The Rotary Club of Abbotsford is pleased to announce the installation of Bruce Beck as President for the 2019-2020 Rotary year effective July 1st.
Past President Bill Bramwell passed the hat and gavel to Bruce on June 25th. Bruce has lived in Abbotsford since 1988 and been a Rotarian since 2008. He is a self-employed Certified Financial Planner and Certified Professional Consultant on Aging. He has served as Community Service Chair, Starfish Backpack Chair and Halloween Bash Planning Chair within the Abbotsford Rotary Club. “I am looking forward to serving the community alongside my fellow Rotarians. Together we are taking the club in a new direction with Vision 20-20, stay tuned for some truly remarkable and impactful programs that will be rolled out in the coming year.” President Bruce stated.
Bruce’s commitment to the community is evident is his varied volunteer roles and activities. He served two terms on Abbotsford City Council, was a columnist for the Abbotsford Times, is a Past Director for the Abbotsford Chamber of Commerce, and has served on multiple boards and committees including: Abbotsford Downtown Business Association, Agrifair, City of Abbotsford Economic Development Advisory Board, and as Chair of the PLAN A committee. Bruce has also volunteered with Abbotsford Emergency Support Services and Abbotsford Fire Rescue Service. Bruce has been married to Lois for 30+ years and they have two grown children, a son-in-law, and one dog holding down the empty nest.
Also inducted to the Board of Directors were: Milt Walker; Doris Woodman-McMillan; Chris Oliver; Amy Badesha; Deanna McIntyre; Ursula Viney; Yvonne Douma; Dave Loewen; George Ho; and Bill Bramwell as Past President.
For nearly 70 years, the Rotary Club of Abbotsford has been changing lives for the better, both in our backyard and beyond.
From building Rotary House, a day-care for children with special needs, to long-time support of Abbotsford Hospice and Holmberg House, which serves families facing the hardest days of their lives, Abbotsford Rotary Club members have responded time and again to the call to serve our community.
Abbotsford Rotary Club was the driving force behind the creation of Rotary Stadium, Abbotsford’s preeminent outdoor venue and host to countless BC Games, sports tournaments, university events and community celebrations. We hosted the very first Abbotsford Airshow in 1962 and have been a proud volunteer partner every year since, as the show has come to have global impact. Abbotsford Rotary Club cofounded Starfish Packs, a weekend feeding program for school kids who would otherwise go hungry. This program has now been adopted in over 20 communities throughout BC and Washington State and provides meals to over 1,400 hurting kids each weekend during the school year.
Abbotsford Rotary Club has awarded hundreds of thousands of dollars in scholarships to high school and university students. We have funded youth leadership opportunities and hosted international youth exchange students. We believe every dollar spent on a young person today will pay a $1,000 dividend back to our community and beyond during OUR lifetimes.
Margaret Mead said, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”Past and present, the Rotary Club of Abbotsford proves her to be absolutely correct.
As we prepare to mark the Club’s 70th anniversary in 2020, we could easily choose to focus on our past accomplishments and successes. But we didn’t achieve so much in our history by looking back. Instead we always look forward. We are justifiably proud of what we have achieved and we will continue to focus on the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.
In an unprecedented attempt to engage the citizens of Abbotsford, Abbotsford Rotary Club will spend the last six months of 2019 engaging local stakeholders, community groups and committed individuals to determine the next community changing project that will be our primary focus over the next 3-5 years, launching in 2020.
The Abbotsford Rotary Club invites those who care deeply about both the present and future of Abbotsford to submit their dreams and hopes for new projects to us for consideration. We offer our potential community partners a 70 year track record of making a real and lasting difference in the lives of those who call Abbotsford home and a demonstrated commitment to always dream big and work hard when it comes to building our collective future.
We publically call on those same stakeholders, community groups and committed individuals, those who dare to dream about a better future for our kids and grandkids and who care about our community as much as we do, to join us. Join your passions and skills and energy to ours, and together we can achieve more than any of us could even imagine achieving as individuals.
Abbotsford Rotary Club is a dedicated, dynamic and diverse group of leaders, offering fellowship, fun and a shared commitment to serving humanity locally and around the world. We have a history we’re immensely proud of, and are looking forward to a future that includes new ideas, new perspectives and new visions of what we can accomplish together.
We want young people with a passion for Abbotsford’s future to take their rightful place at the planning table with us. We want older people whose contributions have made Abbotsford the amazing place it is to live, work, and play to join us. Older or younger, we want people to bring their invaluable experiences and resources to our club help us make Abbotsford even better.
The possibilities of what we can accomplish is limited only by the number and quality of the people who dare to dream with us and dare us to dream with them. The small investment of a few hours a month can change lives around us for decades to come.
If we’ve learned anything over our 70 year history it’s this: the lives that will be changed the most are those who first dare to dream and who are willing to put their vision and passion into action.
The future is calling out to such individuals to step up. So is the Rotary Club of Abbotsford.
We are participating with a few of the other clubs to assist with the serving the food and refreshments to the 600+ volunteers who will work the Abbotsford Airshow over the course of the weekend in August. We as a club are showing the volunteers that we care and appreciate their volunteering efforts.
Most of the food is precooked but some of it may have to be cooked but the menu has not been confirmed yet.
Between our club and any other of our sponsoring clubs in the area we will have to provide 15+ volunteers to staff the food tent each day (see schedule)
The schedule volunteering schedule is as follows:
Thu, Aug 8, 2019 - 6:30 PM to 8 PM (Orientation)
Fri, Aug 9, 2019 - 10 AM to 2 PM (5 people needed)
Fri, Aug 9, 2019 - 1 PM to 9 PM (15 people needed)
Sat, Aug 10, 2019 - 7 AM to 4 PM (5 people needed)
Sat, Aug 10, 2019 - 9:30 AM to 4 PM (15 people needed)
Sun, Aug 11, 2019 - 7 AM to 4 PM (5 people needed)
Sun, Aug 11, 2019 - 9:30 AM to 6 PM (15 people needed)
Thursday is completely voluntary but it would be great to get solid core of people out to get a good grasp on how things look and how they will run so they in turn can act as leaders while the event is going on.
Parking at the event is 100% free and once volunteering is done for the days we have been invited by the Airshow hosts to enjoy the show and roam around freely afterwards.
Directions to parking and key areas in the show grounds at a later date once we have an idea how many people.
Everyone who is volunteering must use the link below to register for shifts, see the following page:
Table sponsors: Triple C; Dr. Venier & Aldergrove Credit Union
Costume sponsor: Amy Badesha DJ sponsor: Ken Funk
Cash donation: Les Squire
2019 Sponsorship $ 24,000 to date
2018. Sponsorship $ 24375
2019 Sponsorship Goal $ 28750
There’s still plenty of work to be done to reach the 2019 target. I am asking every Rotarian if you have not done so to reach out to your business contacts and ask for sponsorship.
The cut off for the Gold Silver & Bronze sponsorship is the third week of June so there are only thirty days left.
At the April 2, 2019 Club Assembly, the membership in attendance unanimously approved a change in annual club dues. Please note that dues have not increased in price in over ten years.
Effective July 1, 2019, the new annual due schedule will be:
Members Age 40 and under: $240
Members Over Age 41: $340
Corporate Members First member $340, additional members $275
If the new dues provide a financial hardship for any individual club member, please contact a member of the board. A small amount of financial relief has been set aside to assist active club members.
Invoices will be provided to club members in June.
The team has been assembled, the date confirmed, the tickets purchased, and now the fun begins as we finalize our daily itinerary in Antigua. We will be a team of 11: Club members, Bruce Beck, Doris Woodman-McMillan, Blaine Bailey, Rod Thomson, Amy Badesha, & Dave Loewen, along with guests Lois Beck, Andy Bains, Estella Cumyn, and Dr. Zoltan Zeresztes (dentist) and Jane Zeresztes.
Dr. Zeresztes hails from North Vancouver and he has done several dental missions previously to Latin American countries. We’re very excited to have him join us to provide this important service. As for the rest of us, we’ll busy ourselves with some assignments yet to be determined by our host, Judy Bergen from Love Guatemala. We will likely be working with some house construction, feeding program, and distribution of wheelchairs and sewing machines.
As a result of our Halloween Bash in October, we will be presenting Love Guatemala with $10,000 and Transitions with another $10,000. Last year our club’s donations, of $9,000 each, provided a wide variety of material for Love Guatemala, and Transitions was able to provide 16 custom-built wheelchairs.
We leave on February 7th, 2020 and return on February 16th. We will likely be transporting a variety of supplies from here, in addition to the material supplied through our club’s fundraising.
Rotary International continues to work on branding and communication of our organization throughout the world. They are pushing for greater exposure within the press, radio, television and social media.
To this end, we would like to encourage all members to participate, with contribution, on our social media sites.
The link for the NEW District 5050 Facebook is: www.facebook.com/rotary5050/
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