I used the lockdown recently to build a Toddler Learning Tower Stool as a birthday present for my granddaughter who is turning one tomorrow. The stool is made from a IKEA flat pack and some spare left over pieces of woods laying around my garage.
This Toddler Learning Tower Stool will allow my granddaughter to stand up to the level of the kitchen bench to see her parents washing dishes and help out later when she grows a bit older. She can also use the stool to see her parents cooking too and who knows she can be a Masterchef when she grows up ! It is very satisfying for me during this lockdown to build it for my granddaughter instead of buying one for $150. Due to border lockdown in South Australia, I am not able to go to Adelaide to give her this birthday present. When the boarder reopens, I will visit her and give this special present to her.
G'DEH to all. Club Members can access their Club and District information on their mobiles by downloading the ClubRunner App suited to your phone type. Just use your District logon username and password to gain access. For assistance email David (info.nutone@gmail.com) or Colin (colin.byron@gmail,com)
Twice each week, our friends at Ali Fresh and M & G Fresh donate fresh fruit and vegetables from their stalls at Dandenong Market. Along with some beautiful produce supplied by Dandenong Council, this has meant we can provide delicious and healthy fresh produce along with non-perishable goods. For low income families and individuals, access to such a wide range of fresh produce has provided a valuable nutritional boost to the food parcels from Cornerstone.
Hi friends,
Well we are certainly all becoming accustomed to frequent change! Like many organisations and workplaces, Cornerstone has had to adapt our programs and processes in order to keep our community and team as safe as possible while we go through these stage 4 restrictions. This has meant suspending our community meal programs, and ramping up our food parcel service, along with finding new and creative ways to care for people and nurture community.
One of the biggest changes we have seen is the demographic of people contacting us for assistance. Many international students, asylum seeker families and low-income families have been reaching out for support. As we brace ourselves for the long-term impact of local job losses and the reduction of Job Keeper and Job Seeker payments, we anticipate that we are only going to get busier.
One way that we are seeking assistance at the moment is through in-kind support. .
Thank you again for your support. The donations, prayers and encouragement of each of you is invaluable. I pray that you and your loved ones stay safe and healthy as we navigate these challenging times.
Operation Cleft Australia is an international humanitarian project of the Rotary Club of Box Hill Central, Victoria
How the world has changed and every one of us impacted! The Operation Cleft programme (Cleft Bangladesh) like all international care programmes has been hard hit.
This year we proudly celebrate 15 years of serving the Cleft suffering families of Bangladesh, achieving in total more than 14,200 free, life changing Cleft surgeries. The good news is that with your continuing faithful and generous support and our faithful and committed surgeons; in spite of all the obstacles they face, are back doing what they love doing most. Bangladesh continues to experience large Covid-19 infection rates the 15th highest in the world with many daily fatalities. Our surgeons from late August are back operating, bringing smiles to the faces of Cleft suffering children and their deeply appreciative families.
After the severe lockdown effective in Bangladesh from early March only a few urgent Cleft surgeries had been undertaken until now, leaving a growing daily backlog for this year ahead. The good news is that we as Cleft Bangladesh (OCA and partner DCKH) were still able to complete a high 1,286 free surgeries for the 2019-2020 year.
Free surgeries continue to change lives and bring smiles to faces because of your faithful, generous on-going support. Individual donors (friends of OCA) have over the year maintained a high level of support, Organisations, made up of Trusts, Schools, Businesses and groups (outside of Rotary) increased giving by 85% compared to the previous year, this is deeply appreciated. An increase in the number of contributing Rotary Clubs also occurred, while total giving from Rotary Clubs was down for the year by 22% due to the Covid-19 lockdowns and restrictions preventing normal Rotary Club fundraising activities.
We do not know what the year ahead holds but we do know that around 14 babies are born every day In Bangladesh with a Cleft lip/palate issue. The backlog numbers will be high with the suffering experienced by the families with untreated Clefts, long and difficult.
Rotary members have played an invaluable role in the effort to rid the African region of wild polio. We should be proud of all the hard work that we’ve done to eliminate the wild poliovirus throughout Africa and in nearly every country in the world.
This progress is the result of a decades-long effort across the 47 countries of the African region. It has involved millions of health workers traveling by foot, boat, bike and bus, innovative strategies to vaccinate children amid conflict and insecurity, and a huge disease surveillance network to test cases of paralysis and check sewage for the virus.
Over the last two decades, countless Rotary members in countries across the African region and around the world have worked together to raise funds, immunize children, advocate with local and national leaders, and raise awareness about the importance of vaccination, enabling the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) to effectively respond to and stop polio outbreaks.
This milestone is an incredible public health achievement for Rotary members, the African region, and our GPEI partners, and a huge step forward on the road to global polio eradication. But we still have important work to do in order to eradicate wild polio in the last two endemic countries.
We have faced many challenges in our journey to eradicate polio. But we’ve made remarkable progress, and the polio infrastructure that Rotarians helped build will serve as a lasting legacy that will continue to help protect vulnerable children against other diseases for decades to come.
We are calling on you today to recommit yourselves to ending polio. We need each and every one of you to help finish this fight and continue raising $50 million each year for PolioPlus. The eradication of wild polio in the African region shows us that polio eradication is achievable, and shows how our hard work, partnerships and financial commitment continue to propel us forward, even during a global pandemic.
Thank you for your continued efforts, for achieving a wild polio-free African region, and for remaining committed to fulfilling our promise of a polio-free world.
Sincerely, Holger Knaack K.R. Ravindran President, Rotary International Chair, The Rotary Foundation
With Captain Colin at the helm of the good ship Zoom, the Meeting got off to a good start, with 26 Members present and apologies from John A, Val and Anthony. We were also graced by the presence of Steve O’Reilly from Phillip Island San Remo.
Phil, with his District Insurance Officer hat on, immediately began his thorough presentation on how Rotary Insurance works, illustrating his talk with Power Point slides. The main points were:
Unless Club projects are formally approved by the Board, we are not covered by insurance and are at risk. (That is why we have introduced formal Project Approval Forms, a documented planning process and a formal budget. Ed.)
Rotary National Insurance Program (RIPN) is the title of the program.
$26 per Rotarian goes towards the District premiums.
AON is the insurance broker.
All claims are to go to Phil.
A variety of covers is involved to cover different types of risk.
Covered are Clubs, Rotarians, Partners and other participants.
Activities have to be formally sanctioned by the Club.
Loss of rental is now covered after discussions with AON.
48 clubs have to supply details to Phil (This is a big job folks! Ed.)
Any incident must be reported promptly and comprehensively on forms available on the District website.
Indemnities are important to limit liability.
Youth Volunteer Declaration form being updated. Required by everyone involved with youth projects.
Phil certainly knows his stuff and we now have a better appreciation of some of the changes we have introduced in 2020-2021 and why. Very informative!
Pres Kam then introduced the Behind the Badge segment, starring Cherie.
Cherie has been a Rotarian for seven years. She grew up in The Basin, the fourth of five children and the only girl. She naturally developed into an outdoor girl, enjoying family camping at places such as Lake Eildon, Lake Eppalock and Lakes Entrance.
She attended the good old Boronia Tech, where her mum worked the canteen, before going to Victoria (as it is now known) Uni, where she studied Events Management, majoring in Hotel and Catering Management. After a false start, she did work placement at the Southern Cross Hotel before deciding not to pursue that career.
Cherie’s Partner migrated to Australia because, as a non-Muslim, he was not safe in his homeland of Iran. On her thirtieth birthday, Cherie bought a house in Rowville, with the intention of renovating it and turning it over. She is still there!
Cherie then moved into Human Resources with Officeworks, where she did store visits, checking on compliance with procedures, then coaching and training, which she loved. After the Wesfarmers takeover, she was moved into administration and took up a role as Audit Officer, spending twenty six weeks of the year on the road.
Two years later, Cherie became a Manager in the Finance area, where she “inherited a mess”. She streamlined and automated procedures and trained teams.
On turning forty, Cherie wanted a change of direction into something “more meaningful”. She Joined Rotary and became a primary school teacher, completing a Masters in 2017, while still working part time at Officeworks. She then joined Disaster Aid as a volunteer before becoming a permanent staff member, responsible for donations, and “loving it”!
Regarding her role as Club Administration, Cherie is “having a think”, some of those thoughts involving vocational tours and a social before Christmas.
Cherie has certainly had an interesting life and brings a lot of skills to the Board.
John P on Membership mentioned a potential from the Mens Shed, via Hans VD and Pres Kam mentioned another prospect from the District website.
Con on Foundation gave a potted summary of Rotary Foundation, some of the points being:
Total assets of $US 1.15bn
Annual revenues of $US 360m
Four star rating
Source of funds for Global and District Grants, entitlement to which is dependent on club contributions
Aiming to get $100 per Member per year in donations, resurrecting the Centurions Club, with the intention of contributing $ 5,000 to the Fund over the year.
Treas. Jo read out he bank balances, totalling around $300,000.
Pres Kim reporting briefly on the recent Board Meeting, said that nine Projects had been formally approved, an overall Plan and Budget had been presented for consideration and several other matters.
Colin put forward a recommendation that we use the MS Teams app, consolidating all current sites into one and terminating the others. He reported that we would be adopting the EH Facebook account, as it was the better site and urged everyone to visit and press “Like”.
Pres Kam then returned to the fray, reporting that he had discussed sponsorship with David L, who recommended “thinking big” and will advise the Board of his ideas in the near future. Kam spoke of a five year Strategic Plan, but said it was not a good idea to do it on Zoom and would defer it until after Covid 19 is over. He also proposed chasing a Presidential Citation, mentioned some of the criteria and the need to measure outcomes.
Honorary Members were being considered and he noted the limitation to 10% of Active Members.
Colin called for contributions to a Contacts List, consisting of everyone Members have been involved with who might prove a valuable resource for the Club. This would include potential Guest Speakers and Members.
Kam thanked Terry and Neil for the terrific work they have done so far on Cornerstone and on the application for a Council Grant of $10,000 for a tank and fencing.
Wow, what a great start we had to our monthly meal service at Cornerstone! My sincere thanks go to our generous members who donated money to provide the funds to purchase the meals, our fantastic team of volunteers, Kam, Martin, Graeme & Hans and of course Frank & his team at Charcoal Chicken/Flounders Fish & Chips Endeavour Hills. I'd also like to thank those of you who have volunteered to be on our Roster for the meal service. The roster will be sent out one week prior to each meal service.
The 46 meals provided last night were very generous in size, excellent quality and well packed in containers which kept the food warm. Frank gave us fantastic value for money and donated the gravy and 2 slabs of water. He also delivered the order personally to Cornerstone. It is really nice to think we were able to support a local business during these extremely difficult times.
I'm pretty sure that all in attendance would agree that we left Cornerstone feeling very satisfied that we were able to provide a warm and nutritious meal to those in need, who may have otherwise gone hungry that night.
The meal provided consisted of Chicken, chips, peas, carrots & gravy or a Vegetarian Souvlaki with chips, home-made cupcakes & a snack size kit-kat for dessert, along with fresh fruit & a drink.
The recipients of the delicious meals were delighted and thankful, they were also very impressively 'social distancing'.
We still have some funds in the charity account to help cover the next meal service. I’ll start sending out letters to local businesses over the next week or so, in the hope of getting some donations or discounts for items to assist with keeping our costs for the meal service down. If any of you have any contacts, please let me know. I have a letter of support from Naomi at Cornerstone which we are able to use when seeking donations.
It is fantastic to have such a supportive, enthusiastic club and to be out there in the community making a difference to the lives of those in need.
On a final note, if you're looking for a great take-away meal, please check out Frank's business. Whether it be the Charcoal chicken, fish & chips, burgers, souvlaki or salads, they are by far the best in the area.
Please check out the photos from last Thursday night.
I hope you all have a lovely weekend.
Kind regards,
Leanne Byron Community Chair Rotary Club of Greater Dandenong and Endeavour Hills
The newly merged Rotary Club of Greater Dandenong Endeavour Hills welcomed their new President Kam Pow in an enthusiastic meeting last Tuesday night. Here is Kam's acceptance Speech.
Good Evening. Fellow Rotarians, District Governor, Mark Humphries and partner Linda, Past District Governor, Ken MacDonald and partner Margaret, Past Assistant District Governor, Alan Collier, OAM and partner Vicki and my family, Christine and Emily who are here and via Zoom from Adelaide, my son, Vincent, daughter in law, Clara and granddaughter, Everly and a special guest, Dr Raymond Au to witness this very special Rotary Changeover. Thank you very much to all of you who are physically present tonight and Rotarians via Zoom at this historical Changeover in this unprecedented time of Covid-19 restriction.
I joined Rotary 4 years ago as I wanted to serve the community and tonight I am very honoured and humbled to be inaugurated as the President of the recently merged Rotary Club of Greater Dandenong and Endeavour Hills with 40 members in the club. As President, there are many responsibilities and challenges to lead a successful club. I am sure I can count on my team of directors and every members of the newly merged club to help, support, guide and advise me to make this Rotary Centenary year a success for all of us to remember.
I want to thank the two Immediate Past Presidents Dr Anthony Brown of RC Greater Dandenong and Martin Pater from Endeavour Hills and their respective teams for the great work that they have done. They have set the ground work for me to continue to take the club to greater height. I hope I can fulfil this very important role entrusted to me by all the members as their Club President.
This is an unprecedented and challenging time during to Covid-19 restriction. It has presented us with many challenges and also opportunities for us to do things differently. The Chinese word for Danger is made up of two characters “Wai Chi” which translates to danger and opportunity. The danger part is Covid -19 is a very serious health issue to mankind and the opportunity part is for us to think of doing things differently to adapt and change. Tonight is a very good example of adopting technology to connect all our members at one place to witness using the hybrid model of zoom meeting and face to face for some members at the Changeover
The Opportunity part of the Chinese word for Danger is also the RI President Holger Knacks’s theme of “Rotary opens opportunities” We have opportunity to do things differently and we should all put on our thinking caps and come up with great ideas to make our club a success for potential members to join Rotary.
Next year is the Rotary Centenary year in Australia. As a club, we should celebrate this very important milestone. Our club is working with the City of Greater Dandenong to install a Rotary Centenary Wheel at a park in Dandenong. We have a planned community project to provide shelter and a community vegetable and fruit garden for Cornerstone for the homeless and disadvantaged communities in the Dandenong area. Thanks to a team of dedicated Rotarians especially Terry Valentine’s project management expertise, we were able to, within a short time frame, submitted a community grant application of $10k to the Dandenong City council for this project. We are optimistic that we can get the grant at the end of September to kick start this project to benefit the disadvantaged community that Cornerstone services.
The recent short surveys conducted by Colin for both the clubs revealed about 70% of the respondents wanted to involve in community projects. We are in the process to finalise the logistics to start in late July, a once a month meal service at Cornerstone for the homeless and disadvantaged communities. Leanne, who is the Community Chair will require helps from all members to run this program. Her team will also be talking to other community groups to assess their needs for our club to provide services to them.
The uncertain time calls for different and creative way to raise fund for the club to do more service projects. It will be a challenge to raise fund from traditional way like Bunning BBQs at this time. Some major fund raising events are planned for next year like, the Chinese New Year Celebration Dinner, Holden Car Show, and Golf Day. Leanne has also come up with ideas of online fund raising for mental health. All fund raising activities will allow our club to provide more services to the local and International community. I will be appointing a Sponsorship Officer for the club to further increase our fund raising activities e.g. getting corporate sponsors. If any of the members especially from the former RC Endeavour Hills is interested in this position, please let me know.
This Rotary year, I am planning to have less meeting and more services. There will be 2 hybrid meetings a month via Zoom and physical meeting when it is possible. Of the 2 meetings, one will be with an invited guest speaker to speak on topic of interest to the members. At least one service to community a month like meal service at Cornerstone and a social event per month for new experience, fun and fellowship for all members.
There will be 5 committees for the club namely: Club Administration (Cherie Ramsay), Membership (John Peck), Public Image (Colin Byron), Service Projects (Peter Buck) and Rotary Foundation (Con Meehan). The respective committee and subcommittee will have other members helping to carry out their role and responsibility to achieve the desired goals of the club. I strongly encourage all members to talk to the Chairperson of the respective committee to get involved. In this way, our members can play an active part to make our club one of the successful Rotary clubs in District 9820.
Membership is very important for Rotary. With Rotary memberships in decline, we need to actively look out for potential members in the community and invite them to join our club. I will be working closely with John and other members to address the challenges of increasing membership for our club in the coming year.
I am a firm believer of lifelong learning. I will be appointing a training coordinator to coordinate trainings for members and future leaders of the club. I am amazed at the amount of training materials at the My Rotary learning centre website. You can access all these training material to improve your knowledge. Please sign up to my Rotary to enrol in courses that you are interested in as they are free.
Strategic planning for an organisation like the Rotary club is very important. We need to set goals and track the result to measure the health and success of the club. We need to develop a strategic plan for the coming 5 years to address the needs of the community. Setting goals in Rotary Central so that we can track them. As a team, we will get board approval to select at least 13 out of 25 gaols towards 2020-2021 Rotary Citation. It will be a good achievement for the club to receive the Rotary citation to recognise the hard work of the members who have contributed to the success of the club.
Finally, Rotarians are people of action. Rotary changes life and makes a difference. Rotary opens opportunity and Rotary services above self. I am very excited to lead the club as your President for 2020/2021. I know there are many challenges ahead during this unprecedented time of Covid-19. With all the help from our members, I have no doubt that we can make it a fun, enjoyable year. I want to thank my family for their encouragement and support in my Rotary journey to make a small difference to the community.
Once again, Thank you very much for your attendance via Zoom and in person at this historical hybrid Rotary Changeover and it means a lot to me. Stay safe and healthy.
I will now present the Rotary Theme “Rotary Opens opportunities” Pin to my team of board of directors.
Martin Pater- Vice President and Immediate Past President , RC Endeavour Hills
Phil Thurgood – Secretary
Joe Iellamo – Treasurer
Dr Anthony Brown --Immediate Past President, RC Greater Dandenong
Peter Buck—President Elect, Service Projects and Vocational Chair
Good evening all,
