This past Wednesday afternoon's meeting took us to the newly renovated Bakersfield Ronald McDonald House where Scarlet Sabin, the House Director, gave us a tour and discussed its development, its growth, and its mission to provide for families during times of healing. Thank you, Scarlet!
What a fun time we had Thursday night at The Blvd. Thank you to all of the Twilight club members, families and Centennial Interact Club members who came. We enjoyed good food, games, bowling, and most of all -- fun socializing. A great time!
We had another outstanding and informative presentation at our meeting this past week. Mr. Joe Belli, the Manager of the Panorama Vista Preserve, told us about that non-profit’s mission, gave an overview of its educational programs, and showed us photos of the land, the plants, and some of the animals that have been seen on the Preserve.
The Kern River Corridor Endowment and Holding Co. (KRCE, the non-profit which owns the land) is dedicated to: 1) improving wildlife habitat along the Kern River through restoration of its riparian forest and associated grasslands. 2) providing educational and research opportunities. To that end, KRCE has hosted twice-yearly science day camps for local school children. 3) providing low-impact recreational opportunities for our community such as walking, running, bicycling, and horseback riding. Motorcycles, overnight camping, campfires, etc. are not permitted.
If you have not been to the Preserve yet, it would make a wonderful family outing. The Preserve is located east of Manor Drive below the Panorama Bluffs. You can walk down from the Bluffs or you can park in the Preserve’s parking lot at the east end of the Roberts Lane Extension about ¼ mile east of the Manor Drive/Roberts Lane interchange.
It looks like some of our members were out and about hanging out and traveling.
Sandy Foster and Sister Judy were seen at the Hollywood Bowl with Penny Fulton of Breakfast Rotary Club and our own President, Nancy Pollard.
Past President, Robin Paggi, was spotted in Cleveland pointing out large flower pots with Rotary signs on them all along a large street. According to her, Cleveland rocks.
Another great meeting at The Mark Restaurant & Bar for our club. Last year's President, Amy Smith, was presented with a Rotary Citation Distinguished Club Award from the District. There to give her the Award was Past District Governor, Sandi Schwartz. Charlotte, Amy's daughter, joined us briefly before she had to go across the street to her acting gig. Li Gibbs' son, Steven and his girlfriend, Kayla, also joined us.
Jim Bell filled in for his wife, Donna Bell, and introduced our speaker, Russell Johnson, who has extensive experience in local politics. Many of us know him from Breakfast Rotary Club. Russell has three businesses. He does a lot of consulting. He has saved nine nonprofit organizations from insolvency. He, along with two other people, just bought Valley Ag Voice, an Ag business newspaper.
He talked about Associated Builders and Contractors Association, one of his clients, which is a national association that defends and advances principles of the merit shop in the construction industry. That is just one of the things they do. There are four chapters of this Association in California. They have training classes such as welding and electrical. Before 2015, in order to participate in one of those training courses, you had to work for or be sponsored by a member of the Association. After 2015, they formed a 501(c)(3) extension and now they can serve the general public.
At the end of our meeting, number of East Bakersfield Rotary Club led by their President, Quon Louey, crashed our meeting with a birthday cake for Past District Governor, Sandi Schwartz's husband, Richard. We all sang happy birthday to Richard and were invited by them to join their party after our meeting for some cake.
At our meeting on August 21, 2019, we had number of Centennial High School Interact Club members who all introduced themselves at the beginning of the meeting.
Li Gibbs introduced our foreign exchange student, Claudia, who is from Spain. Li also introduced our local student, Jed, who is going to Korea as our local exchange student. Jed has been studying Korean for his big trip. Both Claudia and Jed were presented with our club's Rotary flag. Claudia then spoke about where in Spain she comes from, her family and what she likes to do in her free time.
Li Gibbs then introduced our speakers, Aleyna Young, Mock Trial participant from Centennial High School, and Brett Dodson, the Centennial teacher who is the Mock Trial coach for that high school. Ms. Young is certainly a very impressive young lady and Mr. Dodson could not make that any clearer. This past summer, she finished second place at the Gladiator Mock Trial Championships. When she "lost" (if you can call finishing second in a nationwide competition a loss), she stood up and clapped for the winner because, according to her, she was truly happy for the winner. Centennial High School has had a competitor in the Gladiator competition each year of its existence. It is one of only two schools that have ever done that. Undoubtedly, it is due to amazing talents like Ms. Young and Mr. Dodson's teaching and leadership. Keep up the great work Mr. Dodson and good luck with your future endeavors Ms. Young.
The first meeting of the newly named Kern County Rotaract Club was held and our President, Nancy Pollard, attended the meeting. Pictured below on the patio after the meeting with the new Rotaract Club banner are: Quon Louey; Tim Banks; Cheryl Scott, our own President, Nancy Pollard; the current year Rotaract President, Noah Salinas; and Rotaract President-Elect, Bethany McKanna.