Wenatchee Sunrise Rotary Club: June 2023

Wednesday, June 28, 2023

June 27 Meeting Notes

The meeting was called to order at 7 am by President Robin DeRock.

International Pineapple Day

Guests:

Mike Kintner - Incoming Assistant/Area Governer
Shanley Crown - Outgoing Assistant/Area Governer

Announcements

Goathead Warriors

Moved to July

July 4th and 5th Fundraiser - Volunteers needed

This fundraiser accounts for $2,000 - $3,000 for CPS Xmas for 45-50 kids
July 4th - Parking at the Toyota Center - Contact Earl
July 4th - Pie eating contest - 3 people needed for 1 HR - Contact Robin
July 5th - Park cleanup team

July 15th - Glass Recycling Event - 10am to 2pm - Grace Lutheran Church

The recycling is for glass re-use of unbroken bottles.
No broken or cracked glass will be accepted.
This event is a test to identify the level of need in the Wenatchee community
Bring it to Robin at the meeting on the 11th

Craig Reese -No meeting on July 4th (Fundraiser!)

Craig will be in Africa on July 11th and 18th

Shanley Crane - Highlights from the last year for the club

Funds Raised - Last year - $23,000 - This year - $43,000
Volunteer Hours - Last Year - 861 - This year - 8,400
22 of 24 District Governers Goals met

Brags and Confessions

Robin DeRock

Robin's mother passed away
Robin got to spend the last 24 hours with her and her passing was peaceful
All of our prayers and best wishes are with Robin and her family

Mark Van Horne

The Wenatchee Wild still needs billets for players
The Wild is picking up players from the "Winnepeg Ice"

Kelly Walker

Kelly and Alan spent 3 days with their 12-year-old granddaughter

Wayne Massing

Wayne is making a great trip to Montana and other great places
He will be out for the months of July for cataract surgery

Rebecca Lyons

She is retiring (and she said she will miss it - NOT!)
She will taking on the role of President Elect of our club

Craig Reese

His son and family are moving to Idaho
Their house sold on the west side after staying with Craig for the last 2 months
Craig and his wife will miss having them around the house, including the grandkids

Program - Lance Keller

PUD Natural Resources Effort

Lance Keller - Senior Fisheries Biologist

Lance was born in Wenatchee. He left town to get his degree. He missed Wenatchee so he moved back to the area. He has always loved the outdoors and fishing. He and his family love to hike, including hiking on the Pacific Coast Trail. He eventually decided to mix his hobbies with his career.

The PUD Resources Effort has been a ten-year project bringing all of the stakeholders together from all of Central Washington to find the best way to meet our power needs while sustaining the environment that is affected by the dams.

Lance presented a detailed review of the effort to make sure that the fish species up and down the Columbia River maintain a delicate balancing act. The goal is to make sure that the various species of game fish are kept at 100% population, while the predatory fish species are kept at bay.

Lance explained that the PUD has a goal of facilitating the return of 91% of the young and adult fish population back from the ocean, with some traveling all the way to Canada, while complementing the other 7% with the hatchery and 2% from tributaries to the Columbia River.

The management of each dam has its own idiosyncrasies. Each facility has turbines that are specifically designed to allow fish to flow through the dam. The project uses 3 kinds of tracking devices to keep track of the paths used by the fish at each dam. They then create improved routes for the fish to successfully navigate the river.

One of the fish ladders at the Rock Island dam has 97 segments that raise the fish up more than 90 feet on their journey.

Attached is a PowerPoint presentation that includes many details of the project. Every generator and path, the primary species of fish, and other details of the project.

Click here to access the PowerPoint presentation.

Lance gave us a very interesting and thorough look at how our needs, and the needs of the environment can coexist.

One of the more interesting things about the project is that every project decision must be unanimous. Every stakeholder must agree with the way forward. That seems like quite an accomplishment at this point in history.

Thanks to Chris McDarment for recommending this excellent program.

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Joke: "I met a microbiologist the other day. He was bigger than I expected!"

The raffle was $22. Wayne Steele did not draw the winning marble.

Upcoming Programs

4th of July Fundraiser
5th of July Cleanup
7/11 - Andy Thomas - Side Street Cashmere

Rotary Anniversaries

Kaitlyn Vanweerdhuizen - June 5th - 4 years
Stacy Gold - June 7th - 1 year
Rebecca Lyons - June 21st - 4 years
Wayne Steele - June 28th - 1 year

Friday, June 23, 2023

June 20 Meeting Notes

The meeting was called to order at 7 am by President Robin DeRock.

National Hike with a Geek Day

Guests:

Mina
Sondra (Kathleen's Toastmaster's friend)

Announcements

Goathead Warriors

Moved to July

Road Apple Roulette Funds

Two Awards

$2000 to Grace House
$500 to Apple Blossum Festival - Queen's scholarship
$1000 to Pybus - Travis left a City Council Meeting to receive the funds

Bylaws Updated

A vote was held to approve the updated Bylaws
They were unanimously approved

July 4th and 5th Fundraiser - Volunteers needed

July 4th - Parking at the Toyota Center - Contact Earl
July 4th - Pie eating contest - 3 people needed for 1 HR
July 5th - Park cleanup team

July 15th - Glass Recycling Event - 10am to 2pm - Grace Lutheran Church

The recycling is for glass re-use of unbroken bottles.
No broken or cracked glass will be accepted.
This event is a test to identify the level of need in the Wenatchee community

Wenatchee Wild moving to the Western Hockey League

The change will reduce the travel distance and cost for the team
This league is a step up in skill level
The players at this level are aspiring to the NHL instead of college hockey.
The players receive a $50 per week stipend which disqualifies them from playing college hockey
This league has 8 more games per season
Concessions will likely change from 2 food booths to 4

This means there is a substantial fundraising opportunity
The confluence club raised $51,000 last year

Recognition for Club Contribution for the last year - Presented by Robin

Mark Van Horne - Joker (His Jokes for the meetings)

Glenn King - I.T. Guru

Brags and Confessions

Wayne Massing

Wayne won the $793 raffle at the changeover BBQ
He donated some of those funds to 2 Rotary District Governers from Europe
He shared banners that he exchanged with other clubs in Australia during the Global Conference
He also got to spend time with his 2-year-old granddaughter.

Craig Reese

Craig has been working toward an international Rotary project in Barundi
He has needed to get a sponsor club in Barundi as well as other support
He found a partner club and has a meeting to discuss the project
This is a major step forward for his project

Chris McDarment

His son Brian graduated from Central Washington University

Allie Schank

The Apple Sox are off to a roaring start. Their record is 12-4.
There are 2 home games on Fri 6/23 and Sat 6/24

Program - Ray Dobbs and Jeff Kimball

Board Members of the North Central Education Foundation

Left: Ray Dobbs Center: Chris McDarment Right: Jeff Kimball

Ray Dobbs, North Central Education Foundation Board Member

Ray Dobbs had a career of over 40 years in the City of Chelan, in radio, banking and as a small business owner. He was a Planning Commissioner and Councilmember for City of Chelan for 15 years and Treasurer for Historic Downtown Chelan Assn for 5 years. He also served on the Wenatchee and Lake Chelan Chamber of Commerce boards. He has been a Rotarian since 1982 and served two terms as president of Chelan Rotary. Dobbs and his wife Kathryn have been married 50 years. They have five adult children who all graduated from Chelan Valley schools, nine grandchildren and one great grandchild.

Jeff Kimbell, North Central Education Foundation Board Member

Jeff Kimbell is a native of Everett and raised his family in Woodinville, before moving to Wenatchee with his wife, Kim. He is proud to come from a three-generation family of teachers. However, Jeff spent his career in operations and program management and consulting. He currently volunteers to support youth and education through Chelan PUD’s Rocky Reach Discovery Center, Youth Dynamics’ Stonewater Adventure Center, Columbia Break Fire Interpretive Center, Serve Wenatchee Valley and Westside High School.

Ray and Jeff presented a very inspiring overview of the mission of the North Central Education Foundation. The foundation is a nonprofit organization focused on helping teachers to purchase the supplies needed to deliver unique programs for their students.

The Foundation first provided a forum for educators to submit applications for funding. The Foundation provides $300 for each approved application.

The goal is to procure funding through businesses, charitable organizations like Rotary International, and individuals. With these funds, they hope to be able to approve every application each year.

This year they are planning to experiment with allowing teachers to pool their projects. For example, if 5 teachers want to share a project, they can submit their application together to receive $1,500.

The presentation included videos from teachers that have benefitted from prior funding from the North Central Education Foundation (NCEF).

Our club was lucky enough to be the first club to hear Ray and Jeff present their support for the education of our students in four counties in North Central Washinton.

Both presenters have been involved in the community as board members and/r leaders in several areas. We thank them for their service.

Thanks to Chris for recommending this excellent organization.

Click here to access the PowerPoint presentation.

Click on the "all black" slides in the presentation to view the videos from the teachers themselves.

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The raffle was $11. Sherry did not draw the winning marble.

Rotary Anniversaries

Kaitlyn Vanweerdhuizen - June 5th - 4 years
Stacy Gold - June 7th - 1 year
Rebecca Lyons - June 21st - 4 years
Wayne Steele - June 28th - 1 yea

Wednesday, June 14, 2023

June 13 Presidential Changeover Dinner

We had a great time Tuesday night celebrating Robin DeRock's year as president, and welcoming in Craig Reese as our new president starting on July 1. Of course Robin wore her tiara, and a banner that said, "I'm Out of Here".

After a time of socializing, guests were introduced. Members introduced their families, including spouses, fiancés, children, friends, and even Hank, our honorary service dog. Other special guests were also recognized. These included outgoing Assistant Governor Shanley Crane, incoming AG Mike Kintner, Wenatchee Confluence President Wendy Dalpez and husband JD, Tanya Hall (spouses of District 5040 Governor), Georgia Doyle (youth exchange student from district 5040), and Henry Hommedal and Hans Christian, two current District Governors from Norway who are friends of Wayne Massing (pictured at right).

The dinner spread included barbequed hamburger, brats, portabella mushroom, beans, salads, and ice cream bars. Thanks to Alan Walker for doing the grilling. Also thanks to Kathleen, Carol, and Shari Funston for set up and decorations.

Robin took the stage to introduce and thanked her officers and directors. Outgoing directors are Kathleen McNalty and Chris McDarment. Robin also recognized a few members for outstanding and/or unique service, and gave them a nice medal and bottle of wine. These were Dave Freimuth (best hugs), Alan Walker (networking Ninja), Mark VanHorne (best/worst jokes), Milt Herman (most calm and collected), Glenn King (Mr. IT), Wayne Steel (volunteers for every project), Carol Adamson (best cheerleader), Joel Bankin (youth exchange guru), and Kathleen McNalty (does it all).

Most calm Milt

Best volunteer Wayne S

Best hugger Dave

Networking Ninja Alan

Cheerleader Carol

Robin presented the Marky Award to Wayne Massing for his service this year, especially during the Road Apple Roulette. The Marky is in honor of past Sunrise member and president Mark Anderson, who moved to Nevada several years ago. Mark gave years of service to our club, and was instrumental in many fundraisers, projects, and fellowship events.

Kathleen gave a review of the year's accomplishments, and presented Robin with a Past-president pin, an honorary gavel plaque, a bouquet of flowers and thank-you gift from the club.

Over the year, Robin gave us lots of material to roast her with (fans and hot lashes, wine, costumes, colored hair, and colorful language to name a few). The POOPS (Past Order of Old Presidents) did a "To Tell the Truth" game show skit to point out some of Robin's quirky characteristics. Afterward, they had a short deliberation to discuss if they wanted to induct her into the POOPS, and found her to be acceptable (the vote was not recorded). Congratulations, Robin, for being accepted into this prestigious group.

Will the real Robin, please stand up?

Attending POOPS (minus Taro) after inducting Robin into the group.

Craig then took the stage to talk about the hopes he has for next year, and introduced his officers and directors. Our leadership team starting July 1 will be Craig (President), Rebecca Lyons (Pres-elect), Alan Walker (Sec), Earl Crowe (Treasure), second term directors Jim Adamson and Mark VanHorne, and first term directors Allie Schank and Kelly Walker.

Craig brought Fran, our YE student from Argentina, to the stage, and thanked her for her outstanding time with us (even at 7:00am). She was presented with certificates of completion for her successful year in youth exchange, and participation in RLYA training (Rotary Youth Leadership Award). She will be leaving in mid-July, so you still have tile to take her to coffee, lunch, sinner, and event, etc.

The evening ended with the raffle draw, which was worth about $750, and only 3 marbles in the bag. Wayne Massing's ticket was drawn, and he pulled the black marble. Wayne is deserving of this, as he buys tickets every week. The rest of us can try again next year.

Friday, June 9, 2023

June 6 Meeting Notes

The meeting was called to order at 7 am by President Robin DeRock.

National Yo Yo Day

Guests:

Becky Cummins - Chapel of the Valley
Rich Cummins - Chapel of the Valley
Willard Fields (PUD History Expert - Presenter)

Announcements

Fran Update

She went camping with some of the other exchange students
The camp was in the forest near a river
They went boating, hiking, and swimming

Erin McCool - 1st Paul Harris Award

Apple Sox Opening Night! The season is officially underway!

Congrats Allie on all of your hard work. Have a great season.

Pride Update

Fantastic Event
250 Bands given out from the Rotary Booth
A list of new friends of Rotary (potential members)

Goathead Warriors - Changed to July

Julie Banken (new member and Joel's better half) will lead the event
Volunteers needed
Julie shared the following about goatheads

They take about 3 weeks to grow
They can create between 200 and 5,000 seeds per year
They can live up to 5 years

Changeover Dinner - June 13th - 5:30pm - $28 per person added to your bill

Spouses and families welcome
Bar-B-Que Grill from Sweetwoods
Please RSVP to make sure the right amount of food can be ready

July 4th and 5th

Sunrise Rotary volunteers needed for:

July 4th - Parking and Pie Eating Contest
July 5th - Clean up the park - The more hands the better

Small Miracles - Alan Walker

Provides lunch for kids while school is out during the summer
Volunteers needed throughout the summer

June 26th thru August 3rd
Monday thru Thursday - 11am to 12pm
www.smallmiraclesncw.org/volunteer

Brags and Confessions

Kelly Walker

She and Alan made the trip to Rochester in 3.5 hours - they took the wings off the car after the trip
Kelly visited her mom in Rochester

Erik Holmberg

Erik and his wife traveled to Tuscany to meet with their son who lives in Isreal
They then went to Cape Town South Africa
They went on a Safari
They stayed in 3 camps including one near Victoria Falls
They Bungie jumped (300 feet)

Alan Walker

Bids for the remodel closed on Tuesday
The project will start ASAP with June 30th open for business target in the new location

New Member Induction

Becky Cummins - Introduced by Kaitlyn (and Kelly)

Becky was born and raised in California, where she loved growing up around the beach and in a small town where they had horses and as many animals as her parents would allow her to rescue. When they moved to the Bay area, she got involved in planning activities for the service men there, which led her to meeting a handsome Navy man, Richard Cummins, who was stationed in Alameda. On their first date, he took her on a little cruise aboard the Aircraft Carrier, USS Coral Sea. How do you top that, well she's happy to say they will be celebrating their 40-year anniversary in October. She's a proud mother of 3 sons and daughter-in-loves, 3 granddaughters and 3 grandsons.

While her children were young, she was a stay-at-home mom and helped her mother in her interior design business. She didn't search out working in funeral business, it found her. She was a Funeral Director in California for over 23 years before moving to Wenatchee last March, where I became the Manager of Chapel of the Valley. She is blessed and honored to continue doing what She loves in ministering to those who walk through their doors. I couldn't imagine doing anything else.

Her joys in life have always been her faith, family, animals, being in nature, especially the beach, heling people, and making gift baskets for many charity fundraisers. She looks forward to continuing getting to know and serve her Wenatchee community. She has already met some amazing people, one of them is Kaitlyn.

Program - Willard Fields - History of Chelan PUD

Willard Fields is one of the most senior members of the Chelan PUD.

Williard worked for the PUD twice. Once for 26 years and then a second time for 20 years. He is the DeFacto historian.

Willard grew up in Idaho. He graduated from Montana State University in 1976. He immediately went to work for PUD Hydro positions. He has been focused on on Rocky Reach and Rock Island dams. He is an avid AKC member with Papillons. He shows his dogs in agility and obedience classes just to name a couple of events.

Williard covered the history of Hydro in our area beginning in 1898 thru today.

1898 to 1901 - Each person was charged a fee and a per lightbulb charge.

Most homes had one lightbulb in their main room in their house.

Waterville power was run to their town but it did not work. Then an earthquake happened and afterwards the Waterville power worked. The cause has not been determined.

The town of Dryden passed the hat to pay for power for Saturday night dances for the town to attend.

In 1920's and 1930's the building of Rock Island Dam saved the Wenatchee Valley from feeling the full impact of the Depression. It created a lot of jobs and the money from the workers was spent in Wenatchee.

1927 to 1928 Chelan was added to the power grid.

1930 the PUD was created.

1936 the PUD took over for Chelan, Okanogan, and Grant Counties

1948 there were 12,000 customers.

Now there are 53,000 customers in the valley.

1948 was the year of record flooding in Wenatchee. There is a mark on a building at the end of 5th in Wenatchee showing how high the water was. It nearly reached Wenatchee Avenue.

The dams added to the Columbia River have greatly reduced the risk of flooding in our area.

1950 to 1951 - The Korean War created a high demand for aluminum. The army Corp of Engineers were going to take over the Rock Island Dam.

The Dam was built with a capacity for 10 generators, but the PUD only put in 4 to begin with.
The PUD contacted ALCOA and encouraged them to put a plant in near the dam.

The PUD got financing for the 6 additional generators from out of town. Ironically those same people that fronted the money for the generators later became customers of the PUD and paid for power that eventually paid off the loans for the generators.

ALCOA produced the aluminum for the war and the PUD retained ownership of the Rock Island Dam.

1954 - The PUD began to sell power to other areas creating the income needed to build additional dams.

1961 - Rocky Reach Dam built

The town of Entiat was affected in a big way.
They either sold the land to the PUD and moved up higher on the hill, or some took the money and left town.

1975 - The PUD officially took full ownership of the Rock Island Dam by selling power out of town.

1994 - The PUD stopped purchasing power from out of town and powered all of the local area themselves.

Williard shared that the area only uses about 1% of the power created by the PUD. There is substantial room for the area to increase its power requirements without fear of exceeding capacity.

NOTE: The Army Corps of Engineers work with the PUD and other power companies to determine how much power is required and where it is sent to other parts of the area or other states.