Redwood Empire Food Bank – 2nd Wednesday of the month.  The next one is January 10th – 5 PM – 7 PM

SRJC Rotaract Fundraiser – You can make your donations here: Click here to donate

SRJC and Sonoma State Rotaract members support the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. If you would like to donate, you can make a donation here.

For more details and additional events, see the Announcements section below.

More socials, projects, & events coming soon!

Rotary Announcements

See the Announcements section below.

Opening Ceremonies:

Rick Allen led us in the reciting of the Pledge of Allegiance, the Four-Way Test and the Reflection, a prayer from B’nai B’rith.

Visiting Rotarians:

None today

Guests:

Andrew Bradford and Valerie Marshall from the Santa Rosa Symphony

Sunshine Report:

Rich Rossi’s wife will have her last surgery on Friday and then will start radiation in January. Matthew’s wife, Andrea, will go home from the hospital on Friday but she will have a long recovery.  Kim Murphy has skin cancer on her ear.  She has had some painful surgery to remove cancer and reconstruct her ear.

Raffle:

Jeff Kolin had the right ticket today with 7 marbles remaining.  Your bulletin editor did not hear how much is in the pot, but it must be close to $100.00.  However, Jeff did not pull the blue marble, so he got his $10.00 and the pot rolls over to next week.  President Ann brought some additional gifts for the holiday raffle.  The winners were Sam McMillan, Natasha Perez and Rich Rossi for “cookies in a jar mix,” and Bill Hatcher got some of Debi Zaft’s homemade caramels (I am so jealous!).

Recognitions:

Jim Green went to the DMV to renew his driver’s license.  Since they allowed him to do so, he was donating his annual $1000 to the Paul Harris Society.

Ted Wilmsen missed our holiday party over this past weekend because of a surprise 50^th anniversary party for him and Deanie down in San Diego. They stayed at the Hotel del Coronado and on the way back stayed at the Madonna Inn. He donated $100 to Polio Plus and $100 to the John Brown fund.

Julia Parranto and Rose Wognum Frances missed the party because they were in San Juan Batista for and art show and talk that Rose was doing.  Julia donated $100 to the Jamison Foundation.

Announcements:

Heather Thurber announced that volunteers were needed to help the Salvation Army this Saturday for the annual kids toys and food distribution.

Mary Graves reminded us of that Saturday, December 16, is the last day to register for the Rotary International Convention in Singapore and get a discount. She says 12 Global Rotaractors will be going.

Casey D’Angelo says that the last 60-65 dictionaries will be going to Bellevue Elementary in January.  Julia Parranto and Diane Moresi have volunteered to deliver.  We are looking for a new book for distribution next year.

President Ann passed the hat around so that we could do our annual tip to our servers at Iron and Vine.

Jeff Gospe gave us an update on fund raising for Ukraine.  Since the start of the war our partnership with the Rotary club of Cherkassy-Centre has raised $275,000 of which $185,000 was used for the 6,000 specialized first aid kits and critical medical supplies.  $90,000 was spent on emergency power generators.  We are still working to raise more money: $25,000 for children’s trauma relief and $50,000 for emergency power for refugee and medical centers.  You can still donate:  www.SREastWestRotary.org.

Andrew Bradford, CEO of the Santa Rosa Symphony and all their many programs!

Andrew trained and went to college to study music.  He was a cellist and has gone on to work with many symphonies in the United States.  He played various videos throughout his presentation to show just what our local symphony does/performs in Somona County.

The Santa Rosa Symphony was founded in 1928.  In 1953 it became a 501(c)3 charitable organization.  Now in their 96^th year, they are the fourth largest symphony in California.  They have big plans for their 100^th birthday in four years. They are the largest performing arts program in Sonoma County and have a budget of $5,000,000 annually.  Francesco Lecce-Chong is only the fifth music director in those 96 years. They have been performing at the Green Music Center for the last 12 years. In a typical year there are 40 performances.  They have seven subscriptions, three family series of concerts, four free youth concerts, the Fourth of July concert with fireworks, and four POPS concerts.  For kids they have a Saturday jazz ensemble, free music concerts, training for young musicians, a three-week summer music academy and Simply Strings, a school program at Sheppard Elementary School (which we donated to last year).  For those of us at the meeting today, he handed out a coupon for 15% off a Santa Rosa Symphony Classic Series Concert between now and February 2, 2024.

For more information go to https://www.srsymphony.org/  ( or ask Keven Brown).

Program Slides

No program slides this week