President Arnie Biondo welcomed everyone to the Centerville Rotary Club and led the Pledge of Allegiance. PDG Harvey Smith provided the prayer.
President Biondo shared the quote of the week:
" WE ARE ALL STARS, AND WE DESERVE TO TWINKLE." MARILYN MONROE
Announcements:
- DG Frank Scott is fully recovered from COVID and back to work.
- Please share Community Service project ideas with Crissy Allums.
- The Social Committee of Sofie Ameloot, Kelly McDonald, & Jeff Senney are also looking for ideas
- The membership committee of Scott Kujawa, Kim Senft-Paras, and Dan Johnson will have their first meeting on Aug 18 at 11:15 am.
- We are still looking for members for the PR committee.
Jeff Senney introduced his guests - Ashlee Walton & Lauren Gay, who are interested in learning more about Rotary.
Adam Manning announced the first Pancake Committee meeting is next week Aug 4, 11 am at Yankee Trace. Please join and see how your help is needed.
Mike Wier announced there are still tickets for next week’s Dayton Dragon’s Game, August 4 at 7:05 pm. Let him know if you’d like tickets.
Happy Bucks this quarter go to support Operation Warm, providing new winter coats to children.
Boyd Preston was our Sergeant at Arms this week.
Happy Bucks generously given:
- Boyd Preston said it’s great to have Sofie back, and he is hoping for English lessons for Arnie.
- Sofie Ameloot had a lovely vacation in Belgium; photos to come. Her daughter will have knee surgery on August 10, and Delphine was working at Hannah’s Treasure Chest today.
- Judy Budi had missed a few meetings and was a late greeter today (Hello to everyone!). And then Jeff Senney said he was supposed to greet today, too and totally missed it!
- Brad Thorp was just happy.
- Susan didn’t find any clean money in her laundry pile this week but was still happy.
- Brian Hayes was just happy.
- Frank Perez was happy.
- Don Overly was a little happier than Frank.
- Jim Harris was happy for today’s visitors.
- Mike Wier was happy.
- Kelly McDonald is traveling to Portland ME next week.
- Chris Norman is happy 20-25 students are coming for nursing training next week.
- Chuck King has a new AC/furnace now after suffering without AC for 6 nights, and is now happy. He has a friend who donated $1,000 for Operation Warm and is asking for someone to match his donation. Any takers?
- Elda Gotos-Gay saw Ann Blackburn who is now at Subaru and will be back to meetings soon.
- Arnie Biondo was glad Boyd was supporting U of Illinois orange and blue and reluctantly announced his daughter was accepted at Ohio State.
- Michael Norton-Smith was just happy.
- Don Stewart is back from a vacation - flew to Denver and rented a 29’ RV to do an 1800 mile loop to visit Yellowstone, Grand Canyon, Jackson Hole, Aspen, etc. and it was fantastic. They didn’t wreck and had perfect weather.
- Jeff Senney was thrilled Lauren came back to visit, was glad Ashlee is interested in joining, and was excited to be on the social committee.
- Carol Kennard was happy to watch her granddaughters have their first horseback riding lessons and now may need to find a horse…
- Adam Manning gave for a coat and is happy.
- Uriah Anderson has been up and down the past couple of weeks - COVID, Maine for vacation, dental surgery, and now things are on the up again. He thanked the club for sponsoring the ramp into Santa’s cabin for Woodland Lights and is still looking for sponsors
- Scott Kujawa had a groundbreaking for the new fire station, and met the daughter of the architect at his table today - our speaker Clara Bement!
- Lee Hieronymus had nothing to say! But then prompted Scott to share about the August 14 Ice Cream Social and Car Show at RecPlex sponsored by Washington Township.
- Robert Ford was happy to be here.
- Harvey Smith gave for a friendly insult to Boyd and a coat.
Adam introduced our speakers Lee Truesdale Chief Development officer and Clara Bement from The Foodbank.
Lee shared that the Foodbank has been in business since 1976 and was first under the Red Cross. In the 2000’s working class families were in need of food assistance for the first time. In 2004, the Foodbank became their own non-profit. They distribute 15-18 million pounds of food annually to over 100 agencies who then distribute to families. The Foodbank also does outreach programs.
One focus is to provide emergency food assistance, as they did during COVID. In March 2020, they were serving 740 households per hour. Not that many now, but they saw a 13% need increase from May to June this year across the network.
Don’t have to bring any paperwork to prove need. Through the Job & Family Services there is an online application where they help you enter info and it calculates if you qualify (200% poverty level.)
They serve over 600,000 people in Montgomery, Greene, and Preble Counties. They are the smallest food bank, but fall in middle in measure of community need. There is a high rate of food insecurity in this service area.
Their new mission will be rolled out soon and it addresses the root causes of food need. They pay staff $18/hour, and provide full health care.
Clara is head of the urban garden, which includes an industrial composter, and hydroponic lettuce garden. Compost is made from spoiled food. They rescue food from grocery stores instead of it being shipped to the landfill, and use it as compost. “Turning peels into meals.”
Clara encouraged all to be involved in the Compost Bucket program. For $5/month, you save your food scraps in the bucket and turn them back in to the Foodbank to turn into compost.
The Beverly K Greenhouse had their first harvest last Christmas, and has produced 10,000 heads of lettuce and 400 pounds of herbs so far.
Hydroponic gardening uses no soil, grow in containers in an enclosed setting that stays 75 degrees year-round. They have an Evaporative Cooling System with water pump - water trickles down through cellulose and then air is fanned through the cellulose. It is air conditioning with no chemicals, just water and small pump.
They also added an ozone generator which is used for water purification so there is no pathogen build up which leads to healthy plants. It takes oxygen and converts it to ozone which then kills bacteria.
A small trickle of water is pumped through the grow channels and since they are constructed on a slant, the water then goes back into the tank to be reused. Hydroponic uses less water and you can grown anything hydroponically. Heaters are run by natural gas and they also have carbon dioxide generators.
Food is distributed in a compostable bio-bag. They harvest and distribute the same day so the food is as fresh as it can be - in the car of the client 10 minutes after harvest. They include the growing cube (roots and all) with the lettuce so if you place it in water when you get home, it will continue to produce leaves.
Clara mentioned they are always looking for volunteer organizations to help. (GREAT service project idea...)
Next week’s speaker will be Taryn Filer with Washington-Centerville Public Library talking about Dayton's First Families of Pizza.