Last night was certainly different.
Thanks to Sergeant Bill and Programme Director John S for their flexibility. We had presenter changes right up to the last minute, the idea of a quiz night was contemplated then decided that we would just have a low-key club night and share some information. It went well, nice and relaxed and with attendance numbers down it was a good decision. Again we enjoyed a very tasty meal which last night included a dessert of homemade chocolate chippie ice cream !!
I was able to cover off some Board meeting items which included the introduction of a speaker’s levy. In past years we have had an additional charge made to our usual meeting fee for our meal to cover venue costs and flowers and gifts. This dropped off when we changed venue to the Howick Club. However, this change left us with no budget to present our visiting speakers with a thankyou gift. The decision has been made that on top of the meal charge there will be a $2.00 per meeting charge shown as Flowers and Gifts on your monthly account. This charge will be made irrespective of you attending the meeting, that is if you only attend 1 meeting in the month your invoice will be for x1 meal but also include $4.00 Flowers and Gifts. This will begin this month and will be included in your February account. The fund is for outside speakers only, and will accumulate so that if the opportunity to have a really good speaker, but one who has a fee we will be able to have that speaker.
Another item covered off by Bill Charkow was the relationship between HHV and our club. He explained the current situation where several of our members volunteer and carry out maintenance and minor building jobs at the Village as volunteers not as Rotarians. It was a good reminder for us to renew the links we have through the building we adopted some years ago at the Village and the Community Committee will progress with this.
John Savory has kindly offered to be our own “in house” librarian and anyone who is a little short of books to read and would like to ‘borrow” from the Bookarama supply please contact John and he will make a time for you to meet him at Ray Whites to choose some books. Please note they are to be returned so they can be sold.
We have had a request from the Howick RSA for support selling Poppies on Poppy Day 22nd April. It only requires a couple of hours sitting at a table and selling poppies to the general public. Tables will be at Botany and Howick. Carole Ansley is coordinating this for us.
Our next meeting is on 8th March and our speaker will be Deidre Alderson a senior manager from the Ministry of Education. I am sure Deidre will share some interesting information with us, particularly in these very different and difficult times.
Kia Tupato,Kia noho haumaru
Take care, stay safe.
Madeleine East MNZM
President.
