The Mighty Kahuna Kavinta started last Friday's meeting by showing a message from the District Governor:
DG Michael will be the featured speaker at our next meeting, but only after he meets with the Kahuna's Kabinet (also known as the RCAS Board of Directors) Thursday evening.
THE WORD FROM FA
Our Rotary Exchange Student from Thailand, Fa Sillapajarn, said that she went to see the Arcata High School football team take on Lower Lake High. The AHS Tigers won, 44 to 6. Fa also told us something about marshmallows, but Your Editor didn't have his trusty cub reporter serving as his emergency backup ears, so the Spirit missed it.
MORE ANNOUNCEMENTS
Rob McBeth told us that Kirk, one of the former foster youths who spoke at a recent meeting, is in need of an apartment. If you have a lead, please let Rob know.
Howard Stauffer, our long-serving World Community Service Committee Chair, announced that the process and criteria for Rotary Foundation Matching Grants have changed. The process had become complex, and the costs to review and administer such grants has grown a bit. It no longer makes sense to fund smaller grants at the Foundation level. Now Matching Grants come in two flavors - programs seeking up to $1,500 are asked to request funding at the District level. Larger grant requests will be funded through the Global Grant program. Howard gave the example of a $35k project - at least $10k needs to be raised locally to leverage the money to the $35k level. He said that the WCS Committee plans to apply for a Global Grant later this year. Each year, our Club needs to be certified before it can access this program. President George and President-Elect Barbara attended a recent Foundation seminar, which began the certification process for the current year.
Cam Appleton told us that we are nearing the October 15th deadline for committing to host an Exchange Student for 2013-2014. We have been hosting at least one student per year since 1994, Cam said, "And it would be nice to do it again." However, we need commitments from families to host the Inbound Student. We traditionally have three host families during the year. If you are interested or if you know a family who might be interested (it doesn't have to be a Rotarian's family), please contact Cam.
Grab your bat, glove, and balls ... the Lost Coast Rotaract is putting on a softball game on Sunday, September 30th at Fortuna's Newburg Park. The group is raising money for its Community Service Projects. The official announcement says that concessions, lunch, and VIP seating will be available. There will also be (wait for it ...) a beer garden! Alrighty, then! Contact Kahuna Kavinta to sign up.
Terri Clark announced that her first grand niece was born on Labor Day. (Aren't all babies born on labor day?) I missed the little girl's name, but I didn't miss the news that she is already a Paul Harris Fellow! Congratulations!
NEW MEMBER
Last week, we were pleased to welcome our newest Sunriser - Tomas Chavez. His Sponsor, Angelo Bacigaluppi invited Tomas into the Club, and we're glad he did. Tomas works as a Personnel Consultant for Sequoia Personnel Services, and he and his wife Heidi have a one-year old son, Cruz. Tomas enjoys the outdoors and sports. Welcome, Tomas!
IMAGINE HUMBOLDT
Last week, we welcomed back one of our Charter Members (and a Past President!) - Kathy Moxon. For 30 years, Kathy has been involved in economic and community development. She is currently the Director of Redwood Coast Rural Action (RCRA), a group of regional leaders who are working to grow the local economy through several avenues. The group is a project of the Humboldt County Association of Governments, which is itself a cross-jurisdictional group.
RCRA grew out of a CalTrans project; its initial goal was to look to the future for ways to reduce gas consumption. However, the model used was urban-centric, and it didn't translate well to rural settings. But the idea of planning the future across jurisdictional boundaries resonated.
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| Kathy Moxon |
So in late 2010, RCRA began the process of identifying the elements that comprise the appeal of Humboldt County, and envisioning its future. Kathy noted that the project got off to a somewhat rocky start, and the early results were not encouraging. over 60% of the people at community forums and responding to questionnaires indicated that they thought that the economic situation in Humboldt would be worse by 2050. Jobs were seen as the biggest issue.
A second round of public meetings are now being held, supplemented by an online tool that allows online participation via interactive maps. Kathy noted that there are seven maps, or canvasses, available online (at Imagine Humboldt: Share Ideas): McKinleyville and Northern Humboldt, the Arcata area, Willow Creek-Hoopa, the greater Eureka area, Eel River Valley, Garberville-Redway, and one encompassing the entire county.
The maps allow you to read comments by others, respond to those comments, and/or add comments of your own. Each comment is shown on the map in the location that it addresses. The comments heard in each public meeting are added to the maps, to generate a comprehensive interactive discussion. Kathy said that the initial goal for the discussion is to have 300 or more ideas tagged to the seven maps.
Because both HCOG and RCRA are non-regulatory bodies, they hope to engage the community in a civil conversation about the future of our community. For more information about the project, visit the Imagine Humboldt website.
