa"
Dr. Catherine Julliard
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This Week...
WVRC Club Meeting 5.15.08
Call Meeting To Order-President Chris
Pledge of Allegiance given by Mark Block
Song-Lenny Friedman, “You’re A Grand Old Flag”
Invocation-Mike Newman substituting for Shane Waarbroek.
“Dear Lord, bless our wonderful Rotary Club, its members, its spouses, its children as we move into what will be for many members a graduation or wedding season. Bless our children and grandchildren, and as my kids were taught in Methodist school to pray, “Thank you God for food and friends”.
Guests of Rotarians:
PP Steve Sherer’s spouse-Debra.
Peggy Bloomfield’s daughter-in-law-Patty Bloomfield
Peter More’s spouse- Shirley More
PP Dave Whithead’s spouse-Karen
PDis Gov. Andy Anderson’s spouse-Pat & Ron
Lenore Mulryan’s spouse-Joe
Katia Vaisberg brought Vice-President of Rotaract, Nicole.
Jack Harris’s spouse-Pauline
V-P Ed Gauld’s spouse, co-President of Auxiliary-Kathie.
George Cox’s spouse-Mary Francis
Lenny Friedman’s Special guest and son-David Friedman
Visiting Rotarians:
Joe from LA 5.
President Chris made special mention of John Woodall’s recent trip to Austria. John and his wife visited their eldest son who is a student at the University of Austria. John was unable to attend a Rotary Club in Austria because of the many activities they were engaged in during their 9 day trip. President Chris and John agreed that the trip was worth a $100 fine, not 100 Euros!!
President-Elect Sean McMillan made a request to President Chris by asking if there were any members in attendance who would willingly admit that their mobile phone rang during the meeting? Not surprisingly, no one admitted to hearing a phone ring. President Chris stated that he did not hear a phone ring so he would not pursue the matter any further. Much to the amusement of the members.
Announcements:
May 29, 2008 UCLA Chancellor Gene Block will be speaking at our club thanks to the efforts of Peggy Bloomfield. So mark your calendars!! We would like to give him a big welcome. This is also Spouse’s Day.
June 16, 2008 at 5pm in the UCLA Faculty Center there will be a large reception for visiting Rotarians in conjunction with the upcoming International Rotary Convention. Rotary members who have invited the visiting Rotarians to stay at their home will be hosting the dinner. V-P Ed Gauld and President Chris will be providing the assignments for each member who will be hosting a guest. They are waiting for the District to give us a final tally on the number of visitors.
We are hoping for a very good turnout to welcome the visitors and this will be a good opportunity to display our hospitality. There will be food and a bar at the event.
June 21, 2008 will be the day that President Chris will be demoted to being a regular member of our club. Invitations have been mailed and should be received by this weekend.
President Chris and Peter More discussed whether or not the club should be informed of an upcoming recognition that the WVRC will be receiving. They agreed not to share it at this time. Therefore, I am not mentioning it. You didn’t hear anything about it from me.
Westwood Rotary President Chris Bradford will discuss Rotary plans at a meeting of the Westwood Rotary Club Auxiliary on Wednesday, June 4 at Eloise Siskel's home. Our first lady, Sharon Bradford, will also fly in from Kansas City to be at the meeting which starts at 11:30 a.m. Call Margie Downie, 310-394-4827 to make reservations.
Peggy Bloomfield will install the new officers, with Marie Rolf the incoming president of the Auxiliary. Marie's Board includes Eloise, adviser; Shirley More and Pat Anderson, vice presidents in charge of programs; Kathy Gauld, corresponding secretary; Sally Newman, recording secretary, and Margie, treasurer.
The Siskel home is at 145 North Layton Drive, just off Sunset Boulevard.
Chris will outline the worldwide Rotary International Conference plans which also is scheduled next month in Los Angeles, and the Westwood club's role in the Conference.
Marie also will discuss some of the Auxiliary's plans for the coming year which begin with a Hawaiian Luau at the Encino home of Leo Tseng on Saturday, July 26.
All Rotarians and their spouses are invited to the meetings which include lunch at a $5 donation. The lunch chairmen this year have been Ava Peplow and Eleanor More. Starting in September the lunches will be directed by Audrey McQuay for Tuesday meetings and Helen Beasom for Wednesdays. The group rotates between the two days to allow more people to attend.
Roz Nelson is the new telephone committee chairman and Jessie Robinson is in charge of hospitality.
The Westwood Auxiliary is one of the few spouses' Rotary groups in the nation and definitely the only one in this Rotary district. New Rotary members are especially invited to come to the meetings.
Program:
Peggy Bloomfield introduced her son and past WVRC President, Bill Bloomfield, Jr. He was born in Los Angeles and attended local public school before graduating from UC Berkeley. He followed that up with an MBA from Harvard University. He is also past President/CEO of the family business, Web Service Company. His wife Patty was also in attendance today and they are the proud parents of three adult children.
After leaving the company business Bill was searching for an opportunity to try something different and being a fan of the television show, The West Wing, decided to become involved in the upcoming Presidential election campaign. This was due to the fact that John McCain would be running for President and was also someone who Bill admired. Bill made some phone calls and ended up making some connections within the McCain campaign was able to arrange a meeting with the Senator.
Eventually, he became instrumental in the fund raising aspects of the campaign in 2007. Although Bill had not been involved in this capacity prior to this he discovered that he was quite good at raising money.
Bill discussed various political positions that have become part of McCain’s platform, especially the surge in 2007, as well as various financial challenges that are part and parcel of this type of political endeavor. Bill was eventually invited to join campaign headquarters later in the year to become the Director of Volunteers. Of course, Bill accepted the position and was off to Virginia after receiving the blessing of his family.
Bill led a team of mostly younger volunteers who have given themselves whole-heartedly to the McCain campaign. Being responsible for replenishing the staff Bill concentrated on recent undergraduate and graduate students who had recently completed their coursework and were in the process of seeking some type of employment or volunteer opportunities. He convinced 20 young people to relocate to Virginia and become part of the staff. One of the biggest challenges of his staff was making sure that McCain qualified for the ballot in all 50 states and 5 territories.
Each of the states and territories have their own arcane rules about how a candidate can qualify to be on the ballot, subject to the whims of the sitting Secretary of State in those states. Whether it be a primary, convention or caucus election they were successful in this endeavor.
In later months Bill focused on recruiting volunteers in other states to assist the campaign. One of the themes of the campaign team was “Can you spend 10 weeks of your life to make history?”.
Bill summed up by stating that the most profound impact his volunteer work affected are his priorities. A Hawaiian beach will never be enticing to him as it once was. He mentioned the tremendous sacrifice of the young volunteers who give tirelessly of their resources to serve their country. For Bill the impact of these young people on his life has been “priceless”.
He then opened up the floor to questions from the audience.
Next Week….
Anita Stangl CEO of Alliance For Smiles will be with us.
President Chris ended with the thought for the day/week which was a quote from Yogi Bera, “You got to be careful if you don’t know where you’re going because you might not get there.”
Adjourn
