Prez Gary opened today’s meeting with the Pledge of Allegiance.

Thought for the Day: “I couldn’t wait for success, so I went ahead without it.” Jonathan Winters

 

Visiting Rotarian: Ruth Sparks, from Fort Bragg Rotary.

 

Guests: John Turnbull, and our speaker Joe Karabensh from Florida

 

Today’s Program:

Joe started by saying he wished he could take us on a flight to Haiti… He has worked for 20 years with Missionary Flights International, serving as President for past two years.

 

MFI started in 1964 with one man and one small plane. They started operations flying to the Bahamas, and soon after selected Haiti as their area of focus. They have two turboprop DC-3s and fly about 3.5 flights per week. Their mission is to spread the good news of Jesus Christ, provide supplies to missionaries, mail, school supplies and toys, medications (refrigerated and otherwise), generators, teams of people to work on specific mission projects (mostly construction and medical/dental), and occasionally animals (18 goats, 62000 fish, chickens…).

 

About 3000 passengers fly with them per year. MFI works with over 480 organizations in Haiti.

 

Joe shared a video called The Lives We’ve Touched, featuring 4 stories sampling the work MFI has done. They are preparing to expand into Cuba and Central America with a third plane they’ve acquired, which needs 1-2 years of additional work to bring it up to their flight standards.

 

They’ve also just acquired 5 acres of land near their Florida hangar to build out as a hospitality center with RV slots, cabins and a house that sleeps 30. This way teams of volunteers can come spend the night before flying down to Haiti for their missionary projects.

 

Announcements:

Jody announced that our Debunking is Friday, 6/30/17 from 6-9pm at the Raven’s Restaurant. It will cost about $35-40/person.

 

Donna described the membership survey that will help us make better plans for next year for our club. Please fill out your survey and return it to Donna as soon as you can.

 

We’ll be dark the week of July 4. Our next regular meeting will be July 13.

 

Jerry talked about the 4th of July event in Rotary Park, where our club will be handing out flags and candy for kids under 12, offering kids’ facepainting, and staffing a table with information on future plans for Rotary Park and to accept donations. Please show up on July 4th to volunteer from 10:30 – 2:00pm!

 

The Golf Tournament is coming up Aug. 26! Get hole sponsors ($50) and game sponsors ($200) and raffle/auction items. Food will be around the golf course, without a banquet afterwards (just desserts).

 

Happy Dollars:

  • John P. just celebrated his 86th birthday!
  • John C. just celebrated a birthday.
  • Jerry is happy to have his son and daughter-in-law here from Florida.
  • Donna is happy she’ll go to tomorrow’s MHS graduation.
  • Pete is hopeful our country can come together in peace.
  • Heather went to a conference last week that was great!
  • Joe is happy his eldest daughter is coming in for the weekend.
  • Gary is happy today is his last official regular meeting as President!
  • Harold is happy to have had a great visit with his grandkids.

 

Sunshine Report:

John P sent a card to Wilma.

 

Gary held an auction for an American flag stand to raise funds for Polio Plus. No one bought it, so he passed the hat instead to collect funds for Polio Plus.

 

Today’s Raffle:

Jerry was the lucky winner — he picked what was in the box — LED light bulbs and a $25 Harvest gift card! Dean had the other winning number, and he chose the white wine.