Stories

Girl Scouts

Posted on Aug 07, 2020

Liz Sheahan from Girl Scouts San Diego was our speaker today. Liz oversees all of Girl Scouts San Diego's advancement initiatives, including marketing and communications as well as philanthropic partnerships. There are 23,000 Girl Scouts and 11,300 volunteers in San Diego County.

Girl Scouts have proved to be a mighty force in the world today. The Girl Scout law focuses on what Rotary is all about: "I will do my best ot be honest and fair, friendly and helpful, considerate and caring, courageous and strong, and responsible for what I say and do, and to respect myself and others, respect authority, use resources wisely, make the world a better place, and be a sister to every Girl Scout."

They focus on four pillars:

Entrepreneurship
Operation Thin Mints
STEM
Life Skills

Paul shared that his daughter Katie was a gold level Girl Scout and Charles & Alicia have been active supporters of the Girl Scouts and their programs.

More Paul Harris Fellow Awards

Posted by Jan Parsons on Jul 31, 2020

Four More Rotarians Receive the next level Paul Harris Award

Radia Hunter received her Paul Harris +1, Charlotte Jones also received her PH+1, Jon Fish received his PH+3, and Steve Weitzen received his PH+4. A Paul Harris Fellow is recognized for the substantial financial commitment they make to the Rotary Foundation. A gold pin is given for those who contribute $1000, and then a blue sapphire is added for each additional $1000. Thank you all for your generous contributions.

Conscious Capitalism

Posted on Jul 31, 2020

"Conscious Capitalism - Investing With Your Values To Improve Environmental, Social, and Financial Returns"

This was the talk Scott Smith gave today as explained by the slide below.

And these are other things we can do

Alzheimer's San Diego

Posted on Jul 27, 2020

Michelle Van Hoff, Director of Development at Alzheimer's San Diego, gave a touching talk on July 21 at our evening meeting on this terrible disease that is the 3rd leading cause of death in San Diego County. It touched members' hearts as many Rotarians have experienced dementia and alzheimers in loved ones. The charts here show how Alzheimer's San Diego is helping those in need during this pandemic and how we can help. President Herb is calling for all Rotarians to join his ARMY for ALZ & sign up to walk in October.

Paul Harris Fellow

Posted by Jan Parsons on Jul 24, 2020

Three Rotarians Receive Next Level Paul Harris Fellow Pins

President Herb Liberman and Foundation Chair Paul Butler presented three members with the next level Paul Harris Fellow pins (all done virtually). Ken Barrett received his Paul Harris + 1 which is a pin with 1 sapphire, Paul Butler received his Paul Harris + 3 pin with 3 sapphires, and Jan Parsons received her Paul Harris + 7 pin with 2 rubies. The Paul Harris Fellow program was established to recognize individuals who contribute $1000 + to the Rotary Foundation . Well done!

OUR VERY OWN!!

Posted by Jan Parsons on Jul 20, 2020

Passing the Banner

Finding the "I" in Team

Jimmy Karam, retired Naval Officer and current Mental Performance Consultant, works with youth to help them on their life-long path of discovering who they are and how they fit in

Incoming President Herb Liberman holds first virtual meeting

DMSB Demotion Party 2020

DEL MAR-SOLANA BEACH ROTARY HOLDS “FUN” VIRTUAL DEMOTION PARTY!!

zoom

This is how we're now meeting - via zoom!

See info at left and join us for great comradery & speakers

Celebration of Service 2019-2020

Posted by Susheela Narayanan

DMSB Rotary Virtual Celebration of Service 2019-2020

DMSB Rotary Grants $25,000 for Coronavirus Needs

Posted by Susheela Narayanan & Bill Sutton

The following was published in the Del Mar Times, Solana Beach Sun, & Carmel Valley News on April 17, 2020

Participants at BocceFest 2019. Bocce events each year helped to build a reserve for unexpected emergencies.

Del Mar–Solana Beach Rotary Grants $25,000 to Five Nonprofits

Serving San Diegans Most In Need Due to the Coronavirus

Del Mar-Solana Beach Rotary recently donated $25,000, split equally, to five nonprofits at the forefront of serving the needs of those most hurt by the coronavirus outbreak in San Diego County. An additional $1,250 is being sought for the same five nonprofits via matching grants from our local Rotary District’s reserves.

Girls on the Run

Posted by Susheela

Why should girls participate in running? Read more to find out....

From the Gate of the Jail to the Door of the Church

From the Gate of the Jail to the Door of the Church

Dianne Crawford talks membership

The world needs more Rotarians, says Dianne Crawford

test test

Posted by Susheela Narayanan

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San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station

Posted by Susheela Narayanan

DMSB Rotary began the new year with an informative talk by Mr. Torgen Johnson about the future of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station.

Johnson holds two Masters’ degrees in Urban Planning in addition to a professional degree in Architecture. Since 2013 he has organized eight public forums titled “Fukushima – Ongoing Lessons” in San Diego, New York, Boston and Japan featuring the former prime minister of Japan – Naoto Kan – and other regulatory leaders and industry experts.

"Pure Water San Diego Program" by Tiffany Ngo

Today we saw that the Hilton was decorated everywhere for Christmas holidays. Our usual meeting room was all decked up since Phil mentioned that that room is used for screening movies and for hotel guests to come and relax.

Herb appointed Bill as the "Aid de Camp" to help him with things that he forgets as part of the President's duties. He was acting President since Venky is on vacation. He announced that the club will be DARK on Dec 27, 2019 and that our next meeting will be Jan 3, 2020.

Herb also announced our new member Sarah Taylor and Charles presented her with the new member badge and advice about membership advantages.

Today Patricia had the last day of toys collection drive and this week the punishment was for Art Mendoza. He had to sing a Christmas tune :-).

Today's 1-minute talk was by Sanjiv and he presented some points on the history of Rotary.

> Over 33,000 Rotary clubs in 200+ countries

> Two official mottoes of Rotary

Service Above Self
One Profits Most Who Serves Best

> Dedicated to six areas of focus

Promoting peace
Fighting disease
Providing clean water & hygiene
Saving mothers & children
Supporting education
Growing local economies

> Saw couple of interesting news items on the Rotary site —

> In May 2014, Guinness World Record recognized Rotary for the “The World’s Biggest Commercial” photo awareness award since Rotary had enlisted 177 celebrity participants for the global effort to eradicate polio.

> A couple from India (Mr. Ravishankar Dakoju, and his wife, Paola), recently donated US$14.7 million to the Rotary Foundation.

## "Pure Water San Diego Program" by Tiffany Ngo

Our speaker today was Tiffany Ngo, who is a consultant and community outreach specialist for the City of San Diego Public Utilities Department. In her current role, she works on the education and outreach program for Pure Water San Diego, the City’s phased, multi-year program to provide San Diego with a safe, reliable and sustainable water supply.

She has been part of the consultant team for the City of San Diego’s Pure Water Program since 2016, where she provides strategic counsel and implements community outreach tactics to engage diverse stakeholders and maintain public support as Phase 1 of the program nears construction.

Tiffany is a graduate of UC Santa Barbara, where she majored in environmental studies with a minor in spatial science.

She talked about how earthquakes can cut off water supply and hence the need for programs to store pure water.. Imported water used to cost $400 /acre foot and that now costs $1,300!

There are 5 ways to deal with water shortage -

Conservation
Desalination
Ground water development
Recycled water development
Pure water development

As an example, she said that the Torrey Pines Golf course uses re-cycled water to maintain part of the lawns. She said that a DEMO facility with a small 1 million gallon capacity has been built and has gone through some 50,000 lab tests to verify water purity. The water comes out as "too" pure and so they have to add back some impurities to make it safe to drink for humans. There are 5 steps to purification and it takes about 2 days. The phase-1 plan is to build the Morena Pump Station, which will be a trench-less construction.

At the end, DMSB Club President-elect Herb Liberman presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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DMSB Holiday Party

Posted by Susheela Narayanan

Del Mar - Solana Beach Rotary celebrated the holiday season with friendship and camaraderie over a holiday dinner party at the Cosmopolitan Hotel in Old Town on December 8th. Drinks and jokes flowed as festively dressed members partook of a tasty feast served in the outside patio festooned with twinkling holiday lights.

"FBI in U.S. Embassies" by Allen Vitkosky

Herb announced that he is the President-Elect and that Vicky will be next president after Herb and Kevin Cahill will be his fine master.

Paul announced that our DMSB club received the 100% participation EREY (Every Rotarian Every Year) award.

Bill Sutton displayed the CRC certificate of appreciation for helping with the holiday baskets and distributions. DMSB members sorted about 7.5 tons of bananas by removing them out of plastic bags so it can breathe properly and prevent them for rotting.

Patricia had some fun penalizing members that did not turn in any toys for the Military Toy Drive. This time it was Kevin Cahill's turn for a punishment. Please watch this brief fun video of Kevin trying to balance himself on one foot for 30 seconds :-).

Charles Foster presented his 1-minute talk about Rotary history. He mentioned that Rotary International's headquarters is in Evanston, Illinois and it has 6 international offices located in India, Europe/Africa, Brazil, Australia, Tokyo and Korea.

## "FBI in U.S. Embassies" by Allen Vitkosky

Today's speaker Allen Vitkosky has some very interesting facts and stories about the FBI operations at U.S. Embassies across the world. He has been with FBI for over 30 years and the past 3 years he has been in the Legal Attache (Legat) department in the international arena. He was posted in Riga, Latvia for the past 3 years, which is located across the Baltic Sea from Sweden.

There are 90 Legat locations overall and 27 sub-offices. Each location is manned by just 4 people. There are 353 FBI employees overseas out of a total of 35,000 employees and 13,000 are agents.

Bogata, Columbia was the location for the first FBI agent in 1940. EuroPol is where agencies of different countries exchange intelligence information and InterPol is just a reporting agency for information for and from all countries. He also talked about the major case of "Scan4You" that helped malware developers attack American businesses using malware.

At the end, DMSB Club President Venky Venkatesh presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

================

"San Diego Blood Bank" by David Wellis

We had many members today to listen to David Wellis from the San Diego Blood Bank and to celebrate George Sousa's 89th birthday!

Paul kicked off the meeting by showing a video on Polio's progress and how it has impacted lives.

Polio Video: Click here

Then everyone had a fun time celebrating George' birthday with a cake that Bill & Suzanne decorated and brought in.

Patricia had some fun with punishments for people who did not bring gifts for the Toy drive :-).

Following that we had the 1-minute Rotary talk by Jon Fish.

Following George's party, Venky showed a video that the past Indian Ambassador to the United States had created to honor South Asian musicians from various countries. This can be viewed below.

South Asian Music Video: Click here

## "San Diego Blood Bank" by David Wellis

David is a cell biologist with over 25 years of experience in the life science industry and currently serves as the CEO of the San Diego Blood Bank. David joined SDBB following his tenure at a variety of companies that developed antibody therapeutics and tools for biomedical research, diagnostic and applied markets, including Illumina and GenVault. David received his B.S. from UC Irvine, an M.S. and Ph.D. from Emory University, postdoctoral training at Tufts University and UC Berkeley, and business training at Leavey Business School of Santa Clara University and Haas Business School at UC Berkeley. David serves on the Executive Committees of the Altman Clinical and Translational Research Institute at UC San Diego, and the All of Us Research Program at the National Institutes of Health. He also holds board and committee roles in several national blood bank organizations and local biotechnology companies.

He said that the blood bank is a local San Diego organization but it has regional and national reach. The relationships with Jonas Salk helps with lots of research work on blood. He said that a person loses about 600 calories when you donate blood. All the blood collected comes to the central office every day where it is processed until 2:30 pm and then gets distributed. They deliver blood to over 75 locations each week.

They are part of a National Donor Club called "Be The Match". This program saved a child's life 15 years ago. Last match was sent to Texas Children Hospital recently. They also participate & promote many community events with Padres, Comic Con and Chargers Drive where they setup blood mobiles to collect blood. They collect over 3,500 pints over a 3-day event. Turns out that Los Angeles & Orange County do not have blood banks and San Diego supplies to them.

They also started a Mother's Milk Bank where moms bring breast milk in coolers. They collected milk in 1 day that San Jose did in a year!

The average cost of collecting a pint of blood is $50, which includes the cost of needles, supplies, testing, etc. They currently have 7 blood mobiles, each costing $750,000. They need 3 more.

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"Villa de Vida" by Ms. Hunter Christian

Posted by Susheela Narayanan on Nov 15, 2019

On Friday November 15, 2019, DMSB Rotary hosted Ms. Hunter Christian, the executive director of Villa de Vida, a non-profit organization committed to empowering developmentally disabled adults to live life fully, by providing them affordable housing and support services that would allow them to live independently.

Mercy Housing, CA (MHC) is a California based, non-profit housing development corporation with the mission of creating stable, vibrant and healthy communities since 1981. It currently serves over 17, 300 residents in 142 affordable communities throughout the state. It is committed to the philosophy that all residents deserve respect, dignity and a place to call home. MHC and Villa de Vida, Inc. are partnering to develop Via de Vida Poway, a two-story 54-unit affordable housing development serving adults with developmental disabilities who are capable of independent living. The development will be located on Poway Housing Authority property at the corner of Oak Knoll Road and Poway Road in Poway, CA.

Supportive services will be self-directed by each resident.

The on-site Resident services Coordinator will help residents access funding and supportive services that they require to successfully live independently.

Most residents will receive Supported Living Services (SLS) as well as other publicly funded services like MediCal, mental health services and In-Home Supportive Services (IHSS).

Villa de Vida is projected to be 100% completed by Fall 2020 with 100% occupancy by Fall 2021.

To learn more please visit www.mercyhousing.org and www.villadevida.org.

=============

"Refuge for Women" by Dan DeSaegher

Posted by Susheela Narayanan on Nov 08, 2019

We had a smaller audience since many members were traveling but the speaker and George Sousa made the event very interesting and fun.

Herb started off with his talk on Rotary History and events. Then we had Suchandra describe what the global grant will provide for her organization in India.

Then we had George present a wonderful video on veterans to celebrate the upcoming Veteran's Day weekend.

## "Refuge for Women" by Dan DeSaegher

DMSB Rotary hosted Dan DeSaegher, Developmental Director for Refuge for Women, who spoke about the sensitive topic of sex trafficking in San Diego. Today Refuge successfully operates homes in five states, and the sixth home is being planned for right here in Southern California.

Trafficking is modern day slavery, conducted by force, fraud and coercion. California is #1 on the FBI list for trafficking of American girls and boys, with San Diego being on the top ten of all U S cities engaging in a trade that generates $810 million in annual revenue. 80% of victims are US born and 85% of traffickers in California are related to San Diego gangs. The most common age of trafficked youth is 14 – 16 years. There are 3400 – 5200 victims every year. Traffickers prey on vulnerable youth that are mostly abandoned or ignored by society so they become easy victims.

Dan’s program called “Refuge for Women” provides safe houses for the recovery and rehabilitation of these trafficked victims. Right now, there are about 178 safe houses in America, providing about 600 beds for a population of about one million victims. The surprising statistic is that about 70% of rescued women do not return to the sex trade! So, the need for safe houses is great.

In Phase II of rehabilitation, called Healing, the rescued women are taught life skills training, goal setting, educational opportunities, financial intelligence and job placement. In Phase III they are offered Guided Independence – they get transitional housing and given more counseling in order to re-integrate with society and a more normal life.

He concluded by saying that his goal was to raise funds and resources to expand access to safe houses all over the country but also specifically in San Diego.

Finally, George had one more surprise for all -- his special Teddy Bear singing the song "Proud To Be An American" :-).

=================

"Urban Corps’ Dual Focus Program" by Meghan Reed

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Nov 01, 2019

Herb was the "Acting" President today (despite being very sick) since President Venky was not present.

Today we had Paul Butler deliver his 1-minute talk about why he joined Rotary. He was inspired when his daughter won a $10,000 Rotary scholarship and later became President at her Rotary club. He said it took an army to convince him to become President of the club and also really enjoyed his visit to the International Convention in Birmingham, England. He said that Rotary has done a lot for his family.

We also had the opportunity to listen to a wonderful testimony from Kirk Collins about his Rotary involvement and the project he worked on in Malawi. It involved donating 46 wheel chairs from our club and sending school supplies to a school in Malawi. Our club still sends $2,000 every year for school supplies. Charles Foster visited him in the Bay area and recorded his testimony.

## "Urban Corps’ Dual Focus Program" by Meghan Reed

Meghan, an Arkansas native, moved to San Diego earlier this year. Her background lies in nonprofit work and literary writing. She is the Development Coordinator at Urban Corps, writing foundational and corporation grants. In addition, she also takes care of the organizations’ marketing needs. She started her talk with a video about Urban Corps' program and some stories about some of the graduates from their program. That was very touching to see the hard work the participants go through. Urban Corps was started 30 years ago on July 20, 1989.

Their program trains disadvantaged children to get an education and work and stay positive and out of trouble. Many work at various Urban Corp programs. Incarcerated people get a second chance through job training. Urban Corps helps them with securing necessary certificates, driver license, etc. They run a Charter School so the students can get a proper high school degree.

Some of the jobs that they do involve painting public walls to get rid of graffiti. Their statistics shows that the students have painted walls with cumulative area that equals about 2000 Qualcomm stadiums!

They have about 220 students (ages 18-26 years) active in schools at a time and over 400 graduate annually. They have multiple campuses in San Diego. Their signature program is called Corps-To-Career that runs an internship program whereby they recruit employers who are willing to employ Corps graduates as an intern with the goal of becoming an employee after the intern period is over. Their Charter School currently has over 200 Corps members in the program.

At the end, DMSB Club Acting President Herb Liberman presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

=================

DMSB Oktoberfest Party

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Oct 29, 2019

The Oktoberfest Social party at the Viewpoint Brewing Restaurant was wonderful. We had over 30 people attend along with 5-7 guests. Our youngest Rotarian Riley was also there to enjoy the beer :-). Kudos to Patricia for planning this so nicely. She even made up the ramp in her wheelchair :-). Here are few pictures from the event ...

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"Embracing Diversity and Inclusion" by Taryell Simmons

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Oct 25, 2019

Since many were on travel the audience was a bit light. We had Kevin Cahill give his 1-Minute Rotary talk and fielded some questions. Apparently someone picked him to be President during his first year and he just dived in. He encouraged members to be involved with District events where you meet wonderful people. One of the questions was, "how was DMSB club created?". Kevin said it was primarily because the Del Mar club was reaching 100 people and they wanted to keep it small. Hence many members that wanted a breakfast club joined together to form DMSB.

## "Embracing Diversity and Inclusion" by Taryell Simmons

Taryell Simmons is a Foodie, Entrepreneur, community activist, workforce consultant, and HR trainer recognized as one of the most prominent voices for diversity and inclusion in the workforce. He is the Co-Founder of EvoGrant, Workforce Development Specialist at SAGE business & Education and a Founding Member of the San Diego Tech Hub. For the past five years, Taryell has helped create and develop workforce programs like "CONNECT2Careers" to help young people in underserved communities get living wage jobs.

Taryell believes that successful careers come from being connected to one's strengths, abilities, skills, and passion. This is why he has dedicated his career to exposing people to opportunities that will help them figure out paths to combine their talents with a career they love. Taryell is a RISE Urban Leadership Institute graduate.

He talked about how older generation people deride the younger generation kids by saying "Back in the days ..." and that just irritates the younger kids always :-). When he worked in HR on the east coast the popular phrase was "snitches get stitches". However, on the west coast it is the opposite - "see something, say something".

He clarified that diversity and inclusion is not just the color of people but there are many other aspects, such as, culture. religion, etc. The new generation likes people to earn their respect and not force any values upon them.

Taryell along with 2 other co-founders created "Culture Cocina" where the mission is to create space for breaking bread while learning about the history of the community through art and food. They conduct tours of different areas of San Diego and mingle with different cultures.

Finally he mentioned a story about his childhood. He was smart but labeled as "ADD" (Attention Deficit Disorder) and so his teachers kept him away from many activities. However, there was an older white Jewish person that saw some potential in Taryell and helped him to go through college and he got his Masters degree. So, he keeps advising young kids and adults to never give up.

==============

"Mental Illness and Suicide" by Dave Jones

Posted by Charles Foster on Oct 18, 2019

"Mental Illness and Suicide" by Dave Jones

On Oct. 18, Dave Jones spoke to DMSB Rotary about mental illness and suicide. He got our attention by telling us that his father killed his mother and subsequently committed suicide, and that his grandfather also committed suicide.

Dave has no formal training but, with a family history of mental illness, was triggered into action by the news about a young man in north county killing his grandmother with a hammer and his investigation into this event. Dave has now spoken to about 16 Rotary and Kiwanis clubs and will soon speak to an Optimist club and to any other organizations that would like him to speak.

Dave’s intent is to inform the public about mental illness and that it is treatable, and to help reframe the public’s understanding of it. He mentioned troubling statistics, including that middle-aged white men have the highest suicide rate, and over 50% of prisoners have some degree of mental illness and often receive little or no treatment. He added that middle-aged white women have highest rate of depression issues and suicide attempts.

He also spoke of a lack of understanding that mental illness is a disease of the brain, with the stigma it carries, that mental illness is something that those afflicted with it can overcome, if only they tried harder. Recognizing that those with brain cancer or colon cancer don’t face a stigma, Dave used the description, Cancer of the Mind, as a way to differentiate between a disease and personal choice.

Later Dave described events such as his father killing his mother as being caused by mental -illness-caused confusion or even love, not by anger or selfishness. With proper recognition of mental illness as a disease, openness to discussions of it in its many forms, and proper treatment, Dave believes that we can get to zero suicides.

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Dr. Shawn Carlson's LabRats Education Program

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Oct 11, 2019

We had our honorary member Heinz Hoenecke give a quick update about his global programs. We also had few other guests. Paul gave an update about the Foundation and reminded everyone about the 46th Annual Foundation Seminar on November 9, 2019.

Jan Parsons gave her 1-minute talk about why she joined Rotary and how she appreciates the friendships built through Rotary. Following that Ken gave a quick update on the BocceFest final numbers and that the Thank You notes were sent out to all players.

## Dr. Shawn Carlson's LabRats Education Program:

Dr. Shawn Carlson is a physicist and an educator who works to make the scientific process less mystifying and more comprehensible to nonscientists. Carlson is the executive director of the Society for Amateur Scientists and an adjunct professor in physics at San Diego State University. He has authored and edited a number of CD-ROMs that explore core concepts in physics and problem-solving techniques.

Shawn Carlson received a B.S. (1981) from the University of California, Berkeley, and a Ph.D. (1989) from the University of California, Los Angeles.

In 1994, Carlson founded the Society for Amateur Scientists, which identifies opportunities for curious amateurs to investigate important, but as yet unsolved, scientific questions and to provide a forum for the organization of amateur research projects. As author of the “Amateur Scientist” column for the Scientific American, Carlson features innovative and inexpensive designs for equipment and experiments that amateurs can use to explore current research questions. Finally, he moved to San Diego and then in 2016 he started the Lab Rats program (https://sdlabrats.org/) so kids can be part of a STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics) program.

He says that once kids get to the 8th grade their interest in science plummets. Hence it is crucial to get them excited about STEM and at an early stage. He therefore starts kids at LabRats from 5th grade all the way to 8th grade. He incorporates 3 spheres of engagements - Self, Custodial and Social engagement. Key aspects of the LabRats program are:

Create groups for girls and boys to engage in projects with their own peers
He believes in small classrooms with 1-on-1 engagement and not 1 teacher lecturing a class of 30 kids.
Character development is one of the KEY focus
The program is taught by science experts that have a Masters and PhD degrees
Their STEAM center is in Encinitas at the Boys & Girls Club
They now also have a Mobile STEAM bus so they can go to the schools and create programs on-site for the kids

He showed everyone a special tool (a unique rock millions of years old) used by people in the early days as a multi-purpose tool. The artifact we brought was a 500,000 year old Acheulian biface created by the Neanderthal people in Southern France. He said there are only 103 such stones in the world and he has 3 of them that he received from France.

His colleague Ryan Merrill, Director of Education, who teaches at LabRats demonstrated a device that creates a certain static electric field through a human's body and one can see the hair stand up. Our club's Vice President Vicky Mallet volunteered to be the subject.

Dr. Carlson indicated that they are planning a big campus to grow the program. Currently they have about 600+ students go through their programs and it costs on average about $10 per student.

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BocceFest Pics and updates

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Oct 04, 2019

BocceFest San Diego event turned out to be a grand success with the help pf all the members. The unofficial count is that we had over 300 people show up at the event.

As always we had the Del Mar and Solana Beach Mayors kick-off the event. Below are some random pics from the event. Enjoy!

In the end we had a very exciting Finals round that lasted a long time. And the day ended with a whole bunch or hot-air balloons taking off from the field nearby :-). A beautiful sight!

## BocceFest Meeting Updates:

The Bocce management team provided some initial updates (not final yet) on the results of the fund-raising as follows:

Unofficial count says that over 300 people attended the event.

Sponsorships collected was about $57,000 (last year was $52,000). This was primarily due to the 3rd Premier Sponsor this year.

Donations = $500

Auction = $8,300

Raffe = $2,000

Beer sales = $4,000 (Nickels + Sales)

Independent Teams = $1,600

Registered Teams = 124, which means at least 248 people on the field playing Bocce Ball!

Bill gave his 1-minute talk on why he joined Rotary.

Finally we had a grand presentation by Charlotte - THE GOLDEN BOCCIES :-). She came up with some creative awards for each member that provided some unique experiences at the event. Herb announced that the biggest GOLDEN BOCCE award goes to Charlotte for her tireless efforts in marketing, organization and Auction setup :-).

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"From Undercover Cop To Chief of Police" by Shelley Zimmerman

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Sep 13, 2019

We had a strong audience today with many guests, who came to hear San Diego's past Chief of Police Shelley Zimmerman.

Then we had Ken and Molly talk about the progress on Bocce sponsor levels and it looks like the funds have reached almost $52K. Malcolm confirmed that 11 breweries signed up for the beer competition, which will be held at the Hilton Del Mar on Sunday Sep 15, 2019.

Radia gave a brief summary on Youth Services and mentioned that Model UN is going to be on March 28/29, 2020.

We then had Bev Liberman give her quick 1-minute talk on what inspired her to be a Rotarian.

### "From Undercover Cop To Chief of Police" by Shelley Zimmerman

Shelley Zimmerman joined National University in January of 2019 as a Chancellor appointed professor focusing on public safety and leadership.

Prior to this appointment Chief Shelley Zimmerman was hired by the San Diego Police Department in October of 1982. She was promoted to Chief of Police on March 4, 2014 and retired on March 2, 2018 after an illustrious thirty-five-year career. She was born in Cleveland, Ohio and is a graduate of The Ohio State University, with a degree in Criminal Justice. She is also a graduate of the FBI National Academy, FBINA #241.

During Chief Zimmerman’s tenure as Chief (2014-2018) San Diego experienced historic low crime rates, including the lowest homicide rate per capita of any of the largest cities in the country. In 2017, the City of San Diego had the lowest overall crime in the past 49 years and was named the safest large city in America.

Chief Zimmerman received numerous awards and citations throughout her career which included; the San Diego Press Club Headliner of the year award for her undercover work and the San Diego Police Foundation Women in Blue Award for her commitment to making San Diego one of the safest large cities in the United States.

She once had the opportunity to hold the Olympic torch when some part of the LA Olympics 1984 was held in San Diego. Another interesting story she mentioned was about how she worked as a prostitute to catch pimps and prevent other issues. Once a car pulled up and she could see that it was a 16-year old kid driving. She made a judgement call and let that kid go after giving him some solid advice. 15 years later she get a call and it turned out that it was that same kids, who had turned around and became a doctor with 2 kids. That was a very touching and rewarding moment for the Chief.

She was under-cover cop for many years and in case she did a school drug bust by getting into Patrick Henry school as a student. She somehow talked her way into the school without any transcripts! She later arrested 73 people. Her leadership skills as Chief of Police is bound by some of the principles listed above, which enables a culture of excellence in her department. She encourages all employees to talk about bad news directly with her. Her desk had this sign clearly displayed - "Bad News Welcomed Here" :-). The San Diego Police Dept. was the first one in the country to implement body cameras. Her success is tied to relationships that she builds with the community.

Chief Zimmerman is an avid sports fan and often participates in athletic charity fundraisers, such as, the Challenge Athlete's Foundation.

In the end, DMSB Club President Venky Venkatesh presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"Toilets for Life in Uganda" by Zubaire Bakubye

Posted by Susheela Narayanan on Sep 06, 2019

On 9/6/2019 Zubaire Bakubye, a Rotarian from East Riverside Rotary Club in District 5330 and CEO of ISEAC (Integrated Science & Education for African Communities), gave an interesting presentation to DMSB Rotary on the urgent topic of “Toilets for Life in Uganda”.

Born and raised in rural Africa during a time of social strife and civil war in Uganda, Zubaire witnessed firsthand the social and economic challenges faced by people in developing communities without access to clean water and health care. After moving to the US to get his BA and MA in California he uses his education and access to resources to support his passion of empowering native communities to achieve literacy and education that would create further economic opportunities. He has worked with the Center for Nonprofit Advancement to develop program models and systems that would be able to access resources for further economic and infrastructure development in Uganda.

In a graphic PPT Zubaire pointed out that the United Nations had a goal in place that promised adequate, equitable access to water, sanitation and hygiene to all people everywhere by 2030. It promised a world in which extreme poverty would be eliminated and no matter where you lived you would have enough food to eat, clean water to drink, a safe, private place to relieve yourself and soap and water to wash with. The biggest problem facing the world today is lack of access to water and sanitation. These were some of the staggering statistics he presented: over 650 million people have no access to clean water /over 2.3 billion don’t have access to a safe private toilet/ diarrhea is 1 of the 3 most common killers of children and young women globally/ 58% of childhood deaths could be prevented by clean water, sanitation and good hygiene.

80.9% of the population in Uganda has no access to safe toilet systems – they defecate in bushes or plastic polythene bags, empty buildings and structures, in rivers and other water ways, or in pit-latrines. Unmonitored fecal disposal causes health hazards to the population through contamination of food and water. There is an urgent need to transform these primitive systems to safe, septic toilet systems. Zubaire is actively seeking help and collaboration from Rotary groups and other non-profit organizations to help him achieve these goals.

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"San Diego Zoo & Wild Animal Park" by Rick Schwartz

Posted by Susheela Narayanan on Aug 23, 2019

Rick Schwartz, San Diego Global Ambassador, gave an interesting talk to DMSB Rotary on August 23, 2019. A wild life expert and former Senior Zoo Keeper since 2000, Rick is also the co-host of San Diego Zoo Kids and Production Coordinator for the new Animal Planet series: “The Zoo San Diego”.

As Ambassador Rick has travelled around the world to far flung places such as Botswana, the Galapagos Islands, Australia and Kenya in the name of conservation. Schwartz shares his passion for conservation by making appearances in many well-known local and national television stations and shows around the country. As Senior Keeper at San Diego Zoo Global, Schwartz has been responsible for the care of many different species of birds, mammals and reptiles. He has also been deeply involved in innovative scientific programs seeking to protect and preserve endangered species that might otherwise be on the verge of extinction, such as the Great Northern White Rhino.

Schwartz continues to share his passion for animals as a part-time Instructor at Moorpark College’s Exotic Animal Training and Management Program. Drawing from his years of experience Schwartz teaches Wildlife Education to future generations of keepers and conservationists.

In the end DMSB Club Past President Charles Foster presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"THINK LIKE A DOG!!" by Scott MacDonald

"THINK LIKE A DOG!!" says Scott MacDonald. Huh? What does that mean? And is that even possible?

Read full story below to find out more......

DMSB Rotary Blood Drive

Posted by Charles Foster & Sanjiv on Aug 11, 2019

DEL MAR – SOLANA BEACH ROTARY HOSTS SUCCESSFUL BLOOD DRIVE

The Del Mar-Solana Beach Rotary Club successfully hosted its first ever blood drive for the San Diego Blood Bank several weekends ago and exceeded the donations goal by 50%. Forty-eight donors and Rotarians participated to support the bloodmobile parked in Solana Beach’s Lomas Santa Fe Plaza just off I-5 on Sunday, August 11^th. Many Rotarians donated blood or helped process donors, and many did both. DMSB Rotary and the San Diego Blood Bank are already in the planning stages for additional blood drives at this Solana Beach location, which can easily serve coastal San Diego donors.

As learned from the San Diego Blood Bank, “Blood is Medicine.” Every year, more than 100,000 patients of all ages and backgrounds are recipients of donated blood provided by the San Diego Blood Bank. These patients struggle with life-threatening medical conditions that include cancer and other blood disorders, severe burns, organ transplants, trauma, emergency surgeries, childbirth complications and more. One thing they all have in common is their need for donated blood to stay alive. There is no substitute.

The Blood Bank and DMSB Rotary thank all who did give blood and those who will give in the future. Giving blood is one volunteer activity good people can do to save and enhance lives, and it only takes an hour. Though not well known, one donor can help save the lives of up to 3 people. For more information about the San Diego Blood Bank, see https://www.sandiegobloodbank.org.

Del Mar-Solana Beach Rotary helps make our communities better for all, both near and far. While doing so, its members develop new business relationships, leadership skills and friendships that can last a lifetime. DMSB Rotary meets most Fridays for breakfast at the Hilton Del Mar. One can learn more by visiting www.DMSBRotary.com

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"Three Key Questions to Thrive in Business and Life" by Jamie Marvin

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 09, 2019

We had a guest Kevin Popovich talk about his role in helping companies with new ideas and marketing statistics. He is known as "The Idea Guy". Then we had Herb Liberman give his 1-minute talk about why he joined Rotary and his contribution to various charities, such as, the Kawanis club, Kenya schools, etc.

Jamie is a beach photographer and speaker committed to bringing peace and joy to the world through art, smiles and connection. She is the founder of the Smile Soul Bright movement and lives locally in Carlsbad. She is a Toastmaster speaker and trains people on speech presentations.

Her talk was about three key questions to thrive in life.

What am I looking for?
What is the truth?
What do I want the outcome to be?

She talked about how the stress of lies leads to health issues, such as, back pain, headaches, etc. Whether it is in personal life or business, speaking the truth always keeps the stress low.

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"Homeless in San Diego" by Kelsey Martinez

Posted by Charles Foster and Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 02, 2019

Kelsey Martinez, Outreach Coordinator for the Interfaith Shelter Network, spoke to us about their emphasis on helping situationally homeless families. As compared to chronically homeless families, the situationally homeless have only recently become homeless and, with some help, can be expected to move out of homelessness in less than a year.

The Interfaith Shelter Network involves over 120 congregations of all denominations county-wide in a Rotational Shelter program. About 70 of the congregations host the program in their facilities for two or four weeks a year and the remainder serve in a valuable support role.

The homeless are sheltered where there are no shelters and receive the understanding and support of congregations when, previously, all they knew was fear and uncertainty. Congregations benefit by getting to know homeless individuals personally. The mutual sharing of stories is beneficial to both.

Case management is the key to success for our guests, and they are only sent to congregations in the Network after being screened by an area social service agency to assure there will be no active drug, alcohol or mental health problems.

This is a practical, manageable way to serve others. Congregations usually host the program for two weeks once a year. Normally, only 12 guests at a time stay in the congregation facilities. At the end of two weeks, the whole operation — cots and guests — rotates to another area congregation. Guests can stay up to eight weeks in the Network. The average stay is just under six (6) weeks.

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Visit by District Governor Marta Knight

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 26, 2019

On July 26, 2019 Rotary District Governor for San Diego region Marta Knight gave an inspirational talk to motivate all members. Assistant Governor Susie Callahan introduced Marta Knight. Marta is a member of the Chula Vista Sunrise club. She was born and raised in Tijuana, Mexico. Her father is a member of the TJ club for 41 years. She has 4 children and 2 grand children.

Marta recognized few members. She gave a "Club Hero" pin to George Sousa for his outstanding dedication to the club.

She also gave the Rotarian of the Month pin to Charles Foster and a Past-President pin to Ken Barrett. She also gave a "To Be D.G." golden gavel to Steve since he will be District Governor soon.

Steve Weitzen then gave his 1-minute Rotary talk. He had fun at the District Governor conference and heard stories from other District Governors. He has had 20 Rotary Presidents visit his house. Rotary has enriched his life and many long-lasting relationships built.

Marta then talked about her "AHA" moment. She was at the LA Convention Center for Rotary International conference and the Rotary President said, "Rotary lets ordinary people do extraordinary things". Her father also gave her lots of inspiration. He would use the 4-way test to settle arguments between his kids. Many members of her family are Rotarians and that was a huge inspiration for her.

She said she had an opportunity to visit a school in Ecuador and she was thrilled to see the joy in the kids' faces when they saw pencil sharpeners that she donated to the school.

In the end, Marta mentioned that she was once the Queen of Tijuana Rotary and District 4100. She also talked about her visits to Ecuador prisons where 13-17 year old kids were kept. She sat and had lunch with them. It was very touching.

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"Operation Hope" by Cindy Taylor

Posted by Susheela Narayanan on Jul 19, 2019

Who/what is Operation Hope? Where is it located? What is their mission and who do they serve?

Read the full story below to find out more about this enterprising non-profit organization.

"Very Few Proud Women in the U.S. Marine Corps" by Col. Marianne Waldrop

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 12, 2019

We had a large group today and lots of guests since it was Venky's FIRST day as President of our club :-). He had invited 8 of his family members plus 3 close friends!

Following that Paul Butler presented a Paul Harris Fellow pin to a long-time supporter of our club's Bocce event - Dan Phelan of Pacific Southwest Realty.

Other updates were as follows:

We had a new member Rita Albert, who transferred from the Rancho Santa Fe club.
Malcolm reminded members about the $2.00 fine for not wearing the Rotary pin.
Bill reported that over 5500 chilled bottled water was distributed by our members at the StandDown event.
We also had a scout candidate Ken come with his father to give a quick 5-minute presentation about his work with scouts. He said he camped about 250 miles, did Eagle Scout camping at Filmont, trekked 80 miles and went up 12,000 feet.
Charlotte and Molly announced that they have about $11,400 registered sponsors so far.

## "Very Few Proud Women in the U.S. Marine Corps" by Col. Marianne Waldrop

Marianne Waldrop is the youngest of four children from a U.S. Marine Corps family and was born and raised on the east coast. In 1987, she graduated from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill with a BA in Math and in 1989, she graduated with an MS in Computer Science from Naval Post graduate School in Monterey, CA. Subsequent to graduation, she served as a project manager for Marine Corps signals intelligence systems. After this tour, Marianne resigned her commission to work in the information technology industry in San Diego; however, this venture in “corporate America” was short-lived (2 years) due to her recall from the reserves for post-9-11 intelligence operations in support of U.S. Central Command, MacDill Air Force Base, Tampa, Florida. She retired in 2011 and earned a Ph.D. in Leadership Studies from Univ. of San Diego in May 2016.

She was deployed to Bahrain, South Africa and Kuwait and she worked in the Intelligence department. She was a very proud marine and the daughter of a marine. She was born in Quantico, VA. She was in the Marines from 1987-2011. They were the only Father-Daughter combo in the Marines at that time.

She said she had to take SAT seven times to go to Navy. Then went to join Navy ROTC. She retired as Colonel and then later went to SDSU to do her PhD in Leadership to understand why women in leadership roles were so few in the Military.

Her research showed that the common traits among men & women leaders were that they focused on 3 areas - Structure, Culture and Agency. The Agency co-relates with Actions, Decisions and Personal traits. She learnt that in 1970 the first woman was promoted to Brigadier General.

Some interesting statistics were as follows:

1918 - first woman enlisted in the Marine
1978 - first woman in USMC was appointed Brigadier General (Col. Margaret Brewer)
1985 - first woman (Gail Reals) competitively selected to Brigadier General role.

In the end DMSB Club President Venky Venkatesh presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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Celebration of Service

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 28, 2019

This was a special day celebrating the year of service by our Rotary club. Our club's President Ken Barrett was demoted last week.

Jon Fish was celebrating his 75th birthday and he was also awarded the Rotarian of the Month pin.

Malcolm announced new club rule that there will be $2.00 fine if anyone forgets to wear the Rotary pin.

Paul also awarded a Paul Harris Fellow award to a long-time supporter and sponsor of the Bocce Ball tournaments - Scott Simms of Bank of America.

## Celebration of Service

We kicked off the celebrations with a UNIQUE video introduction by our demoted President Ken since he was forced to go an a anniversary trip with his wife. His joke was that he better go with his wife rather than pay a divorce attorney

. He had planned an amazing video delivery of his talk well-timed (except for few minor glitches) with other Rotarians' talks.

Herb's spiel on Global and District grants.

Paul Butler's update on the Foundation.

Charlotte's updates on the various charity organizations that received our funds

Charles Foster delivering his update on the progress and planning of BocceFest and the goals.

Charles update on the Public Relation efforts.

The meeting ended with a final "Thank You" club by Ken via his remote delivery

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Governor's Dinner

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 27, 2019

Some pictures from the Governor's Dinner sent by Jan Parsons.

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“In pursuit of Nuclear Technology for 21st Century" by Puja Gupta

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 21, 2019

The meeting started off with Kevin and Phil being presented their new Paul Harris Fellow (PHF) awards by Paul and Ken. This is Phil's first PHF award and Kevin's fifth.

## “In pursuit of Nuclear Technology for 21st Century" by Puja Gupta

Puja delivered a very interesting talk about her research and some details about the Nuclear Technology in the 21st century. She is smart with a very dynamic personality. She also showed interest in joining our club as a regular member since she lives in Del Mar.

The slides above are self-explanatory and describes her points.

In the end DMSB Club interim President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"Highlights of City of Del Mar" by Mayor Dave Druker

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 14, 2019

We had a new baby Rotarian in today :-). Molly brought her daughter Riley and she was so cute in that stroller :-).

Charlotte was happy that her son Mauer was graduating 4th grade.

Venky was celebrating his 49th anniversary this week.

Charles reminded everyone that the blood drive was finalized for August 11th at the Von's parking lot off Lomas Santa Fe.

# "Highlights of City of Del Mar" by Mayor Dave Druker

Dave Druker has been on the Del Mar City Council from 1996 through 2008 and 2016 to present. He has been Mayor four times. Dave has lived in Del Mar since 1986. His wife Kristen is a retired History teacher at The Bishop's School and Culver City High School. They have two adult children and one grandson. Both Dave and Kristen graduated from USC. Dave has a BA in Match and an MS in Counseling. Dave works at DataSkill, a software development company that uses artificial intelligence to facilitate international trade finance.

He said Del Mar's boundary is from Jimmy Durante Blvd. to Crest Canyon and that Del Mar has 4000 residents. He has been Mayor 4 times, no staff and he spends about 40 hours each month. Del Mar split off from San Diego county about 60 years ago - primarily to avoid giving development rights to San Diego county. The city's budget is $10M per year and $8M of that is from property taxes. The city gets about 13% of that property tax. City has no ability to control anything at the Fair since state owns the property.

The major issues that the city has been facing are; 1) short-term rentals and 2) sea-level rise leading to bluff erosions. The tracks are not actually impacting the bluff since the train vibrations dissipate horizontally.

Street Scape is the new project to allow sidewalk cafes. This should be ready by end of July 2019. He has lived in Del Mar for 32 years, married for 48 years and works at Dataskill.

In the end DMSB Club interim President Venky Venkatesh presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"Juveniles and Adult Probation Population for next 5 years" by Gonzalo Mendez

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 07, 2019

Ken announced that the next BocceFest meeting will be at the Sutton's home on Sat June 8, 2019 at 10 am.

The Beer committee is pushing for a Gold Tap award to one brewery to increase participation.

We had a guest today - Matt Walker, Public Defender, who took over from Steve Binder. He gave quick updates on the veterans' Stand Down event coming up soon on June 28, 29 and 30. He indicated that out of the 8,102 homeless people about half of them get the needed support. At StandDown they get legal help, medical, dental, eye care, showers, etc. The Public Defender's office also does Homeless Courts once a month with the help of about 60 volunteers.

## "Juveniles and Adult Probation Population for next 5 years" by Gonzalo Mendez

Gonzalo Mendez grew up as an immigrant. His father was invited to the U.S. and later his brother went to the state penitentiary and they lived in the rough neighborhood of south east San Diego. He once went to the El Centro prison to meet his brother, who advised him to become a lawyer. At 19 Gonzalo volunteered in the Probation Department and he was sent to some bad areas. He soon got used to it. He worked hard and went to SDSU and paid for his college by working at various restaurants. He graduated with no college debt!

His first job was at Campo where there were 250 juvenile youths. In the first 6 months he was ready to quit. He had to sleep with roaches. But he pulled through and in 1995 he was promoted to Correctional Deputy Probation Officer (CDPO) and soon after that in 1997 he was promoted to Deputy Probation Officer and then in 1999 he became a Senior Probation Officer (SrPO). In 2001 he was promoted to a Supervising Probation Officer (SPO) and finally in 2012 he became the Division Chief! When he was a supervisor his brother died in a car accident after being hit by a drunk driver. That was a very disturbing moment for him and the family.

The probation officer has several tasks as shown above. He found jobs for many of the juvenile kids and changed their lives for ever. In the past 7-8 years he has helped reduce juveniles in San Diego by almost 70%. He is very proud of his team.

He created Collaborative Courts and helps to get felons into a rehab program that pays 90 days of living expenses and gived them financial literacy education so that they can go out and work and be financially responsible. They also have a human trafficking task force that prevents kids from getting lured into prostitution, etc.

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"Eliminating Pain & Chronic Fatigue" by Dr. Alan Blum; Global Grant #1861779 update by Sanjiv Prabhakaran

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on May 31, 2019

We had a guest (Chuck) today all the way from Arizona from the Via Verde Club.

Charles reminded members about the Demotion Party for Ken Barrett on Sunday June 23, 2019 at 5 pm.

Steve reminded all that the District Governor's dinner is on June 27, 2019.

Ken awarded the Rotarian Member of the Month awards to Charlotte Jones and Sanjiv Prabhakaran for their work on the web sites and Bocce planning.

## Global Grant for Paraplegic/Quadriplegic clinic update by Sanjiv Prabhakaran

Sanjiv provided a final update on the completion of the global grant project # 1861779. Below slides will provide the details.

The training center

The quadriplegic beneficiary (Ajay) getting the special chin-operated automatic chair.

## "Eliminating Pain & Chronic Fatigue" by Dr. Alan Blum

Dr. Alan M. Blum has been a practicing chiropractor in San Diego for over 40 years and has been studying kinesiological muscle testing techniques for over 30 years. A national speaker, he has invented or innovated several groundbreaking kinesiological muscle testing techniques and has taught many of those techniques at the Total Body Modification Research Seminars.

Dr. Blum’s greatest joy is helping to heal people. Experiencing firsthand severe stress and severe chronic fatigue, he spent years looking for solutions and created some groundbreaking techniques to heal others and teach them how to have more energy, combining chiropractic practices. The chart below shows the various areas of the spine and how it controls various aches in our body.

He talked about instantly correcting the energy inside the body. He uses a technique called Total Body Modification (TBM), which is similar to acupuncture. A chiropractor works form brain down through the spine to the legs. The body has electric signals that pass through every cell in the body. By re-charging these cells the pain can be minimized. He says that most tissues can be regenerated but some tissues are slower.

We had several volunteers that stepped up to get a quick massage from Dr. Blum. Paul Butler, Herb Liberman and Bev Liberman all had a good dose of his techniques for some instant rejuvenation :-).

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"San Diego Fair Update" by Fred Schenk + Steve's Paul Harris Society

Posted by Susheela Narayanan & Sanjiv Prabhakaran on May 17, 2019

Scott Carr, past District Governor was there to award Steve Weitzen with the Paul Harris Society certificate.

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"San Diego Fair Update" by Fred Schenk

The speaker today was Mr. Fred Schenk, who has been the Chair of Operations at the San Diego County Fair from 2007 – the present. This year the fair will run from May 31 – July 4, closed Mondays and Tuesdays in June.

The San Diego County Fair, which began in 1880 with the aim of bringing SD County farmers together to share ideas, compete for the best pies and citrus fruits and challenge each other to horse races, continues to celebrate agriculture and community pride. It simply wouldn’t be summer in San Diego without this iconic fair, which is one of the top five fairs in the United States and Canada, drawing more than 1.6 million visitors annually.

Fred talked about some of the highlights of 2018 which included three beverage festivals of wine, beer and distilled spirits. There will be nine stages for entertainment, including the grand stand stage for the main entertainment. The theme of the fair will be peace, love and livestock. Every Wednesday afternoon talent from the fifty-year-old Woodstock festival will be featured. There is a 20-minute presentation of fireworks held every year.

The theme of the 2019 fair is going to be OZ-some. Presented by Albertsons|Vons, this year’s County Fair invites guests to skip down the yellow brick road and enter into an “Oz-some” world inspired by L. Frank Baum’s classic tale, “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.”

Visitors will journey to the Emerald City, meeting magical new friends along the way. Channel your inner courage in our whirlwind of carnival rides. Expand your brain by immersing yourself in creative and educational exhibits. Warm your heart creating new memories with your friends and family. With all of the adventures you’ll encounter, you’ll discover, “There’s no place like the Fair.”

The “Oz-some” lineup for the Toyota Summer Concert Series will feature 27 night of entertainment on the Corona Grandstand Stage. Notables such as Smokey Robinson, Neil Sedaka, KC and the Sunshine Band, Pitbull, Credence Clearwater and others will cater to every musical taste. Sundays will be especially dedicated to music that caters to the Hispanic market, and will include musicians that cater to various age groups.

Eating is a major San Diego County Fair activity, with more than 100 food booths, several sit-down restaurants, and food-and-beverage events. On Thursdays from noon to 5:00PM, food vendors offer a small portion of one of their featured foods for $3.00. Great for small appetites, or for grazing your way through the Fair. Sometime in May, there will be a Food Map showing where to find those delicious Fair treats, both the ones you’ve come to love, and some new ones, too!

At the conclusion of the meeting Fred handed out complimentary fair tickets to all the Rotary members in attendance, which were well received. For more fair information go to: https://sdfair.com/.

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"Financial Market Update" by Clyde Chandler of Fidelity

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on May 10, 2019

Steve Weitzen was very happy since it was his 66th birthday. He was also sad since his close friend Lori was the victim of the Poway Synagogue shooting.

Steve also announced that the Director of the San Diego Fair Fred Schenk will be coming next week to give us the update on this year's theme and also distribute few tickets.

Charlotte announced that the new Bocce website is up and can be viewed at www.BocceFestSD.com.

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"Financial Market Update" by Clyde Chandler of Fidelity

Clyde has been in the financial field for over 20 years and currently he is a Senior VP at Fidelity Investments in Carmel Valley and deals with hi-net worth clients. Clyde has a BS in Economics and has many certification in wealth strategy, financial planning and has passed Series 6,9,10, 63 & 65 exams. Clyde enjoys running, surfing, coaching soccer, and spending time with his family. Clyde has been a staunch supporter of our Bocce Ball fund raising events for several years and this year he has graciously agreed to be the $5k primary sponsor.

Clyde talked about the various types of investments and how the markets are reacting. They provide 3 types of strategies --

Secular (10-30 years) that covers sectors, such as, Energy, etc. This category goes up and down over many years.

Business Cycle (1-10 years) - this sector goes through growth, stagnation and recession.

Tactical (1-12 months) - this is for the day to day stuff.

He indicated that the economic growth is directly tied to labor and productivity. Output is the measure of the economy's success.

Japan has had no economic growth for 30 years due to the aging population.

His prediction was that the Feds might lower the interest rates.

The above slide shows the signs of recession - high labor costs, negative rate of return, profits declining. He says that 2 years of negative rate of return is an indication of a future recession.

His advice to all is that the ration of stocks to bonds is usually 60 to 40 for basic investors but then age also plays a big factor. For example a 25 year old investor will be recommended 90% in stocks since he/she can bear some risks.

His final point was that earnings per share drives the stock price and that in turn drives up the economy. He said that some companies buy back their shares but that unfortunately does not grow the company.

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DMSB Social - Cinco de Mayo party at Casa Sol y Mar

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on May 05, 2019

We had a wonderful social gathering at the Casa Sol y Mar in Carmel Valley in the Del Mar Highlands Mall. We had 13 people attend the event with friends and family members. You can see more photos and a video of a wonderful dance at the link below. George was all ready to dance too :-).

Pictures link: https://photos.app.goo.gl/t2Q4sA72w16UGpsNA

Enjoy!

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The Coin-Up Story by Leena Patidar

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on May 03, 2019

We started off with some quick announcements by various members --

Patricia reminded all about the social gathering at Casa Sol y Mar on Sunday at 3:30 pm.
Bill announced that Stand Down starts on June 28, 2019 and ends on June 30, 2019. He had sign-up sheets passed around.
Charlotte talked about a new plan for Bocce to move forward with requesting the beneficiaries to help promote the event. She encouraged members to bring in more sponsors.
Charlotte said that she is hoping to have the new site ready by May 13, 2019 unless there are any critical issues.

## The Coin-Up Story by Leena Patidar

Leena is a CFO by trade and the Managing Director at Ascent Private Capital Management. She was born and raised in Chicago, but her parents took her to India often to visit their grandparents and relatives. Every time, she could not bear the thought of the children and infants that were on the streets and so vulnerable. She felt they were put in circumstances that nobody deserves, especially the innocent. So she knew one day that she would want to come back and help protect them by getting them off the streets, providing medical care, education, clothing and giving them a chance to survive in a better environment.

Over the years she noticed how charities like Ronald McDonald House, March of Dimes, and Salvation Army have all collected millions of dollars in spare change each year. However, as we move towards a cashless society, that loose change is no longer available. So, Leena came up with a new way to donate and her entrepreneurial drive led to a very creative company called Coin Up. She had to fight with Apple to accept her donation app for over 3 months before they finally agreed to approve the first donation app on Apple store. Apple used to reject Donation apps due to several fraudulent apps.

The idea is to donate your “loose change” from a credit or debit card transaction to one of your favorite charities. Coin Up makes it really easy to do and to manage your total donations including setting monthly limits. Coin Up now has over 300 charities to choose from, including ones that support orphanages in India and around the world. The app won the San Diego 2017 Athena Pinnacle Award.

In the end DMSB Club interim President Vicky Mallett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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Serving Dinner for the Solutions For Change Families

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Apr 27, 2019

We had a large group of members and spouses and children volunteer to serve dinner to the families at the Vista location of Solutions For Change. Enjoy the photos below ...

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Bocce Planning & Action Meeting

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Apr 26, 2019

We started the meeting with some updates from members' trips.

1. Susan H. went on a trip to the Sea of Cortez and had lots of fun.

2. Charlotte and family just returned from a trip to the Galapagos Islands.

3. Suchandra just returned from India and will be in San Diego for about 6 months.

4. Phil was excited since he said there will be some 3000-4000 people registering at the hotel for the La Jolla Half Marathon.

## BOCCE MEETING:

Today's meeting was dedicated to the planning and updates on the Bocce event. Malcolm stressed on the fact that we need get closer to the $100K revenue. He had a tentative plan for a new layout for the field that keeps the auction items & beer vendors inside the big tent and the VIP canopies along the border of the tent so they can keep ordering beer. He said that the local Brewers' Guild has sanctioned our BocceFest event. The beers are all donated and so no cost to the club. He had invited Dick Stevens from the Eco-Encinitas club to learn some ideas from him. He gave some very good ideas of how to involve other charity organizations to help.

Then we had Charlotte give an update about her marketing strategy.

And, finally Molly spoke about the sponsorship plans.

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"Children's Picture Books" by Scott Sussman

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Apr 12, 2019

# MISCELLANEOUS TOPICS:

Diane Huckabee announced that she just got her 2nd grandson!
Steve Weitzen announced it was his 33rd anniversary!
Ken Barrett was celebrating his 50th birthday!
Herb showed pictures of devastating floods in Malawi that destroyed many homes.
Ken showed the club a video about education and healthcare in Uganda -- video link.

# "Children's Picture Books" by Scott Sussman

Today's speaker, Scott Sussman, was born in Fountain Valley, California in 1971 and currently divides his time between California and Italy. His children’s picture books include Silly the Seed, Weird the Beard, Lerky the Handturkey, the Mark and the Molecule Maker trilogy, and Fred and the Monster, which was an Independent Publisher Award Winner, 2015. He has also written a middle grade novel, The Shining Adventures of Shelpa McStorm, and is currently working on more middle grade novels. When not reading or writing, Scott enjoys playing the harmonica and traveling with his wife.

He became a school substitute teacher and later moved to Israel and settled into a unique type of settlement (commune) known as KIBBUTZ. The residents of these communes shared everything and worked as members of that community. While there, he studied Hebrew and started to write. One day he wrote on a blank paper "Lovely Flower in a Red Rose Sky" and gradually the words just started to flow.

The time he was in Israel he witnessed the Prime Minister getting assassinated and many people getting killed. From there he went to Santiago in South America and wrote more books there. After that the next 13 years he was in Rome, Italy. He learned the language and taught English to teenagers and older people. There he met his wife Francesca in 2006. She had a big job with company car, etc. When they decided to move back to USA in Sep 2016 it was a tough decision. They settled in Carlsbad. He makes a living by selling autographed books. Many of the club members purchased several books from him.

His favorite quote is by a Japanese author -- "When you get to the top of the mountain, keep climbing".

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""Providing assistance to child & family support with a clean diet with nutritional beneficial foods" by Crystal Hilsley

Posted by Susheela Narayanan & Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Apr 05, 2019

Today we had a surprise visit by Alicia Foster to celebrate Charles' 75th birthday. Alicia said that over the years it has been tough to find a gift for Charles and so this time she gave him a $10,000 check that he can spend on Rotary in any manner he wishes! Everyone was thrilled at her gesture.

## ""Providing assistance to child & family support with a clean diet with nutritional beneficial foods" by Crystal Hilsley

Members attended an informative talk by Crystal Hilsley, a Child Food Advisor who specializes in transitioning families to eating a clean diet with nutritionally beneficial foods as a daily reality. Crystal’s unique and highly effective approach involves participation from the whole family, schools and recreational clubs. According to Crystal one in eight children are on the Autism spectrum and one in three children is predicted to be obese. Sugar is the main ingredient in 80% of the food we buy and consume. Crystal described how most of the treats brought by parents to after school games and sports involved empty calories and high levels of food dyes and sugar, such as in donuts, cookies, cupcakes with enormous amounts of artificially dyed cream frosting and even artificially dyed Gatorade. Apples, oranges, cheese and crackers, healthy nutrition bars and plain water would be much better substitutes, but many parents need to be educated about these alternatives.

Crystal also talked about how so many elementary school children cannot sit still in class and focus on the teacher’s instructions because of all the extra sugar and chemicals that they consume in popular foods. They also suffer from dehydration. Sometimes simply drinking a glass of water helps them to calm down.

Crystal created a program called Crystal Clear Kids to emphasize the importance of looking carefully at food labels before buying foods with chemicals and dyes in them that can adversely affect children’s’ moods. Many inner city and low income neighborhoods have become “food deserts” – where only highly processed, convenience foods like donuts and hot dogs are available instead of fresh produce and healthy foods. The program aims to educate parents and children about how chemical dyes, food coloring and unhealthy foods can create cravings and affect children’s chromosomes.

Crystal has partnered with Dr. Brian Alman at Kaiser Permanente to create a company called TruSage International that teaches parents and children how to relieve stress naturally through healthy means such as coloring, drawing, yoga, swimming and other physical activities. She is available to give talks and workshops to schools, clubs and other community groups to spread the message of making wise choices in foods, which will help heal bodies and minds in a natural way.

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District Training Assembly Meeting of 2019

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Apr 01, 2019

This event is held once a year and all members, especially red badgers, are encouraged to attend. They offer various training sessions for club chairs to learn more about their roles and how to become more effective leaders. This year we had Jan Parsons, Venky Venkatesh and Beverly Liberman attend the events. Steve Weitzen was also there in funny costumes :-).

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"Finding Peace in a noisy world" by Orlando Javien; New Rotary flag & Rotary scholar

Posted by Susheela Narayanan & Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Mar 29, 2019

## Miscellaneous Topics:

Steve talked about “adopting” a Rotary scholar – it was unanimously approved by the members.

Charlotte send around a reminder sign-up sheet for Rotarians at Work day on April 27^th at Solutions For Change. Members will prepare and serve food to about 20 – 30 people at Solutions for Change.

Patricia sent a reminder about the Rotary Cook-out at San Dieguito Park on April 7^th.

Venky Venkatesh, who took over the President’s gavel today, brought and displayed the new Rotary flag.

## "Finding Peace in a noisy world" by Orlando Javien Jr.:

Orlando Javien Jr. is the man of many hats. By day he is a bookkeeper, tax preparer and domestic engineer. By night he is a religious education teacher, inspirational speaker, and author of “Stop Googling Yourself." He opened with a funny story about a boy living on a farm who, one day, dumped a despised “Porta-potty” into the river, unfortunately, while his dad was in the potty

! He went on to talk about the different noises in his life and how he learned to find peace.

Noise #1: His first example was about the noise of pride, a story about his refusing to take care of the dirty dishes because “it was not his turn to do them”. After almost precipitating a fight over this between himself and his wife, he realized that he needed to get rid of his pride. The lesson was that one should put in 100% effort but with 0% expectation in return.

Noise #2: Another time he volunteered to teach a group of children in his daughter’s class. He felt pretty pleased with what he did until he asked his daughter for validation and to his surprise she replied: “Dad you talk too much”. So the second noise in his life was his own voice! One day when his wife came home tired and upset because she had had a long day and had had nothing to eat, he rushed in with suggestions about what she could do next time. When, to his surprise, his wife became even more upset, he realized that again he was talking too much. What she needed at that moment was a hug of empathy, rather than a quick fix or lecture about what to do next time.

Noise #3: The most touching example was when he came home from work one day, very tired, and refused to play with his young son. Being exhausted he sent the child to his room. Later, he was very moved when the child came to him with money from his piggy bank and offered to pay his dad his hourly wage if he would take some time to play with him.

Noise #4: The noise of “addiction” was the last one he mentioned. He admitted that he had been addicted to pornography but had eventually been able to give it up.

He concluded by discussing the biggest problem of all in our society – the addiction to technology and social media. He has put filters on his phones and computers to protect his family from the “noise” of technology. It was a good reminder to the rest of us to be more heedful of the “noises” in our own environment.

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"Berlin before, during and after the Wall and the Berlin Crisis 1960-61"; Paul Harris award; Funny fines by Malcolm Koll

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Mar 22, 2019

We had a surprise guest that Herb brought in - their dog Tootsie! She was really cute and friendly. She made sure she smelled everyone :-). Also, Malcolm pointed out during the "Fines" session that Herb and Bev listed two different anniversary dates :-) and gave Herb a fine for that!

Bill announced that Stand Down event will be on June 28, 29 and 30 at the same location as past years. He added that May 10th is the clothing drive.

Charlotte mentioned that the Rotarians At Work day will be on Sat Apr 27, 2019 at Solutions For Change and the plan is to make and serve dinner between 4 and 7 pm.

Ken and Paul then announced another Paul Harris Fellow award. This time it was for Sanjiv Prabhakaran for his work with the website blogs and Bocce web site design, development and management.

## "Berlin before, during and after the Wall and the Berlin Crisis 1960-61";

Roger Liles was stationed in Turkey and Germany for 5 years as a USAF Signals Officer and stayed in Europe for 8 years. As a military electronics officer for 40 years, Roger's main function was to translate engineering jargon to understandable English and communicate to the senior officers of the US Government in written and verbal form.

In the 1990s he began taking novel writing classes at UCLA, and writing for pleasure. Now retired, he spends full time writing. He is author of THE BERLIN TUNNEL—A COLD WAR THRILLER, first released in Oct 2018 and became #13 on the Amazon Best Seller List for New Releases in Historical Mystery, Thriller and Suspense Fiction and has sold of 1000 copies.

He mentioned about how Churchill talked about the Iron Curtain. He said that during the Berlin airlift there were 275,000 airlift missions and 2.3 million tons of food delivered between 24jun48 to 12may49.

The Berlin Wall was about 94 miles around Berlin. About 200,000 people per year moved to the west. They had 81 checkpoints built in 1961 to control the flow of people. The wall was closed on August 13, 1961 and within a month the American Checkpoint "Charlie" was built.

There were times when people attending church would cut through barbed wire fence and escape to the West. Checkpoint Charlie became a symbol of the Cold War, representing the separation of East and West. Soviet and American tanks briefly faced each other at the location during the Berlin crisis of 1961. That was almost the start of World War III, but fortunately the Russian tanks did not do anything catastrophic.

The wall remained closed for 28 years and many families were separated for all those years. About 560,000 people escaped during those years. Roger wrote a wonderful book (The Berlin Tunnel) with all these historic details and old pictures. The book's cover was designed by an artist in New Zealand and the tag line "A Cold War Thriller" was suggested to him. He received 4.6 out of 5 stars and the book became #13 on Amazon's Best Seller List. The Berlin Tunnel was a joint spy operation between the CIA & Britain's MI6 called Operation Gold to enter into Russian zone and listen-in on communications. The Allied Museum has a presentation of this Berlin Spy Tunnel.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"Tracking Your Inner Maverick: From Wall Street to the Plains of Africa" by Fred Krakowiak; Paul Harris Fellow awards

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Mar 15, 2019

Paul Butler & Ken Barrett awarded few Paul Harris Fellow awards/pics to few folks that contributed extensively last year towards the Bocce event and other areas.

The awards were given to Charlotte Jones, Molly Fleming and Kitty McGee. Congratulations to all of them from the club.

Following that Charlotte announced that Rotarians Work Day at Solutions For Change will be on Saturday April 27, 2019 and the exact schedule and type of work will be announced next week.

Then Charlotte & Ken presented the $2,000 check to YMCA for Youth Camp Scholarships and Tom accepted the award on behalf of YMCA Youth Camp.

Molly announced Bocce already has THREE premier sponsors onboard for this year (Capital One from Patricia, Merrill Lynch from Jan & one more).

## "Tracking Your Inner Maverick: From Wall Street to the Plains of Africa" by Fred Krakowiak

Fred Krakowiak presented "Tracking your Inner Maverick" discussing giving up Wall Street for guiding safaris in Africa & being an artist.

He has some amazing artwork shown above and a book that he has published - "The Artist's Safari: Capturing Africa with Pens, Lens and Paintbrush". Available for purchase at Barnes & Noble.

xxxx

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"Empowering Youth as Future Leaders of Change" by Sarah Heirendt + Zubair from Riverside Rotary

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Mar 08, 2019

Yesterday (Mar 7, 2019) many members attended the VIP ribbon-cutting ceremony at the newly launched Capital One Cafe in the re-modeled Westfield mall in UTC. Our club Rotarian Patricia Case, who works there was responsible for this opening.

We had some announcements by Ken on Bocce planning updates and suggested all members to look at who they brought in as Bocce sponsors in the past and start talking to them for this year. Charlotte had a printout for each member showing their sponsors and took a survey.

Patricia & Charlotte announced few events coming up soon --

Cookout Social on Sunday April 7, 2019 from 1-4 pm at the San Dieguito park.
Rotarians at Work on Saturday April 27, 2019. Options are still to be finalized.

Then we had Zubair Bakubye from East Riverside Rotary club drop-by to share some updates and request for help with some of hte proejcts he does in Uganda. DMSB had supported him and his club in the past on some projects.

# "Empowering Youth as Future Leaders of Change" by Sarah Heirendt

As San Diego Site Director for Hands of peace (HoP), Sarah Heirendt (pronounced Hi-rent) is responsible for overseeing the annual three-week summer program that brings together 50 Israeli, Palestinian and American youth right here in Carlsbad, and other year-round projects that take place in the San Diego area. This includes community education and outreach, participant and volunteer recruitment, alumni engagement and event planning as well as coordination and execution of the many details that go into the summer program.

Sarah served as the San Diego Assistant Program Director in 2016 as well as one of the leadership training facilitators. She received her BA from Vanguard University in Cultural Anthropology and her MS from George Mason University in Conflict Resolution. She has worked for multiple non-profits specializing in community development. While studying and traveling abroad, her interest in the Middle East peace process developed firsthand when she volunteered at a refugee camp near Nablus in the West Bank.

She said that the organization was founded in Chicago since the founder lives there. Sarah brought a guest Darling Kittoe, who was visiting from their Chicago office. They have a location in San Diego and one in the middle-east. The students in the program are usually between 15-17 years old and they go through 6 phases of HoP program. They train students on cross-culture, other religions, dialogues, etc. They also have a shorter summer program that is for 3 weeks. The teams come from Israel and Palestine. They currently have about 300 "Host" families that help to provide living space and about 200+ volunteers to manage the operations during those program sessions. They have to be careful about showing the pictures of kids on their website due to security concerns for these kids and their families. Many of their student stories can be seen here.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"How to communicate your way to success" by Noushin Dunkelman; Just In Time check; "My 3 Things" by Bill Sutton

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Mar 01, 2019

We had a good audience today along with guests from Just In Time (Nathan) and out of town visitor. Susan presented the check for $8,777.60 to Nathan from Just In Time (JIT). Nathan then gave a short talk about their appreciation of being a major beneficiary during the BocceFest event. He mentioned that being a foster child himself he truly understands the value of organizations, such as, JIT. He also announced that he is getting married next year!

In the end we took a group picture of all club members with the JIT check.

We also had a new "baby member" Riley (courtesy Molly Fleming)

Patricia announced that the membership social event is scheduled for April 9, 2019 from 5-7 pm at the Hilton itself.

Sanjiv was designated by Malcolm as the Fine Master for the day and he fined people who were not aware of what the "Rule of 85" meant. In addition there were about 8 members that got fined $2 for an overall attendance of less than 60%.

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Bill Sutton's "My 3 Things in Life"

This was the last session on "My 3 Things". Bill talked about how his family did everything together, went on camping trips in their tine VW '57 Beetle and they would drive up to Bishop that has pretty winding and steep roads and they would cheer each time the Beetle made it up there

. He graduated from UCLA, got accepted to law school but he declined and joined the Marine Corps.

He was Assistant Professor for some time, then met Suzanne in a methodist church. He got married on a Dec 27th just 3 days after getting drafted into the military and soon after marriage he had to leave. He got deployed to Israel, Damascus, Jordan and swam "on" the dead sea. Later in life he joined Loyola Law school in LA.

###

"How to communicate your way to success" by Noushin Dunkelman

Noushin Dunkelman, founder and president of MaxSynergy Consulting, graduated from UCSD with a degree in bio-mechanical engineering. She has over 30 years of product development, management, team building and coaching experience in small to midsize companies. After years of working on the technical side, 5 years ago she decided to refocus her career in helping companies with their organizational challenges.

At MaxSynergy Consulting, she works with companies to find out their internal problems and provide custom practical solutions that meet each company’s needs such as improved communications, develop and implement new skills and tools and train them on actionable feedback to create accountability. She also coaches experienced executives and new managers to further develop their leadership skills.

She talked about the tactical aspects of communication and that the key reasons why people communicate are to problem-solve and exchange ideas. Relationship provides better communication and how listening is a very key aspect of proper communication. She says that humans have 2 ears and 1 mount and so focus more on "listening" . One key fact she stressed on was the primary misunderstanding people have about giving feedback. People feel that the person providing the feedback has control over the change they seek in others. That is not true at all. The change can happen only if the person receiving the feedback takes action to make that change. The person giving the feedback must be very clear about the reasons for that feedback and that makes for a far better communication.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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“Integrated Healthcare” by Pouya Afshar; George Sousa at Camp Pendleton Animal Shelter and Suzanne Sutton’s “My 3 Things"

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Feb 22, 2019

1. George Sousa and Animal Shelter at Camp Pendleton and Patricia’s Social announcement

Few girls from R. Roger Rowe School decided to collect donations for the Camp Pendleton Animal Shelter and they donated $700 worth of supplies. George Sousa, whose honor flight trip was also sponsored by the students from same school helped to deliver the supplies. You can read the full article at this Rancho Santa Fe Review link.

https://www.ranchosantafereview.com/news/local-news/sd-cm-rsf-pendleton-project-20190211-htmlstory.html

Then we had Patricia make her announcement about the club Social event coming up on March 17th at the Hilton with some song and dance :-).

Jon Fish announced that the BocceFest date has been fixed for Sunday September 29, 2019. Ken also showed a video about why Rotary is fun and how people get engaged in it. He then awarded the Rotarian of the Month award to Malcolm.

2. “My 3 Things” by Suzanne Sutton

Suzanne talked about her early childhood days and how she enjoyed horseback riding.

She talked about her fun experience at a boarding school in Switzerland and how she made lots of friends there. She had no emails or phones at that time and the communication back home was via Airmail envelopes. Those were the fun days :-). She later attended a 50th reunion event at a villa in Tuscany and she was afraid she would recognize anyone.

As part of Bill’s military career they moved 11 times and that was pretty challenging for them.

2. “Integrated Healthcare” by Pouya Afshar

Dr. Pouya Afshar is board certified in internal medicine, hospice and palliative medicine, and venous and lymphatic medicine. Since 2010 he has served as an assistant clinical professor of medicine at the University of California, San Diego. He works in different levels of healthcare in an effort to provide continuity of care for all his patients.

As an acute care physician, Dr. Afshar has served as a hospitalist at UCSD Thornton, UCSD Hillcrest, Scripps Mercy Hospital, and the VA San Diego Hospital. A pioneer in transitional care medicine, Dr. Afshar is a medical director for several skilled nursing facilities, where he manages patients’ post-hospitalization during their short-term rehabilitation.

Dr. Afshar founded Integrated Healthcare Alliance (IHA) in 2015, where his primary care physicians lead a multidisciplinary team that delivers in-home medical care.

Outside of medicine, Dr. Afshar is married and is a proud father of 4 children, including 2 newborn twin boys. He is an avid soccer player, former personal trainer, and completed 14 marathons, including two trips as a qualifying runner for the Boston Marathon.

He was accompanied by his intern Dr. Samantha Spilman. Dr. Afshar said that he started the company with personal funds with the core focus to reduce the healthcare costs for senior citizens. He has seen all the wastes happening at emergency centers and hospitals and wanted to change that.

He showed some statistics about how air crashes went down significantly over the past 40 years due to automation and high-end technology. Similarly, he is predicting that self-driving cars will eventually reduce car accidents since the human emotions will be out of the equation. He talked about how the top 2 causes for human deaths in U.S. are heart diseases and cancer. But the 3rd most common cause it seems are MEDICAL ERRROS - almost 250,000 deaths each year! He also mentioned that the U.S. is dead last when it comes to overall healthcare satisfaction.

He compared how patients in the past had lot more access to talk to doctors compare to today’s practice. It seems people go to emergency care just to get refills for prescriptions and the staff there will send the patient to all kinds of tests to eliminate various issues and then after 12 hours send them back with just a prescription refill. Sometimes this could be $15,000 worth of tests for no reason!

IHA’s goal is to provide chronic care by visiting patients at their home and avoid emergency visits as much as possible. They use a technology process called “STAT” to securely transmit patient vital stats to a physician or their call center. They designed a personalized medical alert device (similar to the Life Alert system) and this device is essentially a cell phone and a GPS tracker with built-in speaker and microphone to carry a conversation with the care center or family members.

They did some benchmarks by comparing hospital costs and found that they can save almost 27% of the costs. They are also working with a local company called Tealium to bring data analytics to improve their care model. Currently they are SD based and have about 6000 patients. They partner with about two-thirds of the skilled nursing facilities in the San Diego county to get all their patients.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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Jim Bettencourt of the California Highway Patrol; Molly Fleming's "My 3 Things"; Check for Reality Changers

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Feb 15, 2019

$8,755 Check Presentation to Jacqueline Guan for Reality Changers

Jacqueline Guan of Reality Changers attended the meeting to thank DMSB Rotary for its recent $8,755 donation to Reality Changers. Reality Changers was one of the two Major Beneficiaries of the Club’s 2018 BocceFest fundraiser, receiving 20% of its net proceeds. Reality Changers’ mission is to transform lives by providing youth from disadvantaged backgrounds with the academic support, financial assistance, and leadership training to become college graduates. It is a homegrown organization, started 18 years ago. It serves students throughout San Diego County from its main facility in the City of San Diego and branch in Solana Beach. Jacqueline updated us with news that their main facility now has 15,000 square feet, a major increase from their recent, crowded 3,000 square feet space, and their search for a new leader now that its founder, Christopher Yanov, has stepped down as CEO.

Molly’s My Three Things

Molly Fleming told the Club of the 3 big things in her life: Family, Health, and Career. We learned that she had great, loving parents, even though they were quite strict. She seemed to like her brothers, too. Her parents taught her to work hard (jobs since age 14, including waitressing and phone solicitations while at SDSU), get a good education, and help others through charitable activities (that’s how we found Molly, checking in donors at a mobile Blood Bank event in Solana Beach).

Health is important to Molly, partly due to her experience with panic attacks in college, which she overcame through help, meditation, and increased attention to her overall health.

Molly spoke about her career, why she chose real estate (more personal control), some great mentors (two really great ones), and now her balancing act between career and baby Riley (with Tim’s help, of course).

Program Speaker, Jim Bettencourt of the California Highway Patrol

California Highway Patrol officer Jim Bettencourt provided our program this morning, covering much good information. With 19 years as a CHP’s officer, Jim now serves as a Media Information Officer. He does outreach and news reporting among his many jobs There are two main CHP facilities in San Diego County, one off Ruffin Road in San Diego and the “Oceanside” facility actually in Vista. Their Transportation Management System watches over all of the roads in San Diego County and is worth a visit by the club.

CHP has a Freeway Service Patrol to clear highway lanes clogged by vehicle breakdowns, out of gas, or health and other issues. It also serves as eyes and ears for CHP officers. Call 511 if you need help; it’s free. CHP also provides many educational programs, including its Smart Start education program that teaches high school students (with their parents) about safe driving, including the many poor decisions that can impact them and others. Other programs include Just Drive (for business drivers), Age Well (for older drivers), and Cheaters Program (concerning residents who don’t register their cars in California to save money).

Other tidbits included: In a no-injury crash, clear the lane first and stay in a safe area. Deaths from crashes normally involve at least 1 of 3 causes - Speed, DUI, No Seatbelts. DUI check points catch relatively few abusers, but they serve as a caution to drivers. Most DUI stops are made by patrolmen who notice unsafe driving. The CHP is California’s state police, having absorbed the early California State Police some time ago. So, the CHP can enforce laws anywhere within the state, not just on highways. CHP officers are paid well (about $100,000/year after 5 years), but recruiting good officers is still difficult. CHP emphasizes respect for all, with training and the practice aimed at verbally de-escalating situations verbally if at all possible.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"Shifting perspective on Death" by Lannette Cornell Bloom; $3,000 check to Casa de Amistad

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Feb 08, 2019

This week we missed Molly Fleming, who was supposed to give her brief talk on "My Favorite 3 Things in Life". Hopefully she will do that next week.

Then we had a donation check of $3,000 presented by Del Mar-Solana Beach Rotary club to Nicole Green of Casa de Amistad.

Following that we had a talk by Lannette Cornell Bloom about "Shifting Our Perspective of Death and the Dying Process". Her daughter Melissa also was our guest and she provided some insights at the end during the Q&A session. Lannette is a registered nurse (RN), healer, and author who is passionate about bringing simple joys to others. As an RN and health practitioner of more than thirty years, she has seen firsthand the need to care for others both emotionally and physically. When her mother was diagnosed with a terminal illness in 2003, she came to understand how critical it is that we talk about death in a more positive way and that emotional healing is possible through mindful choices. She shares her story and that wisdom in her book, Memories and Dragonflies, Simple Lessons for Mindful Dying, which is on Amazon.

She says that there are 90 million unpaid caregivers and many are struggling to care for themselves and their families at the same time. Her focus is to change the negative outlook of dying and turn that into mindful dying by being in the present moment. She elaborated about the 5 ways to look at dying in a positive way --

Ignore the clock - don't stop living.
Remember to look up - she talks about her mom one day just wanted to go into a store and look around because that was her favorite store & the store clerk did not even bother to look up.
Always have a sense of humor - she talks about a story of how her mom was watching TV and saw a fire outside and had her daughter call 911 and it turned out in the end to be just a waving flag reflected in the neighbor's pool that looked like fire :-).
Spiritual energy - she refers to a red dragon fly that gives energy and shows how to let go of anger.

She mentioned about some funny movies that helps bring humor to the dying process. One of the movies is "Death at a funeral". She also suggested that more information about the dying process can be viewed at https://eldercare.acl.gov/Public/Index.aspx and https://www.aginglifecare.org/.

In the end DMSB Club Vice President Vicky Mallett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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Bocce Update, “Pay it Forward Processing Donates Parts of Its Fees to Charities” by Renee VanHeel, “My Three Things” by Phil Campanelli

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Feb 01, 2019

President Ken updated the Club about Bocce 2019, saying that we were targeting the last Sunday in September and first Sunday in October.. Responding to Ken’s inquiry, Art thought that Pacific Rim Pathology should be able to be a VIP sponsor again this year and Art would be happy to help Malcolm with the “beer” thing. Bill matched Art by offering his family’s VIP sponsorship again this year plus an offer to help where needed. Steve raised a concern that the Jewish holy days begin the first Sunday in October.

“My Three Things” by Phil Campanelli

With only a few minutes available for the three big things in his life, Phil quickly talked about the three big things in his life, Family, Friends, and Faith, and shared a few photos (which we’ll try to add to this writeup later). He came from a very Italian family back in Ohio. In addition to Phil’s going to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, both of Phil’s sons graduated from there the same year, even though they were several years apart in age.

“Pay it Forward Processing Donates Parts of Its Fees to Charities” by Renee VanHeel

Renee and David VanHeel started Pay it Forward Processing to offer an improved credit card processing experience for businesses in the U.S. and Canada. But, they did it with a twist: they donate a portion of their processing fees to charities that meet their vetting process. Client businesses of PFProcessing benefit from no long-term contracts, reduced processing fees (98 % of the time), business development advice, social media promotions, and the satisfaction of helping their communities. The businesses also gain additional positive exposure as socially responsible companies. Renee introduced Cade VanHeel, a Vice President of PFProcessing, and Andi VanHeel, Executive Director of Every Swipe Benefits Charity, who added additional insights. Nonprofits are encouraged to introduce businesses to Pay it Forward Processing and its Every Swipe Benefits Charity program to provide the nonprofits with a continuing stream of contributions. Thus, Pay it Forward Processing gains new client businesses, the businesses save on processing fees, and the charities receive additional funds to do good things in their communities.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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DMSB Club Meeting + Molly's Surprise Baby Shower

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jan 25, 2019

Ken started the meeting announcing that today it was mainly to discuss DMSB club issues and Bocce planning.

Steve Weitzen gave a quick story about how he was invited to meet the incoming Rotary International President SUSHIL GUPTA at a local Rotary meeting. He said that was a big honor and he was able to discuss few interesting points with him. Mr. Gupta is from New Delhi, India.

Then we had Phil talk about increasing memberships to the club and how each current member needs to be an ambassador and invite guests. He suggested that we plan a social in March to attract more guests and provide some Rotary education.

Ken and Malcolm gave an update on Bocce - what happened last year and what we need to do this year. Key points highlighted were --

Need more revenue and member participation
Promote the "beer" part of the fest more
Member participation needed during the "preparation" stages weeks before the event day
The goal for 2019 is to raise at least $65K
Patrica said her company Capital One has already committed $5,000!
Steve has committed to $1,000
Venky said he will bring $5,000 one way or another
So, we are already $11,000 into the fund raising!! That is awesome!
Charlotte is heading up Marketing as per Charles
Molly will help with Sales
Sanjiv to be involved in the web stuff and will help the Auction chair with Auction related technology stuff
Bev has made a list of all the other volunteers

Following this we had a surprise Baby Shower and gifts for Molly Fleming. Her new baby girl is named RILEY! Patricia had secretly planned this session with all the members :-). Nice work Patricia!

Molly spent some time opening all the gifts and reading out the cards and each member gave her some quick "baby" advice.

CONGRATULATIONS Molly & Tim!

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7-way club meeting + Amy Scruggs Entertainment

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jan 17, 2019

The regular Friday meeting was replaced with this 7-way club meeting at the Del Mar Hilton. It was a packed room and Don Fipps from the Rotary Club of Del Mar kicked off the event.

Each club's President gave a quick presentation and update about their clubs. Ken Barrett kicked that off with updates from Del Mar/Solana Beach Rotary club. The other 6 clubs that belong to District 5340 delivered their updates in this order - Rancho Santa Fe, Solana Beach Eco Club, Encinitas, Encinitas Coastal, E-Club of San Diego Global, and Rotary Club of Del Mar.

Following that we had a very inspirational talk by nationally known vocalist and country musician Amy Scruggs. Her life story was full of struggles and she talked about how she kept "re-calucalting route ..." each time she hit an obstacle or a challenge. She also started a non-profit called Voice For Heroes. She ended the program by singing 2 beautiful songs on the piano. He tag line is "Be Contagious, not Competitive". She is married to Brad Galvan and they have 6 kids. Her full story can be read here.

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"Strengthening the Women, Children and Families' Health impacted by HIV/AIDS" by Sara Duran and "My 3 Things" by Radia Hunter

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jan 11, 2019

Today was a surprise appearance by Radia Hunter. She is back full-time at Rotary now after a 1 year hiatus :-). She kicked it off by presenting her 3 things that impacted her life.

She said she was in Belgium for few years with her sister and she learnt French during her time there. That was an exciting experience for her.
Then she joined Rotary many years ago and was introduced to Richard Fogg, who was a Rotarian. In due course he gave her a job at his firm and she grew into a partner role there and very soon she will be able to acquire the entire business from Richard. She also said that George & Lou Sousa inspired her a lot and she enjoyed every community project at Rotary.
Finally her engagement to Sean Hunter was a life-changing event. Sean called her one day and said he found a great deal to fly to Belgium and had to leave in few days. He took her to Bruges in Belgium and proposed on a boat ride. She said YES! Apparently Sean surprised her by inviting 6 of her old friends. It was the most memorable event of her life.

And then we had another big surprise news from Molly Fleming! She and her husband Tim adopted a brand new baby born on Dec 23, 2018! A baby girl named Riley Galwin. CONGRATULATIONS to Molly & Tim.

Herb gave a quick update on some of the District and Global grant projects.

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"Strengthening the Women, Children and Families' Health impacted by HIV/AIDS" by Sara Duran

Ali Freedman is the interim Executive Director at Christie's Place, a community-based non-profit organization in San Diego, California. Since she could not attend, her Program Manager Sara Duncan gave a nice presentation about the history and activities of Christie's Place. Sara Durán, has a degree in MPH and she coordinates outreach, education, empowerment, and advocacy services for women, children, and families impacted by HIV. Ms. Durán is a Certified Health Education Specialist who has developed and implemented trauma-informed programming at Christie’s Place focused on health education, access, and retention for women living with HIV and their family members. In addition to a variety of local presentations, she has presented to national audiences on trauma-informed service provision in HIV service settings.

Christie’s Place is dedicated to the memory of Christie Milton-Torres. Christie dreamed that one day there would be a haven for women and families living with HIV. At age 20 Christie was diagnosed with HIV. During the late 1980s and early 1990s Christie was a tireless advocate for the needs of women and children. In 1994 Christie died due to complications from AIDS. Christie’s legacy lives on as the agency transforms lives by providing comprehensive education, advocacy and social services to women, children and families.

She said that at the end of 2016 almost 1.1 million people were living with HIV infection in the U.S. Unfortunately, only 25% of those were virally suppressed. Sara indicated that as long as the patients take their meds they cannot transmit the disease. Christie was the 1st woman in to highlight the HIV issue and take some action to provide relief to those infected in San Diego.

They identified that there was a big link between trauma and HIV. Christie has many peer navigators (PNs) that help HIV patients to navigate the health insurance maze. one such PN is Martha at Christie's, who helps patients with HIV. She is very effective because she herself is an HIV patient and so other patients relate to her very well.

Sara mentioned that there are many regimens to the medication process. Some are 1 pill a day program and very easy for patients to follow the program. The CHANGE (Coordinated HIV Assistance and Navigation for Growth and Empowerment) for Women program serves low-income women living with HIV throughout all of San Diego County whether they are entering medical care, have fallen out of care or are at risk of falling out of care. It improves the utilization of medical care and treatment and strengthens the healthcare and social services systems through strategic alliances and implementation of a peer navigation service model. She said it is always good to add the HIV blood test to routine blood tests during annual checkups. Sara added that the common symptoms are bad flu, pneumonia, etc. It seems many can live over 10 years with no symptoms.

There were 2 other board members that attended the event along with Sara -- Laurie Stewart and Renee Sievert. They provided additional information about Christie's fund-raising events and invited our members to a future event that they hold at the Del Mar Fairgrounds. Laurie will send details about this event.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"Mindfulness and Positive Change" by John Allcock and "My 3 Things" by Charlotte Jones

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jan 04, 2019

We had a quick update by Herb about the district grants that he has been working on. He completed a project that delivered 5 tons of food and a scholarship program in Kenya. Then Steve Weitzen reminded everyone about the 7-way District meeting on Thursday January 17, 2019. This meeting will replace the regular Friday meeting on Jan 18th.

Following that we had a brief talk by Charlotte Jones about her 3 important things in life. She said that there were 3 books that made a difference in her life. She grew up in Moscow, Idaho and is a voracious book reader. She uses Audible to listen to books during her commute and walks.

1. "The Brothers K" by James Duncan: It's a coming of age story about a family. This touching, uplifting novel spans decades of loyalty, anger, regret, and love in the lives of the Chance family.

2. "QUIET" by Susan Cain: This was a book that taught Charlotte the power of introverts. The book outlines the strengths of many famous introverts, such as, Rosa Parks, Steve Wozniak, Dr. Seuss, etc. Charlotte says that she is sort of an introvert and this book helped with leadership skills.

3. "Overwhelmed" by Brigid Schulte: This book tackles a very critical issue with most people - can working parents in America—or anywhere—ever find true leisure time? Overwhelmed is a map of the stresses that have ripped our leisure to shreds, and a look at how to put the pieces back together. A very interesting and informative book as per Charlotte. It touches on the elements of culture. kids, aging, etc.

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"Mindfulness and Positive Change" by John Allcock

John Allcock has been a student and teacher of mindfulness for over 15 years and a certified mindfulness instructor all over the world. He has given interviews on over 50 radio and television stations across the country, including many in San Diego. He graduated from Boston College and Harvard Law School. He is currently a practicing trial lawyer with DLA Piper, where he specializes in the trial of complex patent cases.

He met his wife Cheryl about 5 years ago. She was running a school for challenged kids for almost 20 years. The school is called Sea Change Prep and is located in Del Mar, CA. It is a WASC accredited school. They cater to kids from 4th grade to High School. Some of the key teaching principles of the school are as follows --

Don't be ruled by tyranny of events
905 of your worries are wrong
Thinking is overrated -- it seems a person goes through 30,000 to 70,000 thoughts each day and 70% of those are repeats!

John teaches a lot of his meditation techniques to the kids at the school. His theory is that a person can "control what action one takes on the thoughts", but the thoughts itself cannot be controlled. Mindfulness buffers you from bad actions. For example, if a driver cuts you off on the toad then mindfulness teaches you how to change your mind's state. Mindfulness teaches you to pay attention to our present moment experiences without judgement, with curiosity and openness.

He talks about how Koby Bryant uses meditation techniques. Watch his video here. John says that you can control your thoughts by noting it but let it go. He says to choose responses, intentions and actions that promote a healthy outcome. He cited the recent horrific event of the 12 Thai kids that were trapped in a cave after massive floods in Thailand. They survived those 18 days using meditation techniques guided by their soccer coach! Famous celebrities vouch to 20-30 minutes of daily mediation techniques that help them in their success. John also highlights these principles in his own book "40 Things I Wish I'd Told My Kids".

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"Providing Basic Care to Physically Disabled" by George Yeh and "My 3 Things" by Beverly Liberman

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Dec 14, 2018

We had a very touching and inspirational "My 3 Things in Life" talk by Beverly Liberman. Her 3 topics were as follows --

She talked about how she decided to become a Christian and started believing in Jesus especially having grown up in a Jewish family. She joined a group called "Mystic Christians" and went to Bible study and when she read "Mark" in the New Testament she was convinced that Jesus is Messiah.
She grew up in Beverly Hills with a wealthy dad and had butler in the house. She had a tough time then. Years later a book was born - "Incest Repressed: Faith & Healing". Members can order it here on Amazon.
The highlight of her life was meeting Herb. They had a drink and dinner on the first date and Bev asked if he wanted to split the bill and Herb jumped at that offer & said "Yes!" :-). They then dated for 4 years and got married. Then once she went with Herb to feed homeless people and she could not stand it. But when she started serving them her perception changed and since then she has been involved in helping the less privileged.

She then became a law enforcement chaplain and did that for 10 years. In the end she received a standing ovation from the audience.

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CHRISTMAS DECOR AT THE HILTON SAN DIEGO DEL MAR

George and Sanjiv enjoy a good photo shoot at the Hilton - courtesy Phil Campanelli :-).

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"Providing Basic Care to the Physically Challenged" by George Yeh

George Reh grew up in Toronto, Canada and he was a senior official at Dupont. His daughter Dina grew up with Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis and he saw that almost 3-4 months she had to be in the hospital during winter months suffering from inflammation and joint pains. That was a very poor quality of life for all of them. He decided he had to move to warmer area and decided to move to San Diego.

He saw very good improvement in his daughter's condition and she was able to go to UCSD in her wheel-chair and later did her Masters in Clinical counseling from USD. She was very determined to not be deterred by her condition. She now practices as a clinical counsellor at a clinic and helping other similarly challenged patients.

One day Dina was returning home and she was just couple miles away for home when her van collapsed and she had to find a ride. That cost her almost $250! Dina felt she needed to do something about these exorbitant costs. She wanted to offer empowerment to these challenged people. That's when she and her dad founded Club-ABLE.

They essentially identify providers that are willing to work with their group at lower costs and in exchange the patients provide something in return to grow their businesses. Thus a Preferred Partner Network (PPN) was created. They have many future services and products planned. George is looking for help in setting up the 501-C(3) designation for their organization so they can start accepting donations. They also need lots of volunteers to take their mission forward.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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CRC Food Packaging

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Dec 12, 2018

Many of the club members participated in the Community Resource Center (CRC) food packaging & distribution marathon at the Del Mar Fairgrounds on multiple days. Susan took a picture of the truck with our club's logo displayed on it.

The assembly line arrangement was very fascinating and it worked very smoothly with volunteers packing various cans of beans, corn, soup, etc.

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"Solutions For Change" by Chris Megison and "My 3 Things" by Herb Liberman

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Dec 07, 2018

Today we had a very captivating and emotion-charged talk by Chris Megison, co-founder & CEO of Solutions For Change. He was accompanied by his team members Patty Johnson and Debra Sallaz. Since 1993 Chris has designed and led numerous free market social purpose initiatives and innovations that have solved homelessness permanently for over 4,500 people. His trademark impact is his “get up, suit up and show up” model of leadership in which he leads from the front, a style of servant leadership that he learned as a U.S. Marine.

In 1999, Chris and Tammy Megison were helping out at an emergency winter shelter with their two boys, when a 9 year old girl named Jessica pulled Chris’ sleeve and innocently asked, “Hey mister, do you live here too?” Chris looked at the girl and then over to her mother who was preparing a bed on the shelter floor. Chris got down on one knee, looking into the girl’s eyes, and said, “I don’t live here, sweetie, but my wife and I are going to do everything possible so that you, and your family, won’t have to live here too.”

The girl’s eyes welled with tears, and so did Chris’s and a vision was born—to solve family homelessness. This one night forever changed not only the lives of Jessica and her family, who solved their homelessness, but also the lives of over 2,600 other children and their parents who have since found their way to Solutions. Through this promise an imperative evolved that is known today as "Solutions for Change".

Chris grew up in the mid-west and after one bad blizzard in Detroit he decided he needs to go west. So, he joined the military and dreamed of getting to San Diego. But then he got positioned in the coldest place in Amchitka Island, west of Alaska. Finally, after few years he was sent to warmer places, such as, the Sahara Desert in Somalia.

The goal for Solutions for Change is to get these homeless people out of the chain of dependency and denial. Chris then talked about how he met Wolfman Steve 27 years ago, who was a homeless man and he was stuck in addiction. He went to see this guy in action and felt that he could do something to change this man & other homeless people. That is when the "ALPHA" project started and he created this "Social Enterprise". He transformed the scary-looking Wolfman into a guy selling newspapers and Chris went with them to provide the motivation. That led him to the LA fair where he took 20+ homeless folks with an entire truck filled with newspapers and sold every newspaper in that truck.

He then talked about the university program, where he has 197 families enrolled. It's a 1000 day university program. They teach things like Connect, Trust and Act - the concepts of Servant leadership training. When Katrina hit they were able to mobilize 13 different organizations, loaded up several trucks and sent that to Katrina to help the people that were displaced. They are able to "transform" people and many of these transformed students end up working at the farm. Chris is also serving on the Poverty Reform Team under President Trump.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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Member of the Club Award - George Sousa

Ken presented George with the "Member of the Club" award for his dedication and exceptional service to the club. George also requested a moment of silence since today was the Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day.

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Thank You Talk by John Van Cleef, Executive Director of CRC

John Van Cleef recently became the new Executive Director at the Community Resource Center in September 2018. He was very happy to hear that our club donated a new truck and USD 1,500 to support distribution of donated items to needy families. John's goal is to improve the quality of life of many people. He is a Rotarian by history.

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"My 3 Things in Life" by Herb Liberman

Herb shared his 3 exciting events in life.

1. He talked about his life as a school superintendent when he had to make tough decisions about school closures when it is snowing heavily. The politics was bad and so he resigned, packed and moved to Atlanta, Georgia. Later he moved to San Francisco and stayed there for 11 years and sold a company.

2. Then he met Bev in San Francisco and have lived together for 31 years.

3. Finally, he learned about "giving back". He was a board member of St. Anthony's Foundation, then he was a Rotarian for 20 years and then he started a micro-lending organization in Kenya and offered scholarships to kids. He is also on the board of Second Chance, Alzheimer's Society, and works with the Salvation Army and also volunteers at the jail with the people who are being released to help them cope with the real world.

So, the one question from the audience was - "when do you sleep?" :-)

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"Biodiversity, conservation of Marine Life" by Paul Dayton & "My 3 Things" by Sanjiv Prabhakaran

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Nov 30, 2018

We kicked off the meeting with a quick update from Susheela Narayanan. She gave an update about her trip to Bangalore, India and how she was given a warm welcome. She presented the DMSB Rotary contribution of USD 3,900 towards a scholarship fund for 13 college students.

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"My 3 Things In Life" by Sanjiv Prabhakaran

Sanjiv talked about 3 important things in his life.

Amazing Road Trips with family
Compassion - helping others
Bonding time with daughter

He said that despite his dad's busy schedule as a businessman, he made time to take the family on road trips during their annual school vacation time. He would drive almost 800+ miles from Bombay down to southern India (Kerala). His dad loved driving and in those days the roads were not very car friendly but he would still drive for 3-4 days and stop at several places on the way. Sanjiv was thus able to experience the different cultures in each state as they drove down. His dad owned some of the cars similar to ones shown above.

Sanjiv learnt later the compassion side of his dad. Apparently he was funding an unknown child's school and college education through a charity organization. Sanjiv also experienced compassion from many Ohio State Students that helped him settle down in the campus when he first landed in the USA back in 1981.

Finally, he had the best opportunity to bond with his younger daughter through their daily walks to school. When he moved to San Diego the key criteria for buying their house was to be within walking distance to their child's elementary school. That was an amazing experience for both.

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"Biodiversity, conservation of Marine Life" by Paul Dayton

Paul Dayton is a long-term neighbor having lived in Solana Beach since 1970 when he came to Scripps to study marine ecology with an emphasis on kelp ecosystems. Paul is a professor of oceanography in the Integrative Oceanography Division at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego. He was the longest serving member of the U.S. Marine Mammal Commission and has served on several advisory boards. He has mentored over 40 PhD students. In 2007 he became the third recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Western Society of Naturalists. We had a good number of members and guests to listen to his exciting talk.

He talked about the importance of kelp forests in the marine life. Kelps detach and form sea balls and drift to shore. That impacts the life & reproduction of Abalones. The octopus eats these abalones, but the Moray Eels protect the abalones because these eels eat the octopus. This type of ecosystem chain protection is essential to preserve the kelp forest as per Dayton.

When kelp accumulates on the beaches it forms a "wrack zone" that acts as a natural input of marine resources into a terrestrial system, providing food and habitat for a variety of coastal organisms. It also attracts birds that eat the insects under the sand hence forming that important ecosystem chain. Kelp used to be harvested commercially in Del Mar few years ago. It stopped due to the influx of Asian competition. He has done about 500 dives in the Antartica. He says that Starfishes have disappeared due to some disease as a result of warmer sea water.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"The High Performing Woman" by Susan Treadgold and "My 3 Things" by Vicky Mallett

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Nov 16, 2018

Susan Treadgold delivered a wonderful talk about helping people reach peak performance. She is a mother of 2 children that go to school in Rancho Santa Fe. She was in London for 23 years working as a corporate executive in the financial world and then cancer brought her back to San Diego where she is seeking some special non-traditional treatment.

She is a San Diego and London-based holistic executive coach, founder of Treadgold Executive Development, best-selling author, award-winning speaker and transformational trainer. Faculty member for the UCSD Rady School of Management ‘Elevate’ Executive Leadership program. She is passionate about helping people create sustainable peak performance and success by helping them increase their confidence, energy, executive presence and productivity. She is an author of the book - The High Performing Woman: 52 Action Tips for Greater Confidence, Energy & Impact.

Susan joined UCSD to teach management at Rady's School. She talked about IQ vs EQ and says that Energy is lasting success and the key to success. She also talked about how E+R=O, where E stands for "Event" in life, R stands for "energetic Response" and O implies "Outcome".

The importance of energy is explained in her Energy Engagement Wheel above. She talked about an experiment with some mice for 21 days to show how sleep was important for full energy. They fed one set of mice for 21 days and no sleep, while the other set with no food but proper sleep. The result was that the ones that slept had better energy and survived, while the other set all died soon.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"My 3 Things" by Vicky Mallett:

Vicky talked about few things that mattered a lot in her life.

1. She was from Texas and loved fishing. Her grandpa took her out always and taught her the skills.

2. She got married at age 20 to an Air Force captain Don Barryman. At that time she lived near Colorado and then Tucson. Later on, about 20 years ago she got married to husband #2 Nigel Mallett in 2007. Nigel had a big influence in her marketing career & later she got into Farmers Insurance business.

3. She ended with a funny fishing story. She and her friend Priscilla went to Dude Ranch for fishing and they were coached by a Captain Bill, who said that it will be tough to catch any fish at that time. But the ladies caught some fish that day and caught more the next day too :-). The chef noticed they had captured one large size fish and offered $100 for it but Vicky said "NO" and brought the fish back home :-).

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Veteran's Program by George Sousa and "My 3 Things" by Susan Hennenfent

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Nov 09, 2018

We had a wonderful program by George Sousa honoring all the veterans in our club and all over the USA. He started off with a nice video about vets from the Korean war. He indicated that almost 8,100 are still Missing In Action (MIAs), about 3000 bodies returned, and 51% died in prison. He had some of his memorable photos and medals laid out on the table.

He had a round table set up with various items that signifies important aspects of the Korean war. This table is known as the POW/MIA table. The details of the table layout can be viewed at the U.S. NAVY LIVE BLOG site. Charles helped George point out each item on the table as George read it out. We had a room full of guests and all the vets had some form of military dress and/or cap. A brief video of George's talk can be seen by clicking here.

Each of our club veterans gave a quick update about their time in the military and they had some displays of pictures, medals laid out on the tables along the wall.

Bill Sutton said he moved 11 times during his career due to different postings and he was always moved by the POW/MIA table setup as it reminded him of the great heroes still missing in action.

Jon Fish was on a cruise to the Mediterranean when he was posted at Charleston, his ship came back and it became a Reserve ship as it was declared to be unfit for the sea. His next ship trip was when he went to Mekong near Vietnam. He spent 2.5 years in the Navy.

Lou Oberman was a World War II veteran. He was at Parris Island and trained marine pilots on the instruments used for flying. He trained them to fly blind even in bad weather. In such bad weather situations when there are multiple planes all heading back to land, he would stack them in concentric circles at 3,000, 4,000, 5000 feet so they could land safely.

Charles Foster said that his father-in-law was in the Navy and his mother-in-law was in the Marines. He joined the Navy and was assigned as the Engineering Manager for the re-design of a Destroyer. Soon after he arrived at the Charleston Naval Shipyard, it failed an inspection of the calibration systems involved in its work on nuclear submarines. It had to be fixed within 60 days to avoid complete shutdown of the shipyard! The shipyard commander accepted Charles' team's recommendations and started its implementation in time to keep the shipyard’s nuclear submarine work from being shut down. The poster above was one of the ways they brought attention to those involved in the shipyard’s nuclear submarine work that uncalibrated tools and instruments could lead to failures of submarines while at sea and the resulting deaths of men aboard them.

We also had one of George's World War II friend Arnold F. give a brief talk. He said he was on ship Arora and it was stuck in a big storm, lost all life-boats and they were trying to head back to shore. However, they got a message via "light" to go back to the sea to save 2 other ships that were stranded. They managed to save a few.

In the end, George read out some more stories and concluded with his legendary teddy bear song :-).

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Susan Hennenfent's "My 3 Things in Life":

Before she was born her family was in Germany. Both her grand-parents were born in Russia. She could have been born in Russia, but her parents eventually moved to USA and so Susan feels blessed that she was born in the USA! She has some German blood in her.

She admired her Algebra teacher, who encouraged students to take Physics. So, later Susan took Physics in college and ended up getting her Electrical Engineering degree. She met and married Mark.

Finally, she said that joining Rotary was one of the best things in life.

A reference to a wonderful book came up in the discussion - "A Gentleman in Moscow".

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"Kids are happier when their parents know their ABCs" by Cindy Grossman and "My 3 Things" by Venky Venkatesh

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Nov 02, 2018

Paul Butler started off today with a wonderful video from the Rotary Foundation video library known as "A Century of Doing Good in the World". It showed the various accomplishments of Rotary over the past 100 years. This was followed by Venky Venkatesh sharing his three big things in life.

He left India to work in England. Later he applied to some colleges in USA and fate brought him to Los Angeles to do his post graduate studies. Then he got a job at Welton Beck and then he met and married Meera. Later they found jobs at General Atomics and moved to San Diego. He loves tennis and he found that General Atomics had wonderful tennis courts and so he stuck at GA for many years and is still there - soon to retire. He has 2 sons and 5 grand children. Ironically, both his sons went back to live in India.

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Cindy Grossman is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and the Executive Director of Kids' Turn San Diego, a caring non-profit organization that has been creating brighter futures for children experiencing family separation and divorce since 1996. Cindy earned her Master’s Degree in Social Work from SDSU and maintains a current License in Clinical Social Work. She has over 20 years of administrative experience and provided therapy to children for over 12 years. Cindy joined the team at Kids' Turn San Diego in 2013 and services have significantly expanded under her leadership. Having been a child of divorce and currently a parent of a 18 year old daughter, Cindy offers a unique blend of personal experience and professional expertise and is dedicated to helping others transform their families during challenging times.

She talked about how there are about 100,000 children experiencing divorce of their parents every year in San Diego county and some 50,000 military children going through strenuous situations of transitions, multiple schools, etc. Divorce rates in the military is about 85% and the general divorce rate is about 50%. Kids' Turn San Diego has helped about 1095 children and parents in 2017 and in 2018 as of Sept they helped 843 total. They are serving more children & parents every year. She said that the ABC's for parents are Attitude, Behavior and Choices. Bullying amongst kids is a result of what they observe at home with parents. She says that "LISTENING" is the key to all communication. She ended the talk with a wonderful and inspiring video -- The Hug-a-Bug Campaign Video.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the imaginary Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"The BIG Idea" by Chuck Samuelson and "My 3 Things" by Steve Weitzen

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Oct 26, 2018

Today's talk on "My 3 Things in Life" was delivered by Steven Weitzen, who has been selected as the District Governor for 2020-21. His key points were as follows:

Rabbi - In his early days his rabbi influenced into community service and that has changed his perspective on life immensely.
Attorney - He said he has represented over 2000 clients throughout his career and that has impacted his life to know that he has served so many people and helped them in various challenging issues.
Rotary - Joining Rotary has fulfilled his passion in life of serving the larger community. His trip to El Salvador to help the under-privileged people taught him many things. His selection to the District Governor role has been a great experience. It has been a major learning process and he has enjoyed it a lot.

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Update on events after Bocce:

Susan Hennenfent and other key members gave a brief update on the large set of tasks that happens once the Bocce event is over. Members don't realize the amount of work that happens in the background. Final Bocce wrap-up committee meeting below. Wonder why Charles is missing here :-). Great picture Charles!

Jon Fish tallies all the money and prepares the profit-loss sheet.
Jon distributes the monies that go to the various beneficiaries - almost 40% to the top 2 beneficiaries.
Charles follows up to do the press releases and other PR activities.
Thank you letters have to be mailed out to all the sponsors and people that made $50 and above donations.
Susan mentioned that the biggest challenge is getting all the proper addresses of all the donors and auction items.
Auction committee tallies all the collections from raffle, ships out any auction items, prepares reports for Jon, etc.
Bill mentioned that the new format of Bocce+Beer did please many people and it went well.
Malcolm reminded everyone that the target is to reach $100K in net within few years and that he will chair it until that time. He added that this year the net was $41k.
Molly added that we need more members to carry out a huge event like this.

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The BIG Idea:

Next, we had our main speaker talk about "The BIG Idea". Chuck Samuelson, Founder and President of Kitchens for Good, has spent a lifetime in the food service industry as a chef, restaurateur, and consultant. Chuck started his career as a dishwasher at 13 and rose to Executive Chef and Restaurant General Manager in his late twenties. He has owned award-winning restaurants, a catering company, been a Hospitality Consultant to top San Diego restaurants, and served as the Senior Manager for Food Services at Stone Brewing Company. And one interesting fact about him is that he was born and raised on an Indian Reservation in NE Montana and he is a mixed race Native American Mutt.

Chuck said that at Kitchens For Good they primarily hire felons that are looking to get back into society and train them to be chefs so they can have a good life and give back to society. All they hear in the kitchen is "Yes Chef" and "No Chef" :-). They train to become good in culinary and go out to work at various restaurants.

When he was at Stone Brewery, he realized that he was no fulfilled and not happy at the job. He saw lots of food go to waste every day. Statistically, it seems, a single broccoli needs 5.1 gallons of water to grow and an orange needs about 13 gallons! So, he used to cringe seeing all that food go to waste - almost 40% of the food is wasted. That's how "The BIG Idea" started about 3 years ago. One of his goals was to eliminate hunger, but that was not the main goal. The key thing was that he wanted to create jobs & hence trained people in culinary. He wanted to get felons trained since he saw that once those felons are trained the recidivism rate was just 4% compared to other training where the rate was much higher and these felons go back to their bad deeds.

At the school the trainees learn "life" and "knife" skills and graduate with jobs in hand. They have already graduated 190 students in the past 3 years and all are employed somewhere. His goal is to hit 500 graduates each year. One of his classic story is about a a student "Yacca", who graduated and was hired as a chef at a winery. Soon he had to fill the shoes of a Sous Chef and seeing his performance he was soon moved into the Executive Chef role. The organization also gleans food from framer's markets and uses those "not-so-perfect" fruits and vegetables to cook food for the hungry.

Just two weeks ago they partnered with Chef Works and hosted their first fund-raiser and raised almost $50K. They had any celebrity chefs come and make gorgeous entres and appetizers from wasted food! It was an amazing success and the students also learned a lot from this experience to work with celebrity chefs. The students feel good that they are finally feeding others.

His primary needs at this point are to open more kitchens that trains more students by creating a safe place for these felons in their lives. He said that right after his Rotary talk he has to go and preside at a graduation event where his Class #13 is graduating.

In the end DMSB "acting" Club President Charles Foster presented the speaker with the imaginary Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"Mobilizing Leaders to Transform Business and Community" by Jeff Blanton and "My 3 Things in Life" by Paul Butler

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Oct 19, 2018

Today we had Paul Butler deliver his talk on the three important things in his life.

1^st Paul’s last name wasn’t Butler when he was born. When he was young, his mother divorced his biological father and, later, married such a good man that Paul was happy to take his new dad’s last name as his own. His new dad was a very positive influence on his life.

2^nd He happened to meet a Navy recruiter in a mall while Paul was a student at Arizona State. The recruiter said they would teach him how to fly jets, and they did. Paul said that it was a wonderful experience and that he couldn’t believe that he was having so much fun flying and getting paid for it.

3^rd A chance get-together with friends led to his meeting Mary Beth while at Arizona State. And, “Boy, could she dance!” The rest is history, one that Paul said has been great.

###

Next we had a wonderful talk by Jeff Blanton about mobilizing leaders to transform business community. He is the founder and CEO of The Blanton Group, an organization dedicated to helping leaders transform purpose into possibility. Known as “The Purpose Guy”, Jeff is a highly sought-after speaker, author, and leadership guide who assists business leaders to make the shift from success to significance. Prior to founding The Blanton Group, Jeff spent more than 30 years successfully leading large strategic change initiatives for organizations of all sizes, from well-funded start-ups to Fortune 100 companies. He is also involved with multiple local nonprofits and social enterprises focused on effecting positive change in his community. Blanton resides in San Diego, California, “America’s Finest City”, where he does his part to make that slogan a reality. A fun fact about Jeff is that he has been a competitive sailboat racer for his entire life.

Jeff asked those in attendance, "Who of you can truly say you know your purpose?" He followed that question with his personal progress from not knowing even the question early in his career to, at the age of 60, knowing his true purpose of helping others to "mobilize possibilities."

Today, as a speaker and facilitator, he helps business leaders identify all of their possibilities and then mobilize them into action through helping them become "purpose guided and vision driven." He calls his process "jailbreak leadership" for identifying a person's personal purpose to help him or her see the possibilities in their lives, to look beyond the constraints of their particular jails, and to go for it!

At the end of the talk, Jeff answered a number of questions and said that he offers a complimentary 30-minute phone call for leaders who are interested in his Jailbreak Leadership program.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"Taking Action Against Investment Losses" by Leo Kandinov and "My 3 Things" by Malcolm Koll

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Oct 12, 2018

This week we had Malcolm Koll talk about his 3 things in life that had a major impact on him.

"Beer in the fridge" incident :-). This was hilarious where he (at 10 years of age) and his brother decided to try out a bottle of beer. Their dad later decide to drink that last bottle that he knew was in the fridge. When he did not see it he asked the kids, his wife and his maid and no one knew about it. The dad suspected the maid, who was with them for years and fired her. Everyone was sad to see the maid getting fired and Malcolm confessed to his dad. However, his dad never apologized to the maid but the maid decided to continue working there.
Terrorist contact. At the age of 17 he was sent to the army and he was placed near the Angolan border. They caught some terrorist and imprisoned them. One day he came near the cages and had eye-contact with the terrorist and he could see the burning passion in his eyes that showed that he did what he (the terrorist) believed was right even though they were doing bad things and Malcolm believed that he and his army team were doing what was best for the country.
At age 19 he came to the U.S. and he said that is the first time he really questioned what Apartheid really was. His belief is that when you have to choose between what is legal and what is moral, it is always best to pick the "moral" choice.

We had a fairly good crowd today. Malcolm kept it very entertaining for all. members were now anxious to hear our speaker Leo and learn about the crazy things that corporate management gets into.

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Next we had Leonid (Leo) Kandinov from Robbins Arroyo give a talk on "Taking Action Against Investment Losses" that impacts many shareholders and corporations. His colleague Ajit Narasimhan was also in the audience.

Mr. Leonid Kandinov is an attorney at San Diego based Robbins Arroyo LLP. Mr. Kandinov represents individual and institutional investors and consumers in complex litigation, specifically focusing on shareholder rights, securities fraud, and antitrust matters. For his efforts on behalf of his clients, Mr. Kandinov has been recognized as a Super Lawyer Rising Star in 2016, 2017, and 2018.

He indicated how corporate management discusses many things in board meetings that are confidential and they get leaked out leading to major shareholder risk and losses. Tesla was a glaring recent example when its CEO Elon Musk announced taking company private without any written confirmation. That led to major losses for the shareholder, for the company and for him personally.

They represent plaintiffs on a pro-bono basis and only gets paid from the proceeds that comes out of settling the case. It seems that total investor losses have reached almost $334 Billion! The team at Robbins Arroyo works diligently with their clients to ensure that illegal activities by corporations are corrected and secure any compensation for the losses. Recently they did a "Shareholder Derivative Action" against the board and/or executive members of Facebook and they took Mark Zuckerberg into deposition and finally settled the case for some amount.

They monitor "insider trading" issues and other illegal activities that causes a company's stock to fall. Western Union was another example of money laundering that they faced about 5-6 years ago. The company had to pay over $35 million in fines. The sad part is that in some cases, when the company pays the fine it is eventually coming out of the shareholder's pot but in many cases the insurance companies cover that cost. Eventually, as more regulations are put in place the stock recovers. UPS was another interesting case where they were caught shipping illegal cigarette cartons (683,000 cartons) and these were ending up in the hands of under-age kids. They proved that this was happening with full knowledge of the UPS executives and the judgement was a fine of $247 M to New York state and city.

Overall, this was a very educational talk and members really enjoyed it since there were several good questions. He encouraged people to sign-up for StockWatch as it is a FREE service to all clients. There is no cost to the client since the payment comes out in the end from legal settlement costs.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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Global & District Grant updates + Bocce Awards

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Oct 12, 2018

GLOBAL GRANT FOR OTTAPALAM, KERALA, INDIA

We had a Global Grant update from Sanjiv Prabhakaran regarding Grant number 1861779 for Quadriplegic and paraplegic beneficiaries. The total grant value was $35,813.

The beneficiaries received 1 chin operated wheel chair, 23 3-wheel scooters, 7 sewing machines and training for various money-making opportunities, such as, making paper pens, pencils, umbrellas, etc. They have also set up a web site HANDICROPS to promote and sell the items made by some of these beneficiaries so these challenged people are able to live independently and earn some income to support their families.

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DISTRICT GRANT FOR RUIRU, KENYA

Herb and Bev Liberman presented their progress on the District Grant for children in Ruiru, Kenya. They were in Kenya to meet the organizers and children of Praisegate Children's Home. This place is near Nairobi.

Praisegate provides residence for older girls and they have a feeding program for the street children. They also have a clean water service there. The district grant was for $1,300.

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BOCCE AWARDS

Paul awarded the Bocce awards to Jan Parsons and Charles Foster for the largest number of sponsorships that were secured for the BocceFest San Diego fundraising event.

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"My Three Things in Life" by Lou Oberman + Bocce updates

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Oct 05, 2018

Phil managed to get us a tiny meeting room today due to some busy bookings at the Hilton. On top of that, our speaker for today had to cancel his talk at the last minute due to an emergency. Ken, Jon and Malcolm provided some Bocce updates and Bill tried to auction off some remaining Champagne and wine bottles. Jon updated everyone that the sponsorship collection was about $55K and Charlotte mentioned that the Auction+Raffle net collection was close to $15,000. Jon was not so sure about the nickel collection but he estimates that to be around $500.

Then Ken presented the annual past-president 18-carat gold Rotary pin with a real diamond in the center. This was designed by Malcolm. Apparently only past presidents and higher can wear a pin with a diamond in the center. Also, Susan read out a "Thank You" note form Reality Changers that was very touching.

Following that we had the "My 3 Things in Life" talk by Lou Oberman. He showed a picture frame that had some great sentimental value for him. There were three pictures in the frame, which his very best friend Syl Schaffer gave him on his 65th birthday. One picture was of the two of them when they were 4-5 years old, another one was when they were in their 50s, and the smaller one with his wife, was taken about 10 years ago. He passed away in 2009, and they were closer to each other than their own brothers. That friendship was wonderful.

He said he is involved in the Convention of States project and that he has given some 90+ talks for that organization. His dream was to be a major league baseball player. His school PSAL won the championship in 1949. Apparently his team was undefeated in NY city. They had a very tough and disciplined coach and this coach made sure the kids were absolutely clean and that their shoes were shining and spotless. Many commented that they looked the professional NY Yankees. Later when he was in college he was selected to try out with the NY Giants. However some leg injury prevented him from going. Then in 1952 he joined the Marine Corps. Once he came out of the Military he went into selling insurance but soon got disappointed with that and later saw that financial planning was what he really wanted to do and he saw that as the future. In 1968 he moved to CA and eventually to San Diego and retired in 2002 as a financial planner.

One of the quotes that he really enjoys is - "Yesterday is History, Tomorrow is Mystery and Today's Present is a Present".

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BocceFest San Diego on Sep 30, 2018

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Oct 05, 2018

We had an amazing BocceFest event on Sunday Sep 30, 2018 at the Surf Cup Sports Park. The two big beneficiaries Reality Changers and Just In Time had a full crew of volunteers there to help. Del Mar Times, Carmel Valley News and Solana Beach Sun had a photographer there to take pictures for the above article. The original PDF of this article can be downloaded here.

The above pictures were some of the images taken by members of the club. Details of the event can be viewed at BocceFestSD.

In addition, we also announced the awards for the Beer competition that was held few weeks prior to this event. The beer served at the event were donated by the breweries that participated in the Beer competition. The results were as follows:

Category 1: Pilsner

Gold: Ned Hall Pilsner, Belching Beaver Brewery

Silver: Boneshakeur, Rouleur Brewing

Bronze: Spezial Pils, Alesmith Brewing

Category 2: Wet-hopped Beer

Gold: Most Wanted, Dos Desperados Brewery

Silver: Culture Brewing

Bronze: Nickel Beer Company

Category 3: Juicy or Hazy IPA

Gold: Dopeur Juicy IPA, Rouleur Brewing

Silver: Hazinitas Hazy IPA, Dos Desperados Brewing

Bronze: Art is Hard, North Park Beer Co

Category 4: American IPA

Gold: Mosaic IPA, Culture Brewing

Silver: Hop Fu!, North Park Beer Co

Bronze: Ride the Pine, Belching Beaver Brewery

Category 5: Imperial Stout

Gold: Speedway Stout, Alesmith Brewing

Silver: Rescue Buoy, Rip Current Brewing

Bronze: Double Abbey Stout, Viewpoint Brewing

Best of Show:

Mosaic IPA, Culture Brewing

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"Teaching to Inspire" by Don Collins, Teacher at TPHS

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Sep 28, 2018

We had a great audience today with many guests. Charles' 2 sisters from the Carolinas were here. Bocce team announced that over $54,000 in sponsorships has been collected so far and urged members to make the final push to invite guests to the BocceFest event on Sunday September 30, 2018! Charlotte mentioned that the online auction had over $12,000 worth of items for bidding.

Due to shortage of time, the "My 3 Things in Life" talk was postponed to next week.

Our speaker today was Don Collins, the Inspiration teacher from Torrey Pines High School. Don grew up in metro Detroit and graduated from Pomona College in Claremont, CA after completing a degree in Mathematics and receiving his commission as Air Force Officer in 1989. He worked as a Public Relations Officer during the first Gulf War where he received a Commendation medal for his work with the national and international media in the Middle East. Don worked in sales, fitness, construction and ran a halfway house downtown before returning to get his teaching credential from CSU San Marcos in 1996. Don has California state credentials and experience as an instructor in math, English and technology, a Masters in Educational Administration, and a Masters of Science in Educational Technology. He is a Fulbright Memorial Fund Teacher (2002) and was awarded Teacher of the Year at both Sunset High School (2003-04) and at Torrey Pines High School (2014-15). From 2005 to 2008 he was a National Director for the Center for Teacher Effectiveness where he works as a trainer for improving classroom management strategies. He is currently on the Board of Directors for Directing Change, a statewide film contest for high school students to create one-minute PSA’s on suicide prevention and mental health awareness.

Don is in his 21st year of teaching in the San Dieguito District and his 8th at Torrey Pines High School where he is the Peer Assistance Leadership Support Adviser, as well as the teacher for a pilot course called Academic Success & Survival. Don was also selected by the San Dieguito Union High School District to create and run the Sanford Inspire Program in partnership with National University to train teachers to be inspirational. He and his husband Anthony are excited to welcome the birth of their twin sons, Floyd and Stanley, next month.

He inspires those failing and depressed kids to rise and shine. He sees a lot of value in these troubled kids. He compares them to a crumpled $20 bill that you find on the road-side. You open it up and it still has a $20 value. In a similar manner he sees lot of potential in these troubled kids. His program inspires these kids to learn and achieve. One such kid Nick Gulino was a troubled and dropout kid, who eventually under Don's guidance and training went to Yale Law School and graduated from there. Nick's story can be read at this Del Mar Times article.

Don is also a teacher trainer at the Sanford Inspire Center. He says that his motivation and inspiration came from his mom, who was a very tough lady that used to chase him up the stairs with a broom. At TPHS he used to hold monthly lunch programs and encouraged those troubled kids to come and participate and share experiences. The participation tripled and so he then increased that to 4 monthly lunch programs.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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BeerFest competition

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Sep 08, 2018

Malcolm provided a photo of some judges tasting and judging the best craft beer today. 18 breweries participated in the competition - details at Bocce Meets Beer. They all donated 2 sixtel kegs of beer towards Del Mar-Solana Beach Rotary Club's Bocce Ball tournament named this year as BocceFest San Diego.

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District Governor Mel Gallegos's talk and "My 3 Things in Life" by Art Mendoza + Bocce updates

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Sep 07, 2018

Venky Venkatesh was the acting president today and he requested Art to give his talk. Art Mendoza talked about his three things in life regarding Faith and hope, Family and Love were his key things in life. To him family is not just his close family members, it includes a larger group of dear friends, Rotarians, etc. He has enjoyed his 21+ years at Rotary. Love is something that makes us want to be better as per a quote from Jack Nicholson. In 1975 when he was 20 years old he had an opportunity to live in Indonesia (a muslim country) for some time and he was engaged in community work and peace building. He then married a Persian girl and he had the opportunity to go to Teheran but his wife has never been there although her family comes from Iran.

We then had Charles, Molly, Charlotte and Malcolm give some updates on the Bocce Ball fund-raising and the Beer Fest competition.

Sponsorships have reached $40,000
Auction proceeds have reached $5,000
Brewery competition had 18 breweries that participated. Each brewery donated 2 sixtel kegs, which is 80 pints total

Following this we had our District Governor Mel Gallegos give a talk about his life and how Rotarians are helping the world. Susie Callahan and Steve Weitzen introduced Mel. Steve had invited many guests. Mel was born and raised in Central California. He received his BS in Nursing at California State University, Dominguez Hills. Mel served our country as a Hospital Corpsman in the United States Navy stationed at San Diego Naval Hospital, Balboa. Mel joined the staff of Sharp Memorial Hospital in 1981 working on the Cardiac Care Unit. In the last few years he transitioned to the Information Technology department to work on the electronic medical record-keeping system.

Mel was recognized as a Partner of Health and Pillar of Philanthropy by the Sharp HeathCare Foundation. A multiple Major Donor to The Rotary Foundation and Bequest Society member, Mel is dedicated to making the world a better place. He also actively supports Project Mexico and Mana De San Diego and is a member of the American Legion. Mel is Past President of the El Cajon Breakfast and San Diego Downtown Breakfast Rotary Clubs. In addition to serving at the club level, he has served the District in many capacities including Assistant Governor, Foundation Mentor, Rotaract Chair, Community Service Chair, Foundation Gala Chair and District Conference Chair. Mel’s wife, Hey Jude, is a member of San Diego Downtown Breakfast Rotary Club.

Mel’s first trip to Africa was to participate in an NID in Eritrea. That was the beginning of several trips to East Africa for Mel and Hey-Jude. They have attended District Conferences in Mexico and East Africa.

Some of his key points were as follows --

He said that our DMSB club has given out over $322K to The Rotary Foundation.
He said that our Rotary district was #1 in our zone.
He said we are down to 12 polio cases in Afghanistan and 3 in Pakistan. We are almost there to eradicate polio from the world.
His advice was to find ways to retain members since many clubs lose members in the first 1 to 2 years.

He ended his talk by showing a video of his mock press conference at the Catamaran resort. That was quite funny.

In the end Mel congratulated Venky for running the meeting today and gave him a special and rare Rotary pin.

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"Lithium Ion Battery development and applications at General Atomics" by Dr. Aaron Sathrum and "My 3 Things in Life" by Kevin Cahill

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 24, 2018

Susheela Narayanan was honored today with her 2nd Paul Harris award.

Kevin Cahill talked about his three things in life regarding Faith and hope, Humility and Love for the family. He spoke very eloquently as usual.

Finally Dr. Aaron Sathrum, Concepts Engineer from General Atomics spoke very well about "Lithium- Ion Battery Development". He focused on the design and development of such batteries used in various Tesla models.

He said that one of the recent development is that Tesla has unveiled Tesla Semi-Trucks in 2017 with a range of 300-500 miles without a charge and goes into production in 2019. The talk was very interesting and many members asked questions about the talk.

In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the speaker with the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"Living a healthy happy active life, full of vigor and enjoyment after cancer treatment" by Sal Mariscal

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 17, 2018

Sal Mariscal was born in Mexico City. Moved to Hollywood CA at a young age. Graduating from Hollywood High in 1960. Sal studied business administration at the Alexander Hamilton Institute and, in the summer of 1962, he went to Mexico for a two-week vacation. He stayed17 years. There in Mexico he learned the value of possessing dual cultural backgrounds and how to use them in international marketing.

In 1978 he returned to the USA. After working at different international companies, to hone his skills, he eventually established his own International Marketing Company and ran it successfully for over 40 years.

After having a successful cancer treatment and in an effort to give back to society, Sal is now dedicating his time to the Community Cancer Awareness Initiative, whose purpose is to educate and spread the word on how to deal with cancer, the medical system and different treatment options with the aim of having a fantastic, fruitful, happy life without any side effects from cancer therapy.

Sal spoke about life decisions we face when dealing with cancer. 50 % of all men 30% of women face cancer decisions in their lives. His decision related to prostate cancer and whether to have surgery or radiation treatment or just wait and see. Possible collateral tissue damage in treating prostate cancer made him look for alternative treatment and he found proton therapy. Sal had to work through strong insurance restrictions placed on his medical plan until he got the right treatment. Today he is cancer-free and with no side effects from treatment.

A good example for all of us as to how insurance companies work to control how and what treatment we can receive. He had a good message for all. In the end DMSB Club President Ken Barrett presented the Joshua certificate that represents our club DMSB donating school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

We also had "Three Impactful Things In Life" talk by Jan Parsons today.

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Operation Game On Golf Tournament Sponsorship

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 14, 2018

George & Bill played in the Operation Game On (OGO) Golf Tournament fundraiser at Fairbanks Ranch CC on Monday & DMSB Rotary was a Tee sponsor.

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"Transformational Boarding School" by Jabez LeBret and "My 3 Things" by Patricia Case

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 10, 2018

We started the meeting with a quick talk by Patricia Case about her "3 Things in Life". She showed everyone an old family picture and mentioned that FAMILY was highest on her list of things that impacted her life. Her family instilled great long-lasting values in her and she had an ideal childhood. They taught her the importance of being committed to the community. She loves reading books and read out a verse from one of the books she is reading now called Fugitive Pieces. Very rarely, she says, that anyone now reads books. She was on a flight back to San Diego and noticed that all 3 passengers in her row were reading books :-).

We had good audience today and in the end Bill Sutton jokingly asked her a question - "Do you know where you live?". Patricia responded "no idea" since she keeps traveling a lot now-a-days.

Malcolm also gave a brief update on Bocce Beer competition and mentioned that many breweries, such as, Duckfoot, etc, have applied for the competition.

Finally, Phil introduced Jabez LeBret as our keynote speaker. Jabez's partner Tom Schenck was also in attendance. Jabez has been homeless, is a high school dropout, and was on a path to nowhere. After getting his GED, Jabez studied finance and marketing at Gonzaga University. He went on to become a financial analyst at Nordstrom, an international public speaker, author, and Forbes Contributor. He recently sold his award winning marketing agency to free up time to pursue his passion in education as co-founder of Sisu Academy, a new education model. Jabez is a coffee lover and Gin enthusiast.

He said that he became homeless at age 16 and that it was a teacher in school that noticed him and motivated him to learn. This teacher (Art Dolan) took the pains to spend an hour each week for 3 years and taught him business basics. He later decided to start a school (Sisu Academy) that can help such challenged kids to thrive in the community. He wants to create this academy where the students are boarded and fully taken care of while they are in training. The "Accelerator" concept will pay for the program so it is completely tuition-free for the students.

His goal is to educate these kids in a practical environment rather than traditional school formats. The kids need to engage and experience real-life scenarios. The chart shows the key factors for challenged kids to succeed. Apparently millenials lack 3 of the 4 critical things in the chart above. He feels that Robotics and Programming must be mandatory for all kids in the current world. Social farming, music and animal therapy are many ways to train the students when they are boarding in the academy. A well-trained pool of such candidates can fill many open jobs. Apparently San Deigo port had almost 90K jobs unfilled few months ago and only 50% has been filled far.

They already have some students identified and there is room for few more. Their initial goal is to start with 12 students and reach 350 soon. They have identified the location of Alliant University in the Miramar area for now as the spot. They hope to get that location in 2 years.

In the end, our club acting president Vicky awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Jabez that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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Bocce update + Sex Trafficking in San Diego - The Epidemic that's Happening in Our Own Backyard & "My 3 Things" by Jon Fish

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 03, 2018

Thanks to Paul Butler for the wonderful notes for this event. The meeting was started with the bell ringing from the real gavel by Venky as acting president... President Ken on vacation somewhere in Colorado ...

Fine master: After nearly choking on his breakfast.... Malcolm fined Paul $10 for looking at his own phone when Malcolm called him right during the meeting... it was even on vibrate!

BocceFest update: Sponsorships are up about 10,000 from last week thanks largely to Charles Foster's efforts. Charles was able to secure a Premier Sponsor in "Brand Napa Valley" and a VIP sponsor in "Rancho Coastal Computers" Charles is the winner of a bottle of Brand Napa Valley wine and a growler of his choice from Viewpoint Brewery. Please let Paul know your beer choice.

Malcolm then felt bad when Foundation Chair presented Malcolm with a Paul Harris + 5 award. congrats to Malcolm for his generous support of the Rotary Foundation.

Jon Fish talked about 3 important events in his life that involved 3 mentors at summer camps and at college and in business

Great program today by educating the club to sex trafficking problem in San Diego and other parts of the country. Rachel Devine has been involved in the fight against sex trafficking for 6 years. She earned her degree in International Studies and Political Science from Point Loma Nazarene, and focuses on international human rights issues, specifically forms of oppression against women, all around the globe. She's traveled to 10 countries and has worked with many different non-profit organizations in Asia, Africa, and here in San Diego - all focusing on sex trafficking rehabilitation. She has been working with GenerateHope for a year and a half and is excited about the powerful work being done in her local community. San Diego is the 8th worse U.S. city for sex trafficking with an estimated 3000 to 5000 victims today.

In the end, our club acting president Venky Venkatesh awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Rachel that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

DMSB President's Assembly Meeting & "My 3 Things" by Diane Huckabee

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 27, 2018

Today was our new Club President Ken Barrett's Assembly Day. He kicked off by showing this video from the Rotary's video collections. It was a very touching and timely video reminding members of why we are all in Rotary.

Then we had some surprise guests today to celebrate the nomination of Steve Weitzen as the District Governor for 2020-2021. These guests were the past District Governors and the current District Governor Scott Carr.

Each one gave a 2 minute speech to celebrate Steve's new role in 2020. And finally Bill Sutton also pitched in at the end from our club's side.

Following that we had the "My 3 Things In Life" talk by Diane Huckabee. She said that her primary things in life are - Health, Family & Travel. They have family re-unions every 3 years, which started some 30 years ago. Last July 4th they had a gathering of 20 family members in South Lake Tahoe. It seems she has been losing young family members through these years. Her older brothers were diagnosed with Myotonic Dystrophy also known as Steinert disease, which is an adult version of Muscular Dystrophy. Hence she has always been concerned and every birthday she crosses she celebrates it with a vigor :-). She also enjoys traveling to various part of the world. This is part of her compensation package from work. Her last trip was to Beijing and in November she plans to go to Africa.

She has 2 sons Brandon & Eric and husband is Tom. Apparently Tom & Eric are CPA's and Eric works for Tom. According to Diane Tom panicks a lot and so once Tom & Eric went to a CPA conference and came back all panicked saying that by 2027 only 25% of S&P 500 companies will be left in the market! He wanted to get out of the market soon and Diane jokingly commented that by that time we will be old and out of the market :-).

Ken then announced the best Rotarian of the Month award. Molly Fleming was the winner for her excellent dedication to marketing the Bocce BeerFest event coming up on September 30, 2018!

She and Paul also announced and showed the graphic chart of the progress with sponsorship funds. We have so far $12,800 in various forms of sponsorships. Charlotte also added later that the Auction committee has received over $10,000 in auction items already.

Then we had Malcolm provide an overall Bocce update on the BeerFest competition and how he plans to attract some 75 entries that will provide about 3000 pints of FREE beer for the Bocce competition. At the competition he plans to use coins made from wood as the currency for the beer - called Wooden Nickels. Guests at the event can purchase a 12 oz glass of beer for one wooden nickel. He expects to have several types of beer, such as, West Coast IPA, Wet Hopped IPA, Hazy IPA, Golden / Blond Ale and Classic Saison. He then ended the update with one of his own quotes :-).

Finally Kevin Wilde (surprise guest and past member) requested George Sousa to say a few words about his wife Lou who passed away last week. He was very emotional and said they were married for 68 years. He showed everyone a beautiful picture of Lou taken at Bill Sutton's demotion party last month. That was the last club meeting that she was able to attend. He said she loved Rotary events. George's son Rick also attended as a guest. He came from New Mexico to help George out. Rick also thanked the club for all the support during these tough times.

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Paradigm Shift in Fighting Wildfires by Amir Emadi and "My 3 Things" by Charles Foster

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 20, 2018

The meeting today started by Venky kicking off the new "My 3 Things In LIfe" talk by Charles Foster. He talked about his Scout program at age 14 and how the Red Cross training while in the Scouts program helped him tremendously. He was the camp's doctor for a day and that experience helped him with his graduate school applications. He received a wonderful reference letter from his Economics professor and finally got admitted to Harvard. He later changed his career path and became a Chartered Financial Planner (CFP). His key advice to all is "Be Prepared, Keep Planning".

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This was then followed by a wonderful talk by Amir Emadi about the paradigm shift in fighting wildfires with new technology. Amir Emadi is the CEO of Skylift Global, which helps first responders save time, money, and lives by delivering supplies in the last mile of logistics with heavy-lift drones. He's studied International Security and holds an MBA in Global Management. During Operation Iraqi Freedom, Emadi was an advisor to US policy makers on physical security, political violence, and human rights in the Middle East particularly in Iran and Iraq. Since then he has dedicated his life to introducing technology to protect those who risk their lives to protect us.

He talked about the difficulty of delivering critical supplies to military personnel, firefighters and healthcare professionals in remote and hard to reach areas. His company has created a unique drone system that can lift heavy loads and drop it off at convenient spots for these organizations. These drones can handle loads from 100 to 400 pounds.

In the end, our club acting president Vicky Mallett awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Amir that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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YMCA Overnight Camps & Youth Development by District Executive Tom Madeyski

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 13, 2018

The meeting was kicked off by Ken introducing our new red-badge member Suchandra Brahma. She was a Rotarian in India and now shuttles between Del Mar and India. Charles & Paul gave an update on Bocce and Paul said that we now have about $13,000 in sponsorships collected so far. He also mentioned that the Bocce prize of a growler for maximum VIP sponsorships brought in by members has been extended to this month since it was a tie last month. Steve Weitzen mentioned about the future Rotary International conference coming to Honolulu in 2020. Reservations will start in Jun 2019.

Then we had Susan present a check for $2,250 on behalf of our DMSB club to Tom Madeyski of YMCA Camps to support the foster kids that get a chance to attend their 1-week camps.

Then Venky talked briefly about the new "My Three Things In LIfe ..." talk by members each week. This could be my three (could be 1 or 2 also) biggest lessons in life, tips on being happy, events in my life, things I’m most passionate about, challenges I’ve faced, trips I’ve taken, etc. This gives everyone a lot of flexibility to choose what they want to share and do it concisely thus making it very interesting. Charles Foster will kick it off next Friday since he is the earliest member of the club.

Then we had an exciting talk by our main speaker Tom Madeyski. He has been with YMCA Camps for 38 years and lives with his wife Debbie in the RainTree Ranch in Julian where they have one of the camps. He serves as Executive Director of YMCA Camping programs here in San Diego County. In his tenure, camp attendance has increased from 10,000 to 26,000 children and families annually. The three YMCA camps, Marston, Raintree Ranch and Camp Surf have seen over $10M in capital improvements in the past 15 years. Tom is a proud Penn State Nittany Lion and is a certified YMCA Organizational Leader.

He said that the kids that attend are from 7 years of age and up. The cost is very reasonable at $250/week during non-summer weeks and in summer it is $700/week. They also get sponsorships from Rotary and other organizations that pay for some disadvantaged foster kids. The camp helps to minimize the screen time that today's kids have. According to some research and statistics, it seems the average kids today spend only 7 minutes outdoors and 7 hours in front of electronic screens! The 1-week camp helps to change that and he says kids just love the activities and at the end they are not missing their devices at all. The triangle logo of YMCA represents SPIRIT, MIND and BODY and the YMCA philosophy and tag line is - Caring, Honesty, Respect and Responsibility.

In the end, he was asked a question as to what was the most "touching" event he had come across and he mentioned the story of a mom that was diagnosed with cancer and was about to lose her apartment. She applied for aid to send her kids to camp so they could experience the camp life and she finally got approved. During the week of the camp training she lost her apartment and just 2 days prior to kids returning home she managed to get a new apartment and that was a very touching story for Tom that he can never forget.

In the end, our club president Ken Barrett awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Tom Madeyski that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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GLOBAL GRANT #1861799 progress in Kerala, India

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 04, 2018

As many of you are aware, the Global Grant (#1861799) for $35,813 was approved last month for the Quadriplegic & Paraplegic clinic in Kerala, India. Our partner Rotary club in India is the Ottapalam Rotary club in Kerala. They recently celebrated the occasion by handing out purchase orders to all the vendors for the various equipments that are needed for the recipients.

They created the banner above in honor of all the recipients. The International Chair Ambalakat Ram Mohan (known as Ram) has been very instrumental in making this happen along with the extensive support by our own International Chair Venky Venkatesh and rotarian Sanjiv Prabhakaran. Thanks to everyone for supporting this great cause. The training sessions will start in few weeks and they have been sending monthly progress reports.

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StandDown 2018 service by DMSB members

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 01, 2018

Several members of Del Mar-Solana Beach (DMSB) Rotary volunteered to help the veterans at this year's StandDown event near Balboa Park. Thanks to Bill Sutton for coordinating the event for our members. Turns out that there were about 3000 volunteers to help serve and help the veterans for various needs, such as, legal counseling, getting driver's license renewed, doing various medical tests, taking care of their pets, applying for various veteran services, etc., all for free. DMSB sponsored a tent there to serve chilled water for all the visitors and volunteers. We distributed about 3800 bottles of water!

Enjoy some of the pictures taken by several members. One of the picture shows a lady wearing a hat. She has been visiting StandDown for many years and she started a fancy hat project 19 years ago! It contains Poppy flowers that she collected from the vets with their year and name on it. She sews on these flags onto the hat and has been maintaining the hat for 19 years so far!

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Articles in Del Mar Times - Solutions Farm check, Lou Oberman

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 01, 2018

DMSB members in the spotlight in Del Mar Times ...

1. Del Mar-Solana Beach Rotary helps Solutions for Change buy needed refrigerated van with $25,000 check

(June 27, 2018) DMSB + Solutions Farm

Solutions for Change, a nonprofit dedicated to solving family homelessness in San Diego county, needed a refrigerated van to deliver its produce to schools around the county. Del Mar-Solana Beach Rotary rose to the occasion by funding a large part of the van’s cost with a $25,000 check ... more ...

2. Movement to rein in federal government alive in North County

(June 19, 2018) Lou Oberman

Up until a few years ago, Lou Oberman counted himself among many in the country who are frustrated by the problems plaguing the federal government in Washington, but didn't think there was any way to change things for the better ... more ...

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"MacDonald Scholars: Paying it forward" by Scott MacDonald

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 29, 2018

Today Scott MacDonald revealed some interesting statistics on financial aid, college fees, etc. He grew up near Chicago and graduated from Indiana University and the U of North Carolina. He recently retired as Chairman and CEO of one of Australia’s largest commercial real estate companies. Prior to living in Sydney, he was CEO or President of several US based real estate companies and worked overseas with Morgan Stanley for several years advising on their real estate investments.

His latest book, Saving Investa, how an ex-factory worker helped save one of Australia’s iconic companies, was published last year and his next book, Think like a Dog, how dogs teach us to be happy in life and successful at work, is due to be published later in 2018. The new book was co-authored by his rescue dog, Sadie, and himself.

Scott found that many challenged and low-income families had no way to pay for college due to high rise in fees. Since he did well in his career and felt that he did not need all the money he had made and decided to start a scholarship fund at Davidson College in Charlotte, North Carolina where his kids attended. He has endowed 8 scholarships at Davidson. He calls these Community Service Scholarships, where the qualification is not easy. Applicants need to develop special community projects in order to qualify for full college scholarships. It's a "Pay It Forward" concept. He said there is currently about $1.8 Trillion in student debt. And the U.S. government is going to write off billions off that amount. The primary reason for such high costs, as per Scott, is that the states are not contributing as much to education now as in the past and so the colleges are forced to raise tuition to cover the expenses.

He mentioned one story about a girl Olivia that called him while he was in Australia and met him. She was a recipient of the MacDonald scholarship and wanted to talk to Scott about how she qualified for it. She had moved to S. Carolina from Switzerland due to the need for warmer weather after her mother fell quite sick. Her father had passed away before she was born. She had a project in mind to build a school in Ethiopia. It required $20K in capital and about $20k in annual maintenance. She wrote a book filled with kids pictures and quotes and started selling those online for $50 and soon raised the $20K to build the school. Scott was moved by her story and started to seek out other such scholars to hear their stories.

Another story was about 26-year old Eli Kahn, who went to India and rented a 3-wheel scooter (called tut-tut) and drove across India from north to south delivering a hand-held solar light to impoverished villages so kids could study at night. This was sponsored by some solar panel companies. A full story of Scott appeared in the Union Tribune and can be seen here.

Scott then started approaching large universities, such as, University of N. Carolina and Indiana University to promote his scholarship fund concept. It took almost 2 years to go through the college bureaucracy and finally he seeded those funds and the universities then raised millions. As of now Univ. of N. Carolina has given out 12 scholarships, Indiana Univ. gave out 20 and several at University of Michigan. He struck a deal with University of San Diego such that he funds 1 per year and the university will fund 3 per year.

Scott is getting ready to publish his next book, which will be on the financial aid crisis. He distributed one his books "Saving Investa" to all the DMSB members that attended today. Go to MacDonald Scholarships for more information on Scott and his scholarships.

In the end, our in-coming club president Ken Barrett awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Scott MacDonald that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"Challenges faced by the Sheriff's Department in the fields of Law Enforcement and the Detentions arena" by San Diego County Sheriff Bill Gore

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 22, 2018

William D. Gore was elected as the 29th Sheriff of San Diego County in June of 2010. Sheriff Gore oversees one of the largest Sheriff’s Departments in the nation with over 4,200 staff. His department handles detentions, patrol, courts, licensing and regional forensic support. Sheriff Gore is well known for his collaborative approach to law enforcement including his spearheading of the Law Enforcement Coordination Center (LECC). Sheriff Gore's law enforcement career spans 47 years. Sheriff Gore graduated from Crawford High School, holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree from the University of San Diego and a Master's Degree from Seattle University. A Fun Fact is that Sheriff Gore plays a, "Seeing Eye Person for his 12-year old blind Lab."

Sheriff provides police capabilities for 9 unincorporated zones and many incorporated cities. That is over 1 million people overall. He has to manage an average daily population of about 6000 inmates in the various jails. In 2012 they opened a women's detention facility. He is a big advocate of criminal justice re-alignment that improves many areas, such as, crowding in jails., provide counseling to criminals before they are released, give them tools to improve their lives once they are out of jail and train them to integrate back into the community.

He said that 95% of the inmates come back to the community and so they try to train them on anger management, new jobs skills, etc. Crime in San Diego county is exceptionally low compared to the rest of U.S. They provide computer-based video training to all police officers at the Miramar Training Center to simulate real-life situations and it is extremely effective to train on quick reflex actions, but in court these actions by police are sometimes tough to defend. As far as immigrations cases he said only 41% of cases get reported to ICE and usually minor offenses, such as, DUI, women abuse, etc. are not reported, especially in sanctuary states.

In the end, our club president Bill Sutton awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Sheriff Gore that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"What I Do" by Malcolm Koll on Fine Master Chair role; Paul Harris, Check for Casa de Amistad

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 22, 2018

Malcolm Koll explains his role as the Fine Master Chair. Some of her KEY tasks and comments were --

Go through the ClubRunner database to see which member forgets their or their spouse's birthdays and fine members accordingly.
Keeps track of members who are absent and if they did not inform him ahead of time then they get fined.
Looks for members that are NOT wearing their Rotary badges.
He looks for interesting areas and scenarios to fine members.

1. Why did you choose that position? He said he was told to do this :-).

2. How would you improve it? By "fining" members more each time :-)..

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Bill is surrounded by the GAVEL PROTECTORS (Kevin Cahill and Paul Butler) with their Golden Gavels :-).

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Susan and Charles presented a check for $2,000 to Nicole Green to support the work done at Casa de Amistad.

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Paul Butler presented the Paul Harris award to Beverly Liberman for her annual contribution of $1,000 to the Rotary Foundation. Her husband Herb Liberman is to her right.

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"Del Mar, the Mouse that roars" by Del Mar Mayor Dwight Worden

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 15, 2018

Mayor Dwight Worden presented the current state of affairs in Del Mar. He is the Mayor of Del Mar. Now retired, he practiced law for 30 years in coastal north county, serving as Del Mar City Attorney from 1977-1983. He also served on the Coastal Commission as a Governor and President of the Senate appointee and is heavily involved in all Del Mar activities. One fun fact about Dwight is that he plays bass and fiddle in two bluegrass bands that perform throughout the region.

Some of the key highlights from his talk were as follows:

Politics has become very contentious and some civility needs to happen.
He believes that climate change is a key factor in the issue of sea-level rise that Del Mar is facing.
On the technology side there are advancements and research in making crippled people walk.
On the Biology side, nano technology is allowing miniature pills containing cameras to go through the body and take pictures.
As far as state of CA he feels that democrats may lose but there are more NPP (No Party Preference) voters rising.
As far Del Mar specific highlights, he had the following points --
1. The city has a population of 4200 with 2 million annual travelers and about 3 million visitors to the annual fair.
2. Biggest issue is the cost of land and lack of affordable housing. He wishes that teachers and firemen and other service professionals could afford a place there.
3. San Diego county overall has a shortage of housing units by 171,000.
4. Short-term rentals is another major issue and they are working on some reasonable solution.
5. Residents are also concerned of the rising sea-level threat. They expect about 3-5 feet rise by 2070. The city is planning a "managed retreat" and some cities, such as, Cardiff is testing the use sand dunes to hold back the ocean water.
6. Water restriction is another big challenge here. There is a $13 Billion proposal to add 2 tunnels from north CA to south CA.
7. Side walk re-vitalization project has been approved and we should soon see an enhanced look for down-town.
8. The Del Mar Plaza is now under new management since last year and these new owners are local Del Mar residents and so there are big plans to renovate the Del mar Plaza soon.
9. He said that the City Council project is complete now and it was one of the projects that was on time and under budget! It has 140 parking places and the vendors will pay some fee but it will be free for customers.

Charles popped the question as to why he chose this role. The mayor said that as a lawyer for 30 years he wanted to explore how it feels to sit on the "other side" as a policy-maker. He said it is mostly rewarding but not to expect a thank you from anyone.

In the end, our club president Bill Sutton awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Dwight that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"What I Do" by Venky Venkatesh on International Chair role

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 15, 2018

Venky Venkatesh explains his role as the International Chair. Some of her KEY tasks and comments were --

The role involves a lot of interaction with the administrators at Rotary International.
He has orchestrated over $400,000 in global grants since the past 5+ years.
He has successfully completed grants for various countries, such as, India, El Salvador, Uganda, Madagascar, Zambia and Monrovia.
The process was a lot easier in the early days, however, now there are lots of checks and balances and takes a lot longer to get approval.
He said a recent global grant for Paraplegic/quadriplegic clinic in Kerala, India took almost 5 months from start to finish.

1. Why did you choose that position? He said that it was something he loved and he was motivated by other Rotarian cousins from India.

2. How would you improve it? He hopes the Rotary foundation will make the approval process a lot simpler. He has now passed the baton to another club member Herb Liberman for the next year.

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"Talent Recruitment and Retention" by David Alemian; Fred Schenk from SD Fair and Steve Binder from StandDown

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 08, 2018

David Alemian entertained everyone with a very high-powered and energetic talk about talent recruitment. He is a dynamic corporate speaker and one of the country’s top experts on “Talent Recruitment and Retention.” Alemian teaches employers how to attract and retain the top talent they need in a highly competitive marketplace. Nationwide, all employers agree that there is a huge talent shortage, and competition for the best talent is tough. A prolific writer and video producer, he has published over 200 written articles and is featured in over 300 educational videos. He lives in Oceanside with his wife Hillary and their two pugs Zac and Charlie.

He mentioned that 1/6th of the economy is in healthcare and they need more talents everyday. By 2025 he says that there will be a shortage of 500,000 nurses. This shortage is directly tied to the retiring baby boomers. It seems they are retiring at the rate of 10,000 per day! Another alarming statistics he pointed out was that 50% of U.S. physicians are behind in savings and they are not financially prepared for retirement. The employee pool has to constantly be training on new trades since very soon places, such as, McDonald's will have kiosks for ordering food instead of of people taking orders.

In the end, our club president Bill Sutton awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to David that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker. David's summary video can be viewed here - David's video.

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We also had Fred Schenk, Chair of Fair Operations, come and give an update on the San Diego County Fair that started on June 1st and will go on until July 4th. He gave some quick updates about the fair --

The theme this year is "How Sweet It Is".
The world famous Pink's Hot Dogs is at the fair.
He showed the picture of the first fair of 1936. The fair has been running at the Del Mar Fairgrounds every year since then except during World War II.
He said SD Fair is the 4th largest fair in the U.S. and the largest county fair.
Chicken Charlie has new items, such as, cotton candy ice cream!
In the end he gave each club member a free ticket to the fair and a $6 discount ticket.

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Steve Binder is a retired Public Defender and he works with Matt Wechter the current Deputy Public Defender to help the veterans at StandDown at the Veterans Village of San Diego with all kinds of legal issues for free. Steve said that the Homeless Court started 30 years ago in San Diego.

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Collaborating Across Generations, by Dr. Joanie Connell

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 01, 2018

Dr. Joanie Connell is an author, organizational consultant, and leadership coach. Her book is: “Flying without a Helicopter: How to Prepare Young People for Work and Life.” She’s writing a second one on connecting the generations that should be out this year. She gives keynote speeches at companies and schools and runs the consulting firm Flexible Work Solutions, Inc. She has a PhD from UC Berkeley and a BA from Harvard.

Today she educated us on how to cope with the various generations - the Silents, Baby Boomers, Gen X, etc. She says there are lot of conflicts when not connecting with the various generations and trying to understand each other.

Companies face a lot of cost for "NOT" connecting with the generations. She cited an example of an organization that invited millenials to a meeting with more older folks and learnt that the older generation was trying to get rid of the Baby Boomers since they did not understand the younger folks. The millenials felt that they were not welcomed to the group. This lack of understanding needs to be corrected by using the 3 key factors that Dr. Connell trains companies on - INQUIRE, EMPATHIZE and RESPECT.

There is some overlap in these generations as seen in the picture above. The older generations today are living longer. It seems 78 years is average life expectancy today. Each generation faces different issues as shown in image above. The context is different and so it is key to understand those differences as per Dr. Connell in order to bridge those generational issues. People have moved from mailing letters to emails and texting, carriages to space trips, etc. And so, the key is to mingle with an OPEN mind and avoid any "assumptions" of each other. Inquire, Empathize and Respect are the key factors to remember.

In the end, our club president Bill Sutton awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Dr. Connell that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"What I Do" by Susan Hennenfent on Community Chair role

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 01, 2018

Susan Hennenfent explains her role as the Community Chair. Some of her KEY tasks are --

Set up dates throughout the year for various community events that members can participate in.
Key task is to coordinate with venues and find enough volunteers.
Stand Down is one of the major events where we contribute via funds and people.
Play For Say is another big event that we contribute to.
End of April is usually "Rotarians Work Day" and she coordinates a full-day event to build a home, etc. This year the club helped Savannah with the My First Home project and gave her keys to the new home that many Rotarians worked all day to build and furnish.
End of the year is to coordinate with events for the holidays, such as, women with challenges organization, CRC for food distribution, etc.

1. Why did you choose that position? She said that it was LOT MORE fun to give out money than to ask for it :-). Also, she got tired of Bocce and wanted a change.

2. How would you improve it? Find more opportunities that sync with the members' interests.

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Solutions Farm Truck Donated by DMSB

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on May 19, 2018

Bill Sutton and few other members visited the Solutions Farms Aquaponic farm this weekend, which happens to be the largest aquaponic farm in the west. They are a critical part of the organization Solutions For Change that solves the problem of family homelessness. DMSB donated $25,000 towards the purchase of this refrigerated truck.

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Foundation Information by Janice Kurth

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on May 18, 2018

Janice Kurth’s (Rotary District Foundation Committee Chairperson at Rotary District 5340) talk covered the Rotary foundation including its Mission of building peace, fighting disease, providing clean water, supporting mothers and children, and helping to grow local economies. she explained how giving to the annual fund comes back to our club when we do district grants and global grants.

There are 3 ways to give to the Rotary foundation. one is polio plus, number two is to the endowment fund, number three is to the annual fund.

Janice presented to banners to our Del Mar-Solana Beach Rotary club for the 2016-2017 rotary year for 100% member participation and donations that year.

Janice also talked about the awards that members can receive for giving to the Rotary foundation which include the Paul Harris society, Paul Harris award levels, the bequest society and the major donor… she encouraged our members to join the Paul Harris society by signing up for a direct deposit of $86 per month which adds up to $1000 a year for those who are able to do so and for all Rotarians to make The Rotary foundation their charity of choice. Please talk to our clubs foundation chair, Paul Butler with any questions on these various giving programs.

Janice also mentioned that the Rotary foundation received a four-star rating from charity navigator, which rates all foundations in the United States. The Rotary foundation was voted the number one foundation into 2016 where 92% of donations are put to work in the programs and only 6% goes to fund raising expenses and a paltry 2% for administrative cost.

Bill Sutton awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Janice that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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We also had a guest today from Bangalore, India - Mr. M. Krishnamurthy.

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"What I Do" by George Sousa and "Look Beyond the Page" by Michael Gonzales

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on May 11, 2018

The event started with George Sousa giving a talk about his wonderful experience as part of the honored list of folks chosen to fly on the "Honor Flight" from San Diego to Washington D.C. and back with full royal treatment! Following that we had an excellent talk by Michael Gonzales.

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Michael Gonzales gave gives talks on various topics, such as, ideas about telling a story in a fun way that captures audience attention, how to avoid writer's block, etc.

Bill Sutton awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Michael that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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George Sousa's Honor Flight

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on May 06, 2018

San Diego airport was packed with friends and families of all the Honor Flight veterans. There were several members from our DMSB club there to greet George Sousa! The above picture shows George's American Airlines flight #9459 on it's way to San Diego from Washington D.C.

Terminal 2 was packed with veterans, families and friends all waving the American flag. We ll arrived there around 2:30 pm and the first veteran rolled down the aisle around 3:30 pm. There was music and excitement all around.

They announced that the oldest veteran on the Honor Flight was 99 years old! Finally after about 30-40 minutes we saw George walking down the aisle with his wife Lou. It was pretty emotional and exciting!

In the end we saw the founder of Honor Flight San Diego Dave Smith walk down the aisle!

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"Compassion It" by Sara Schairer

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on May 04, 2018

Sara Schairer is the founder and executive director of the nonprofit "Compassion It" whose mission is to inspire compassionate actions and attitudes. She can be seen above providing a guided meditation class to make the audience more mindful of their compassionate actions in life.

Sara is a Stanford-certified compassion facilitator and leads trainings globally for people of all ages and backgrounds, including inmates, business leaders, students, educators, and healthcare providers. She was a contributing author to the book "The Neuroscience of Learning and Development" and also writes for The Chopra Center. An interesting fact is that she was the female vocalist in a local indie band that broke up in 2015.

She explains that there are many varieties of social issues in the world - hunger, divisive country on racial issues, bullying, hatred, etc. She points out there are several solution proposed and she looks at her doc Scout and says that is the definition of "Compassion" since dog's love every person whether that person is rich, poor, homeless or a criminal.

Her passion for this movement started when she was divorced early with her little daughter. She went through various challenges for several years until one days she saw a show of Ellen DeGeneres with a person talking about compassion. That changed her life completely and the idea of the phrase and company name "Compassion It" came to her, which makes compassion a verb and a movement!

She was dealt with another tragedy when her father got hit by a truck and was killed instantly in 2004. So she stared making T-shirts with the "Compassion It" logo and giving it out at Yoga clubs and other events.

Then she came up with the idea of a wrist band that had a purpose. It was designed with flippable colors so that one side was a different color and the other side was white. She suggested that wearers should flip the band each time they do an act of compassion. A girl in UK demonstrated and explained this well on a video that went viral. Later 2 high-school girls set up a fundraising event and people were lined up outside the school and they sold all the bands in 42 minutes. These bands can be purchased from her site at Compassion It Store.

She says there are about 140,000 bands in use all over the world! She was with the President of Botswana distributing the bands to the office staff and other folks there. She found out that Stanford in CA offers a course on compassion training at the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (CCARE) and she got certified 5 years ago as a teacher and now offers various courses to inmates in prisons, business leaders and healthcare providers.

Bill Sutton awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Sara that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"What I Do" by Patricia Case, Refrigerated Truck Donation update

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on May 04, 2018

Patricia Case explains her role as the Social Chair. Some of her KEY tasks are --

Be creative and cost-conscious.
An example was the fabulous event we had for the 25th anniversary celebrations of our club.
Keep nagging people to RSVP for events as early as possible to get the best possible rates from venues.

1. Why did you choose that position? Said Bill pushed her into it :-).

2. How would you improve it? Stop working :-). Other than that some members suggested having events at potential Bocce sponsors that own restaurants.

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Susan Hennenfent reminded everyone about the Aquaponics Farm Tour event on May 19th. Members also get to see the new refrigerated truck donated by our club. Here is a copy of her earlier message.

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The DMSB Rotary club is scheduled for a Aquaponics Farm Tour with Solutions for Change on Saturday, May 19th at 10 am. The tour will be about 90 minutes. It is a really interesting tour. We will get to see the refrigerated van that was purchased with our Foundation funds.

Please let me know if you are planning on attending-Guests are welcome. The Solutions Farm is located at 948 La Rueda Drive, Vista CA 92084. Parking is limited, so please try to carpool.

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"The Opioid Crisis…In San Diego’s Backyard" by Duane Trombly

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Apr 27, 2018

Duane Trombly is a long time member of San Diego’s business community. He started his career as a county program director for substance abuse services. He was a catalyst in opening the first substance abuse treatment program in Western Michigan. Transitioning into the high tech area he spent 30 years with leading edge companies that were ground breakers in the personal computer space. But now he has come full circle, founding Confidential Recovery a substance abuse treatment facility for working adults who require a high level of confidentiality for their treatment. He will share with us the status of the current national opioid crisis and its impact in San Diego. He was on the board of Just In Time for Foster Youth.

He started off with explaining the definition of OPIOID. He said the best way to understand that is to think of "Morphine" and "Heroin". That's how addictive opioids are! It seems of 95% of the opioids are consumed in the USA! Initially it was used for end-of-life treatments for cancer patients. But then in 1995 a company known as Purdue Pharma founded by the Sackler brothers developed the prescription painkiller OxyContin that became a blockbuster medication. It was a long-lasting narcotic that helped patients suffering from moderate to severe pain. It has reportedly generated some thirty-five billion dollars in revenue for Purdue! The opioid crisis story was aired on CBS' 60-minutes around October 2017.

Apparently, when he went for a root-canal his dentist in the end prescribed Vicodin and the prescription was for 10 days to be used 4 times a day! He says that many adults don't use it and they just leave these unused meds in the medicine cabinet within easy reach for teenagers! Many people go for open house tours of homes and search all medicine cabinets for such prescriptions & sell these opioids or use it for their own addiction! Real estate agents have a protocol to inform all sellers to remove any medications from their cabinets prior to any open house sessions.

April 28th happens to be "Take Back Drug Day" when the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) sets up collection centers to take back all unused medications. It is strongly recommended to take unused meds to these centers instead of dumping into the flush as it can pollute the waters. He says many people shun treatments due to shame and embarrassment. Family & friends support is critical to get an addict under control. Apparently, every addict impacts at least 7 family members and friends in their circle of influence!

DMSB member and doctor Gary Schneiderman suggest the book "Crooked: Outwitting The Back Pain Industry ..." as a remarkable book that talks about the opioid addiction. The book is available on Amazon.

Confidential Recovery is an organized started by Duane to treat such patients that are addicted to opioids. They provide a medically supervised DETOX process. They also conduct mindfulness training. He says that majority of his patients are females that are traumatized due to sexual abuse and end up taking opioids for treatments. Similarly, he sees a large population of doctors and police officers, who are subject to heavy stress environments.

Bill Sutton awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Duane that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"What I Do" by Charles Foster, Blue Badges and Rotarians At Work Day update!

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Apr 27, 2018

Charles Foster explains his role as the Public Relations Chair. Some of his KEY tasks are --

Provide photos and articles for publishing in local newspapers and magazines.
Has been doing this for over 10 years and taking pictures of important events, speakers, etc. until Sanjiv took over the photos and blogging on web site.
He says that our club has been taking and publishing more photos and articles compared to the Del Mar club.
Also works on planning and preparing early literatures for the annual Bocce fundraising event.

1. Why did you choose that position? He doesn't know :-). Said it suits his interests.

2. How would you improve it? Follow Jan's example on keeping a log book with details.

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Susan Hennenfent and Suzanne Sutton updated us about the preparations for the Rotarians At Work Day on April 28, 2018 in Tijuana. They plan to construct a house for a single mother with kids. Susan and Suzanne went out shopping with the family to buy the essentials. The family had no idea what a mattress pad was for and were very excited to get into their new home.

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Ken announced the presentation of 2 new BLUE BADGES for the Red badgers Gary Schneiderman and Molly Fleming :-).

CONGRATULATIONS to Molly & Gary!

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"Burundi, Africa: A Treasure Unknown" by Julie Marner and "What I Do" by Kevin Cahill

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Apr 20, 2018

Kevin Cahill delivered his "What I Do" talk and described his role as Youth Chair in the Youth Exchange RYLA program and Model UN programs.

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Following that we had Julie Marner from Burundi International talk about her various projects of teaching English to the young and the old in Burundi. Julie Marner is the Executive Director of Burundi Friends International (BFI), a San Diego based non-profit working to reduce extreme poverty in Burundi, East Africa. Julie oversees BFI's programming, funding and implementation of projects.

Her love for Burundi grew in 2011 when she taught English at Light University. With no resources except a blackboard and a piece of chalk, Julie taught English Communication to 70 college students for 4 hours each day and since then, her passion to create more opportunities for Burundians hasn't stopped. Julie's other career is as a musician having played at local churches for the past 20 years.

She talked about helping the poor Burundian students of middle school and high school to teach English in schools so that they can advance to colleges and universities in and outside Burundi. There are about 500,000 orphans in Burundi. It costs about $1000 per student per year of college. The Del Mar Rotary club has initiated a $55,000 grant for shipping English text books to Burundi schools. BFI now has over 3000 volunteer teachers. The number of BFI clubs and students have increased significantly since 2011 as seen in about charts.

More information can be found at Burundi International.

Bill Sutton awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Julie that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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San Diego History Center: our community, our story ...

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Apr 13, 2018

William (Bill) Lawrence has served as Executive Director of the San Diego History Center since February 2016 after joining the History Center in July 2015 as Chief Operating Officer. Prior to joining the History Center Bill’s professional career spanned three decades with the KFMB Stations (KFMB-TV, AM & FM), providing a “front row seat” to the history being made in our region. For more than a decade Bill was also an adjunct faculty member of Southwestern Community College having taught broadcast writing, photography and production.

He gave an excellent talk about the various artifacts and collections that he has accumulated at the SD History Center. The original name was San Diego History Society, which later changed to San Diego History Center. He said there are about 45 million documents in their collection and one priceless document they found 7 years ago was a document signed by Abraham Lincoln using his full signature as shown below!

He also distributed some interesting pictures to club members based on who could answer some puzzles :-). He had pictures of the demolition of an ancient victorian tower from 1914, and the picture of Lucy & Ricky (from the Here's Lucy television show) enjoying the horse races at the Del Mar racetrack.

He added that they have about 2.5 million photos, 17,000 objects and a special diary of Victoria Jacobs, who wrote her life story in it but died during child birth. In the end he mentioned about a big dinner/reception event on April 21st called the "Makers of San Diego History". Tickets can be purchased at the link above.

The public viewing timings for the History Center are from Wed to Fri from 9:30 am to 1:30 pm. During other days the public can setup appointments. More information can be found at https://sandiegohistory.org/san_diego_history_center/.

Since Bill Sutton is on vacation. Vicky Mallett was the substitute club President today and awarded the Joshua Malawi school certificate to Bill that represents donation of school supplies by DMSB to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"What I Do" by Paul Butler, DMSB's award nomination, George Sousa's Honor Flight award!

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Apr 13, 2018

Paul Butler gave a detailed outline of his role as the Foundation Chair (FC). He said he loves it so much that he will be the Foundation Chair next year also :-). He showed Jan Parsons' USB drive that had all the information that Jan collected during her role as FC. Some of his KEY tasks are --

Monitor and make sure the club is still in the EREY (Every Rotarian Every Year) category - minimum $25 donation from every member.
Send out emails to all members about the various awards, such as Paul Harris, EREY, etc.
Present the Paul Harris pin and award to all members that contribute $1,000 or more each year.
Mail all the checks back to Chicago office.
Get all the reports online about the various awards and inform all members.
Attend the Foundation seminar in fall.
Deposit all the checks collected for Bocce to the Bocce account.
Club's current cash balance is $52,000 after donating $25k towards the Solutions for Change van.

1. Why did you choose that position? He chose that since he saw Charles and Jan do this and wanted to follow their footsteps :-).

2. How would you improve it? Bringing some videos to show to the club and motivate other members.

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Susan Hennenfent showed pictures of DMSB's recognition on the Solutions for Change delivery van. Our club donated $25,000 towards the purchase of the van.

She also announced that Reality Changers has selected our Del Mar-Solana Beach Rotary Club to participate in the Malin Burnham Awards as a 2018 honoree for the "Reality Changers 100" - an elite group of San Diego leaders and organizations that have changed the reality of San Diego and are most emblematic of Malin Burnham's motto of "Community Before Self."

** Winners will be determined by online voting so we need all members' & freinds' help.

Please go to the following LINK: www.Malin.RealityChangers.org/Vote.

Vote once a day in the category "Most-Admired Service Organization" until April 26th. Please also post it on your social media sites and invite your friends and families to vote for us.

In addition to voting, join us on May 8^th at UCSD to learn who has won the award for Most-Admired Service Organization in San Diego by purchasing tickets to the award ceremony. 100% of proceeds will support students at Reality Changers.

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Malcolm gave a quick update on Bocctoberfest. He said that the venue contract has been signed and that the date is Sunday September 30, 2018 at the Surf Cup Sports Park. His budget for this year is $85K but to net $65K.

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Jan announced about the wonderful honor being bestowed on our own George Sousa, who was picked to be an Honor Flight recipient for his service in the Korean War. He will be flying with 80 other WWII and Korean veterans on a charter jet to Washington DC where he will be wined and dined and treated with great honor & respect as they visit various DC memorials from May 4-6. Jan has emailed more details to all members. George knows of his selection.

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Finally, I received some pictures form Bill & Suzanne Sutton after they attended the RIGA International Rotary club in Riga, which is the capital of Latvia. They had wonderful lunch there and exchanged the club flags.

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Rotary's Model UN (MUN) Conference at USD on April 7-8, 2018

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Apr 08, 2018

April 7th & 8th was a grand Model UN conference that Kevin & his student volunteer team put together with great success. Sanjiv Prabhakaran was the MUN advisor for the team sponsored by DMSB - Sophia Sugarman from Canyon Crest Academy and Lauren Degner from Mt. Carmel High. The event was held at the Joan Kroc Institute of Peace & Justice (IPJ) at the University of San Diego. The meeting was kicked off by Kevin Cahill, Youth Chair at DMSB, Andy Blum, the Executive Director at IPJ, and Scott Carr, the District Governor for San Diego Rotary District 5340.

There were 98 students (49 teams) representing 49 different countries. Each team had 2 students, one researching on Resolution #1 (to include Palestine as a member of the United Nations) and the other researching on Resolution #2 (to protect the oceans from plastic waste). The students went through 2 days of speech presentations, amendments to the resolutions, caucus meetings, etc. In the process they establish new friendships, learn about team collaboration, negotiations and the process of reaching consensus.

Saturday night was a dinner banquet where the parents and guests were invited to attend a keynote talk by Kevin M. Kennedy, former U.N. Assistant Secretary General and a grand dinner. This was followed by an emergency news alert about Russia hacking elections in other countries and that they are launching attach on Kurdistan, that was actually a mock news item presented by Channel 8 News as an exercise for the students to go into caucus and find a peaceful resolution to that situation.

Next day the students all met to review the amendments and cast the final vote on each resolution. It took about 2 hours of deliberation on resolution-1 but resolution-2 was quickly passed as there was major agreement on that ocean cleanup issue.

Finally, we had the "Thank You" talk by Kevin and many students and the Secretary General. And then the secretary generals gave out funny award certificates to each student based on their behavior during the various sessions. Sophia received the award that she would throw her shoe at anyone to make her point and Lauren was the person who would bribe people with fortune cookies. And finally the conference ended with the group taking a good and funny picture :-).

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Being an Anchor Institution in a Sea of Conflict: What Does it Mean to Teach Peace? by Everard Meade from Joan B. Kroc of Peace Studies, USD

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Apr 06, 2018

Ev Meade is Director of the Trans-Border Institute at the University of San Diego, where he leads certificate programs in peace building and human rights in the areas of Mexico most affected by the drug war, and directs the Trans-Border Opportunities Certificate Program, a field-based introduction to the politics, places, people, and products that define the U.S.-Mexico border. Before coming to USD in 2014, Dr. Meade was a professor in the History Department and co-founder of the Human Rights Program at UC San Diego. Dr. Meade served as an expert witness in immigration courts across the country, in dozens of asylum cases involving Mexican nationals fleeing the current wave of violence. He regularly briefs U.S. law enforcement and foreign service officers on country conditions in Mexico and he is a frequent Op-Ed contributor on related issues. He delivered a highly charged and motivational talk about the peace building process in violence ridden states of Mexico.

His childhood roots are from the Mexican state of Sinaloa (the place of notorious El Chappo), which ranks 30 out of 31 with regards to violence. He says that there is a huge gap between the positive and negative peace factor. According to Ev, foreigners are not targeted in these places. Executions are usually tied to gang-related or to extract information or to keep some secrets silent.

He promotes and teaches the "I Am Somebody" principles that was originally started by Jesse Jackson back in 1972. The key principles are, Recognition, Positive Support and Integration. He encourages people to visit Mexico since it is one of the financial powerhouses for the Spanish world and is one of the 15th wealthiest countries. Every other week he takes 10-15 students into one of these problematic states so that his students can experience first-hand process of peace building.

He is on the board of 7 different organizations, such as, one that prevents violence in agricultural communities, another one that collects testimonies & narratives of life in contemporary Culiacán, one for developing secure and effective mechanisms to document and report abuses of power, etc. In the end stand-in President Jan Parsons presented Ev with the Joshua School donation certificate that represents donation of school supplies to schools in Malawi in the name of the speaker.

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"What I Do" by Sanjiv Prabhakaran & MUN speakers

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Apr 06, 2018

The Model UN event is this coming weekend (April 7 & 8) and so we had the team sponsored by our club give their speeches as a practice session for their real speeches this weekend. Sophia Sugarman from Canyon Crest HS prepared her research on the resolution #2 about reducing the ocean pollution and Lauren Degner from Mt. Carmel High presented her research on the resolution #1 about including Palestine as a member of the United Nations. Sophia was accompanied by her dad Scott Sugarman, who is a veteran Model UN advisor and advised students for many years. Lauren was accompanied by her mother Carol Degner. Both students gave excellent speeches and were ready for the MUN conference.

We had a guest today from the El Segundo club (Shannon Majid). She was attending an Auto show at the Del Mar Fairgrounds and decided to drop in at our meeting.

Then we had Sanjiv Prabhakaran give his "What I Do" talk. He is responsible for the weekly Programming and maintaining the website blogs. He said his key strategy on program speakers is to find people from the local newspapers, from other events that he attends and referrals from various club members. He starts to communicate with the speakers well in advance and get their date commitments and find out how flexible they are to switch at a short notice in case the next speaker is sick or needs to change dates. He uses an email template to request all necessary information from the speakers well in advance. He tried to book speakers 3-4 months in advance. At this point he has all slots filled until middle of August 2018.

As far as the web site he takes down brief notes at the events and few pics and writes up the blogs soon after the event so there is a record of each event and it helps to spread the story to new potential members.

1. Why did you choose that position? He loves meeting new people and understanding their passion of projects that they can share with our members. As far as website since he is technical he enjoys that stuff.

2. How would you improve it? By looking for new ways to integrate Bocce website with auction site and attract more passionate speakers to come and talk.

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"Building Bridges: TERI’s Inspired Journey" by TERI representatives Greg Snaer & Matthew Anderson

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Mar 23, 2018

Since 1997, Greg Snaer has been a vibrant part of the TERI Family. Starting as an instructor at the Learning Academy, he has since worked and led many programs and initiatives at TERI, leaving an indelible mark on each one. Greg has weaved his passion for artistic expression into launching art, music, theatre, and yoga programs at TERI. Greg’s belief in Collective Impact is evident in his work with legacy planning and his passion and involvement in helping the community to connect with people with special needs.

“When not working he enjoys: community projects, yoga, musical performance, outdoor activities, and family life.”

Matthew Anderson started his career with TERI in 2014 at The Learning Academy, one of TERI’s Non-Public Schools. After a few years working in direct programming and behavioral support services, he chose to pursue an opportunity working in development. Matthew has a deep passion for serving individuals with special needs and their families, and looks forward to the completion of TERI’s Campus of Life! Matthew holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Sociology from Concordia University Chicago and is an IALQ certified Special Needs Life Quality Coach.

“When not working he enjoys: camping, volunteering at church, hiking, traveling with his wife, playing music, and a good cup of tea!”

They showed a video that described TERI's program. According to Greg, 1 out 5 kids are in the special needs spectrum and need some help in coping with day-to-day activities. TERI is building a "Campus of Life" center on a 20-acre plot in Sam Marcos. The Equestrian is already operational and the kids love this as it soothes and calms their nerves when they touch these animals & ride on them. At their current location, TERI has about 12 resident homes where they house such challenged kids, they have day programs and 2 children schools. The new location is a $45 Million project and they need about $20 Million more to complete the campus.

In the end they invited the entire club to visit their facilities in Oceanside and see these kids in action. Bill Sutton at the end presented Greg with the Malawi Joshua School certificate where DMSB donates school supplies on behalf of the speaker's name.

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Bocce update and "What I Do" by Jon Fish

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Mar 23, 2018

Malcolm Koll comes back with a beard after visiting Norway to see the Northern Lights :-). He will be the new co-chair for Bocce along with Bill Sutton. The date has been finalized for Sep 29 and 30 at the east end of the Surf Cup Sports Park. He gave a quick vision of how the Bocce event is going to be re-organized this time with more fun by bringing in a theme of Oktoberfest and hence registered the name Bocctoberfest as the new theme. His goal is to raise over $100,000 within 3 years. Charles and Molly talked about their Marketing and Sales approach and how they need every member to participate. Sanjiv and Charlotte briefed about the approach to Auction, Raffles and other forms of income-generating ideas.

Then we had Jon Fish give a quick briefing about his role as the Treasurer and his past role as Bocce Chair.

As Treasurer he has to make sure he tallies up all the "Happy Dollars" collected at each event, the Polio funds and Fines. He has to reconcile the Del Mar and San Diego foundation accounts. He manages all the finance and tax related work. He gets some reconciling bank accounts and verification help from a consultant (Michelle), who gets paid $75/month.

As Bocce Chair he had to coordinate all sub-committees, manage getting all volunteers, find the field and negotiate the prices, arrange all the staffing and other miscellaneous tasks.

1. Why did you choose that position? He loves finance and has been doing it for a long time.

2. How would you improve it? By adding credit card payments instead of checks.

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Military Service to Community Service by Phil Kendro / "What I Do" by Jan Parsons / Visit by Ildiko Tesak

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Mar 16, 2018

This was a packed event since we had a special guest today - Ildiko Tesak. She is a dear friend of the club and our members have worked with her on projects in El Salvador. She arrived with a cast on her left hand due to broken fingers from a tennis game!

Jan Parsons kicked off the event with her "What I Do" talk. Her primary tasks as the Secretary of the club are to create the minutes of board meetings, log into the ClubRunner site and track all attendances, track the status of members, track the monies collected, such as, Polio funds, Happy Dollars, Fines, etc.

1. Why did I choose this position: By force from previous secretary :-).

2. How would I improve it? Nothing to improve as of now. Process is good.

Then we had a talk by our honorary guest Ildiko Tesak about her work and accomplishments in El Salvador. It seems she is always traveling there with armed guards. Amazing presentation about the armed trafficking, corruption of police that led to more gangs, etc. People are not allowed to move out of the community without permission from the gang's leader. Ildiko has worked with these gangs and convinced them to allow her NGO to work with the community and provide basic essential medical and other services, such as, psychological counseling, group therapy, etc. to these communities. Her NGO provides weekly visits for the children to dental clinics, etc.

We also had District Governor Scott Carr as our guest today and he awarded Ildiko with a special "People of Action" award for all her exceptional services. Usually this is reserved for 1 award each year but he made an exception this year.

Finally, we had a wonderful talk by Community Advisor Phil Kendro. He is a trusted San Diego leader with proven track record in cross-functional team leadership, networking, business development, marketing, veteran mentorship, communications, public relations, aviation and ground operations, executive program and project management, social and historical media.

He is a transitioned 20 years Marine Corps veteran. He has lived all over the U.S. and the world (Virginia, Florida, Mississippi, Arizona, Texas, Okinawa Japan) and multiple deployments to Iraq, Afghanistan, Qatar and more. His specialty was as a pilot, but he also had multiple years of experience in aviation operations, safety and risk mitigation, community relations, forward air controller, and more.

He has been in San Diego almost a decade, leading some of the largest events in the United States. Planning, narrating and entertaining audiences of 10K-500K+ at the Miramar Air Show, Seattle Air Fair, Air Show San Diego, San Diego Fleet Week, Concourse D'Elegance, and the Centennial of Naval Aviation (largest flyover of San Diego since World War Two). His key strengths are in strategic thinking, communications, public speaking, and positive energy during high-risk and high-visibility operations. He is also an executive global pilot with experience in dozens of aircraft. You have a plane? He can fly it.

His Gallup StrengthsFinder includes: Strategic, Communication, Futuristic, Context and WOO (Winning Others Over). He is very active in mentoring vets in transition. His one request to the audience was that if any veteran reached out to connect on LinkedIn then to please connect and spend few minutes on a call or chat over coffee. He started a Veterans Beer Club with 4 other friends - a grassroots organization - in 2015 and has now grown to over 1300!

He is on the board of trustees at the Mt. Soledad National Veterans Memorial. He said that on Memorial Day May 28th there is a large event at Mt. Soledad Memorial from 2-3 pm and there will be a special keynote speaker. He invited all the members and guests to attend that event.

President-elect Ken Barrett presented the "virtual" Joshua-Malawi certificate to Phil. The certificate honors the speaker with a contribution of supplies to schools in Malawi.

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Tuberculosis: "A Silent Threat To Public Health" by Kevin Glynn & Ken's "What I Do"

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Mar 09, 2018

Ken Barrett gave a brief overview of the Bocce committee's findings and the overall decision to continue Bocce fund-raising with some new twists -- a concept of Bocctoberfest ...

Ken then gave some details of what his role is as the "President-elect". Key role is to attend the PETS training conference and drink lots of "Koolaid" :-). His answers to the two questions were ...

1. Why did you choose this role? It was essentially coercion he says :-). But primarily it is to help his kids understand the concepts of service.

2. How would you improve it? Learn from others at PETS and promote and implement those ideas at our club.

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Following that we had a very informative talk by Kevin Glynn about cross-border Tuberculosis (TB) crisis. Kevin is a retired pulmonary physician, former medical director of respiratory care at Scripps Mercy, and a member of Rotary for 17 years and is on the Rotary District 5340 Immunization Committee. A native of Chicago, he graduated from Northwestern University Medical School, and completed residency at the University of Michigan.

When he learned of the plight of the homeless in Baja with tuberculosis, and their connection to TB in the U. S., he decided to join a bi-national coalition working to alleviate this problem. Rotary Clubs are a potential resource in this campaign. In 2017 he published Gasping For Air, a book on how our breathing is killing us and what we can do about it.

As per Kevin, TB spreads from droplets of cough and the bacteria in these droplets spreads and kills tissues in the lungs and other parts of our body. Some stay dormant forever. The U.S. does not recommend any vaccine since it is very rare in the U.S. However, many Asian and other countries have been providing TB vaccine shots and hence the skin tests many times indicate a positive test but the chest x-ray will confirm it as negative because these bacteria stay dormant.

He says that San Diego is seeing some cases primarily due to the transient population form Mexico. It seems that Imperial county has the highest cases - almost 17 per 100,ooo people. However, Baja has 57/100K. 40% of the cases in San Diego has connection to the border traffic. Hence the goal is to reduce the cases in Baja and other parts of Mexico to prevent those cases from reaching San Diego.

His key project now is to fund a clinic in Tijuana called Las Memorias where patients stay for 18 months and get treatment. His plan is to add 30 more TB patients there and hire more staff to follow-up with these patients. They need about $450,000 over the next 3 years. He is collaborating with our club members Venky and Herb to initiate a grant.

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DMSB Rotary 25th Anniversary Celebrations!

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Mar 03, 2018

Del Mar-Solana Beach Rotary club celebrated its 25th anniversary today. Our distinguished guests included Mayor Ginger Marshall of Solana Beach and Deputy Mayor David Druker of Del Mar. We had many past club members also come and celebrate with us at the Del Mar Hilton hotel. Our own club member Phil Campanelli, who is the manager of the hotel, made excellent arrangements. The photos I took did not come out that well due to the dark settings. However, these pictures will jog some memories anyway :-).

The DJ was great and lots of dancing went around. Many members danced away until mid-night!

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"Eat Well and Age Well" by Charlotte Fan of Meals on Wheels & "What I Do" by Steve Weitzen

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Mar 02, 2018

We kicked off the meeting today with Bill Sutton & Gary Schneider giving a quick update on their meeting with the Stand Down committee for helping Veterans. The next Stand Down event will be in the end of June.

Then Steve Weitzen spoke about the roles & responsibilities of an Assistant Governor (AG) in the Rotary club. Some of the key points he mentioned are as follows:

There are 65 clubs in our district and those are managed by 16 AGs.
Steve has to monitor 6 of those clubs including our DMSB club.
One has to serve as President of a club in order to qualify as an AG.
He has to setup a time to talk at each of the 6 clubs once or twice each quarter.
He needs to make sure there are potential Presidents and President-elects at each club by Dec 31st.
Report to the Governor about memberships, challenges, etc. for each of his clubs.

His responses to two questions:

1. WHY DID YOU CHOOSE THIS ROLE: He was chosen by Janice Kurth, who was the Governor at that time.

2. WHAT WOULD YOU DO TO IMPROVE THIS ROLE: He says, it cannot be better than this :-).

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Following this we had a wonderful talk by Charlotte Fan, North County Area Manager for Meals on Wheels. They provide meals for senior citizens over 60 years of age. She came from Taipei Taiwan in 1982 and has a master’s degree in Community/Social Psychology. She joined Meals on Wheels 19 years ago and continues to serve as the North County Manager coordinating over 500 clients and 700 volunteers. Charlotte is married with 4 grown children- a dentist, a speech language therapist, a registered nurse, and a student graduating soon from the pharmacy school at UCSF. One of Charlotte’s favorite pastimes is eating. Some people like to cook and Charlotte likes to eat and Charlotte would like to make sure our seniors eat well and age well at home.

Clients sign up for proper nutrition, to socialize and to ensure safety in the home environment. They have delivered over 18 million meals to date. They have been in service for 58 years now. They pride themselves in ensuring healthy meals are delivered and they make sure when meals are delivered that the client's environment is safe and clean. They check the client's home and refrigerator to make sure the food is not piling up and no unhealthy signs in the home. If they see any issues they report it to the appropriate authorities or family members.

New clients are welcomed with a bag full of goodies as shown above. Some clients make fancy items, such as kitchen trivets, etc. One trivet was made by a client/volunteer Rachel Reed from Del Mar and Molly Fleming at our club received it as a gift at the end for answering a question that Charlotte popped up.

Meals on Wheels also celebrates client's birthdays and major events, such as, Valentine's Day, Thanksgiving, etc. with special treats for clients. The above gift box is delivered to clients on their birthdays. It has many useful items, such as, mittens, bath items, etc.

The primary qualification to receive a meal is that the client needs to be over 60 years and opt for at least 3 weekday deliveries. The cost is very reasonable at $4 per meal and $7 for 2 meals/day. They provide special discounts for veterans and financially stressed clients. More details can be found on their website at MEALS ON WHEELS. Information on how to volunteer or donate funds can be seen on their site.

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Do You Have A Secret? - Erika Katayama from Museum of Man

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Feb 23, 2018

Erika Katayama, the Exhibits Director at San Diego Museum of Man (SDMoM) revealed the story of the PostSecret Exhibit that is about to open at SDMoM on April 14, 2018. It all started in November 2004 with the founder Frank Warren distributing some 3000 self-addressed post cards on the streets of Washington D.C. He has a wonderful TED Talk video here - TED-Frank Warren. Erika was accompanied by Claudia Ehrlich, Chief Development Officer and another new employee Brandie Macdonald, Director of Education and Public Engagement.

The postcard had simple instructions on one side and blank on the other side. The idea was for people to share some secret anonymously that they never told anyone. It gradually started to spread like wildfire and he has collected over half million secrets and it keeps growing. According to Frank, it connects people to their deepest humanity and strong emotional feelings are expressed in keeping and releasing secrets. San Diego's SDMoM was chosen as the site to create the first exhibit of all these secrets. Brandie pointed out that one of the cards from a Barista at a Starbucks was extremely funny. It said, "I give Decaf to customers who are rude to me." :-)

The above picture is an artist's rendering of how the exhibit will appear at the SDMoM. There will be 2 live performances by Frank Warren at the Old Globe on Monday April 2nd. Frank has published 10 books and he still gets these postcards.

Erika invited our club for a private tour of the exhibit so that our members can make this into a social event.

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What I Do: Bill Sutton and Australian guest

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Feb 23, 2018

We kicked off the meeting with Bill Sutton our President explain his role as a President. He said his job is easy since he just delegates it all to the rest of the board members and he heads off to the beach :-). Jokes aside, it is a key role to make sure the club functions as per the guidelines laid out by Rotary International. Some of the key tasks are -

Ensure that the club's board members are aware of their duties and that they get the help needed to perform their duties.
Make sure that the Red badgers (new members) move on to become Blue badgers (confirmed members).
Facilitate the various board meetings.

Then we had a walk-in guest from the Tully Rotary Club (District 9550) of Queensland in Australia. His name was Alan-Frank Vechhio. He was in Del Mar with his wife to attend a dog show at the Fairgrounds. He has been president twice, treasurer 4, secretary 3, held many directorships over the last 19 years in rotary. He is also the past assistant district governor. Alan owns a computer company (Tully Computers) in Australia.

He had a special challenge for the Fine Master & President. He brought a bottle of Vegemite (a popular toast spread in Australia) and challenged the fine master & President to eat a vegemite toast or pay a fine :-). They decided to eat it :-).

He also reminded all of us that today is the 113th birthday of Rotary International. The club was formed by Paul Harris on February 23, 1905.

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IBD: A Real Pain in the Gut - Carly Bazzett from Crohn's & Colitis Foundation

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Feb 16, 2018

Carly is a native of Redding, California, where she aspired to a life of service at a young age while watching her mother's community leadership through the Redding East Rotary. Carly attended the University of California, Davis where she played intercollegiate volleyball and graduated with a dual Bachelor's Degree in Psychology and Communications. Carly began her career with the Crohn's & Colitis Foundation in 2007, co-launching the national endurance program, Team Challenge, then taking the helm as Executive Director in San Diego in 2011. As per Wikipedia, the foundation was founded in 1965. Carly resides in Solana Beach with her husband, sons Jack and Travis, and Labrador Retriever, Zack. She is a proud Paul Harris Fellow.

She spoke about the serious issue of Ulcerative Colitis and Crohn's disease faced by almost 1.6 million Americans. Both are different forms of Inflammatory Bowel Diseases (IBDs). It seems high stress life in kids taking various AP classes, after-school sports and other activities leads to these IBDs. Almost 5 million people world-side are affected. It affects men & women equally. There are big clusters now appearing in fast developing countries, such as, China and India.

Then we had Megan Nicholson, who was a patient suffering from severe Ulcerative Colitis, talk about her harrowing experience with the disease. She got affected when she was traveling to Norway with a Tahitian dance company at the age of 25. She suffered tremendously for 3 years and went through 14 different procedures and a dozen different medications and treatments and finally now she has been in remission for almost a year! Until her disease returns one day, and it most likely will, she is doing all she can to spread awareness about Crohn’s and Ulcerative Colitis to help raise funds in order to continue the search for cures.

Finally Megan mentioned about how they raise funds via various charity events, marathons, hikes, etc. The foundation has invested almost $300 million since inception. Just last year in 2017 the foundation invested almost $1.2 million in many San Diego institutions, such as, Salk Institute, The Scripps Research Institute, UCSD, etc., for research on cures.

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Who Am I by Julie LIen

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Feb 16, 2018

Julie migrated to the U.S. when she was 3 years old. She was part of the chain immigration via her uncle. Her dad was an engineer and later opened a coffee shop in City of Industry near Los Angeles. Her dad worked on some projects at the Getty Museum near Hollywood. Julie joked that he would go there not to look at the art, but to look at the building architecture :-).

She went to UCLA to do Political Science and later did her MBA from UCI. She had the opportunity to be an intern in Washington D.C. and work with Secretary of Commerce Ron Brown. Career-wise she has been in supply chain logistics. She is married to Scott and have two wonderful kids - Shawnie and Shane.

She got inspired to join Rotary from her early days when she received a scholarship for a 4-way test Rotary contest. She has been involved in Rotary for many years now and has participated in several community projects.

One of the big challenges in life was to swim. She was paranoid but one of her best friends went with her for 6 months and eventually Julie was confident in swimming. When in Fiji she had the opportunity to go under-water to see wild life and got to swim with the sharks! That was the ultimate of conquering the fear of water.

FAV MOVIE: Lord of the Rings

MORNING RITUAL: Get her coffee, check computer and news.

BIG BILLBOARD SIGN: With change comes opportunity.

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Feeding San Diego project

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Feb 16, 2018

FEEDING SAN DIEGO + DEL MAR-SOLANA BEACH ROTARY

We had a good group of over 10 volunteers from our club along with some family & friends that helped package and clean food at the Feeding San Diego center in Sorrento Valley. In the 2 hours that we spent there, it seems we created 3600 bags filled with apples, pasta, etc. We also cleaned up several thousand pounds of brussels sprouts.

Feeding San Diego has only 42 employees and manages the entire operation with hundreds of volunteers. They have a very efficient system to register and co-ordinate volunteers online and are always looking for more volunteers.

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String of Pearls Around the Pacific - Richard Earnest

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Feb 09, 2018

Today we had Del Mar's former mayor Mr. Richard Earnest present an exciting talk about the string of pearls built around the Pacific Rim as part of the Pacific Rim Park Project. He is a graduate of the Naval Academy and became a fighter pilot in Vietnam. He spent 30 years in the tech industry, running 6 different public and private firms as CEO. He also served as City Council member in Del Mar for 14 years and Mayor three times. He is still working and helping a company that builds inflatable air supported greenhouses.

String of Pearls is a very ambitions project with the goal to build small parks that face the Pacific Ocean in various countries around the Pacific. The major criteria is that students from various countries build these parks during summer breaks. The hosting country will provide all the accommodation and food. Their goal is to build 41 parks and 7 have been built so far. One of the key project founder is James Hubbell - the famous artist from Santa Ysabel, CA. James provides all the art design.

These parks are built within 30 days and involves tremendous coordination between the students and the hosting country. It provides these students with a great opportunity to connect with different cultures via art. The primary theme is to have an object that resembles a pearl in all the parks. They recently built a park in China last year and later found out that the government demolished it for some other construction and no one was informed! The Park Rim organization finally located another spot and will be building that this July.

They see that the students lean a lot of team-building skills and communicating with them via art since most of them don't know each other's languages! In one case a Mexican student met a Japanese student and they fell in love and got married and recently had a child. So, Richard says that this project creates more than art!

Richard is very passionate about these projects and works on raising the necessary funds to send these kids all around the world. It seems that Jim Hubbell , who is 88 yrs old is still very active and visits every site that is being built.

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Another Paul Harris and Who Am I by Art Mendozza

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Feb 09, 2018

We started the meeting with a surprise Paul Harris award by Paul Butler. This time the winner was Gary Schneiderman!

Congratulations to Gary!

Art provided a wonderful memory trail of pictures. His main punch line is to help others. His father is from Mexico, who married a German born on an 8-acre farm in Staten Island. Art later moved to Washington D.C. and Boston. At one point he wanted to be a pianist and then a rock star, but eventually ended up as a Pathologist scanning through films for cancer cells. He now works at Sharp Hospital.

During his young adult ages of 21 to 24 years he had the opportunity to travel across the globe and visit many countries. At one point he was chasing a girl he met all the way to Teheran, who eventually dumped him :-). He finally married his high-school sweetheart, who also is a pathologist. They have a son, but then eventually had a cordial divorce (without attorneys) and they still work together and see each other at work!

He later married Tina Ziainia on Jan 1, 2011 on the beach in Del Mar. They now have a little girl also. He loves to travel and keeps visiting many countries and hence misses many Rotary meetings!

FAV MOVIE: Sound of Music - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sound_of_Music_(film)

MORNING RITUAL: Go for a run sometimes, then a double espresso and read NY Times or WSJ.

BIG BILLBOARD SIGN: A quote by Ernst Friedrich "Fritz" Schumacher - "Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius—and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction."

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Who Am I: Sanjiv Prabhakaran

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Feb 02, 2018

Sanjiv shared some interesting snippets of his life from India to USA. He was born in the state of Kerala, southern part of India. He grew up in the busy city of Bombay (now known as Mumbai). After his high-school and B.S. in Electrical Engineering he headed to Columbus, Ohio in 1981 and completed his Masters in Electrical/Digital Computers from Ohio State University. He later moved to the Bay area in 1986 and spent 14 years there working for 3 different companies in the areas of imaging and GPS fleet tracking technologies. Later in mid 2000 he moved to San Diego to pursue new opportunities and ended up at a real estate software company in downtown San Diego to revamp their technology platform.

He has a wonderful family with wife, two daughters and finally a son was added to their family via older daughter's marriage in 2017. The other big event in 2017 was younger daughter's acceptance to USC for her graduate program in Doctorate of Physical Therapy.

Sanjiv is also involved in humanitarian projects with San Diego Futures Foundation, Rotary and a group in India called the Ottapalam Welfare Trust (OWT). OWT helps paraplegic & quadriplegic patients to gain skills so they can lead an independent life via training, physical therapy and financial support. One such quadriplegic patient is Ajay (shown above), who met with a tragic train accident and still exudes optimism and a big smile all the time. He trained himself to use his voice to control the computer and be able to edit & create Word and Excel documents. He inspires many young kids and trains these youngsters with computer skills.

FAV MOVIE: Glengarry Glen Ross with Al Pacino, Kevin Spacey, Jack Lemmon, Alec Baldwin, etc.

MORNING RITUAL: Glass of warm water, check urgent messages on phone, Yoga, b'fast with WSJ

BIG BILLBOARD SIGN: Keep Smiling Always!

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Paul Harris + The Fine Art of Art Installing by Lizz Lang & Raul

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Feb 02, 2018

Today's meeting started with a surprise announcement by Paul Butler! He had two 2nd level Paul Harris pins for two amazing members of our club - Bill and Suzanne Sutton!

Then we had Lizz Lang present a wonderful story about how she got inspired with art and to help people and business with the art of installing art pieces from their life. Lizz's mom was very instrumental in inspiring her with art. Lizz’s Mom (Norma Benjamin) began the Cedros Design District back in 1980! The Belly Up Tavern owner, David Hodges (now deceased) agreed to rent out his quonset huts to artists and artisans as her Mom promised him “this is a great area for an art community” - and we now know it to be that & more!! Her Mom is still kicking at 90 and lives with Lizz & Raul in Escondido.

Lizz started a framing studio in San Diego on Morena Blvd. to transform and re-install art and later sold that shop in 1986 to a new owner, who still runs it at the same location. She then moved to LA and got married to a laser artist and got more involved in art installations. One of her scariest story was when they were doing an installation at a Beverly HIlls home. The home owner wanted to install a full size pic of his wife and the installer accidentally drilled through the picture and it happened to be right where his wife's belly button was :-(. The owner got so mad that he drew his gun from his holster and started yelling to get Lizz out of his home. Later Lizz managed to come back with her mother and fix the picture and completed the installation.

She later met Raul and that was instant love and they got married and moved back to San Diego in 1991,. They did many art installations in Japan, Portugal, Dubai, etc. They also had 6 opportunities at Super Bowl half-times. At Super-Bowl they get just 7 minutes to setup the stage with all the props and electronics. They also had the great opportunity to meet with celebrities, such as, Phil Nickelson, Tony Gwyn, Junior Seau, etc.

Her favorite job was the art installation at Tony Gwyn's home. Apparently Tony just gave her all the trophies, awards, memorabilias, etc. and told Lizz to just set it up in the best way she can imagine. It took Lizz an entire week to arrange it all over his home. Needless to say, he was thrilled after the work. Their biggest success story is that they have recently been selected as a primary vendor by Ethan Allen for art installations. They have started working with 5 Ethan Allen stores helping their clients with all the art installations. Their tag line is "Show up and do a good job!"

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Model UN Training at CCA

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jan 27, 2018

Kevin Cahill kicked off the early morning training session for the 18th Model UN program. 49 teams will be participating this year and we had over 120 people in attendance with 90% of the students plus some parents and advisors for each team. The meeting was held at the Canyon Crest Academy's (CCA) Media Center. We had challenges with the heat and lighting but the enthusiasm in the room was so high that people didn't worry about the lack of heat despite a cold morning. We were greeted with hot coffee, croissants, bagels and muffins.

Kevin started off by welcoming the participants and highlighting the theme this year to be "Collaboration Mode". He said that this year we have teams from Mexico and Costa Rica also. the final competition date will be on April 7 and 8, 2018 at the University of San Diego campus. He introduced the Secretariat team as Yasmine Sadoudi (from San Diego H.S.) and Renata Valente (from SDSU). Yasmine has participated in few Model UN competitions in the past.

There will be 2 resolutions to be debated this year:

RESOLUTION-1: This will be about United Nations membership for Palestine. This was created by Yasmine and the topic will be interesting as it will be a discussion about adding a new country to the United Nations.

RESOLUTION-2: This will be about protecting our oceans from all the micro plastic pollution. The primary culprits are countries, such as, China, Vietnam, and Thailand,

Kevin then briefly touched on the agenda for the Saturday and Sunday of the event. There will be a grand dinner banquet on Sat April 7, 2018 for the participants and advisors. There will also be a surprise event at the end of that dinner :-). Kevin also talked about some key strategies for the competition and some of the common research tools to be used. Following that, Yasmine delivered a short training on Negotiation Skills.

In the end, Kevin announced the countries that were assigned to each team via a lottery system. The team sponsored by our club consists of two students from CCA - Sophia Sugarman (senior) and Sabrina Soffer (sophomore). Our team received CHINA as their country.

Sophia attended the event with her grandmother.

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Solar Chargers and Environment Impact by Desmond Wheatley

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jan 26, 2018

Our speaker Desmond Wheatley from Envision Solar presented a passionate presentation about how we can make our world cleaner, greener and healthier and put more dollars back in our revenue stream by using renewable and stored energy.

His photos provided many examples of how we can efficiently store energy from the sun at economical costs and use whenever we need it.

Looks like Ken ran out of (or lost) the Speaker Certificates and hence is presenting a "virtual" certificate to Desmond :-).

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Who Am I: Jan Parsons and Rotary updates

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jan 12, 2018

Today's "Who Am I" talk was by one of our long-time member Jan Parsons. Since our featured speaker was sick she had ample time to delve into her story. It was fun and exciting to hear her early entry into Rotary at age 16. She received a letter from the local Rotary club and that inspired her to get involved. She grew up with skiing being a big part of her life. Once she received a 6-month pass to Europe and she skied all over Europe and tried to live on $10 per day! Lunch was usually candy bar & beer :-). She would stay at places where dinner and breakfast were free.

Then she got married and stayed in Morocco for 2 years. Did her Bachelors in Business. Then in 1989 joined Securities Pacific Bank, which later merged with Bank of America. Around that time she got re-introduced to Rotary. She was with BoA for 27 years. She retired on April Fool's Day :-). She loves the arts, classical music and travel.

FAVORITE MOVIE: It's a Wonderful Life - A 1946 American Christmas Fantasy comedy-drama.

MORNING RITUALS: Get her coffee, do some reading, grab the news, play Sudoku.

WHAT WILL HER BIG BILLBOARD SIGN SAY: Love is all you need and God is love!

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OTHER CLUB HIGHLIGHTS:

Lou Oberman mentioned about Convention of States - requesting all to sign up at https://conventionofstates.com/.

Ken Barrett talked briefly about Bocce meeting on Monday Jan 15th at 5:30pm at Charle Foster's home. The goal is to kick-off the planning for the next Bocce fund-raising event.

Patricia gave some highlights of the future game night and 25th anniversary events coming up on Feb 3rd and March 3rd. She has already sent out invites last week.

Bill mentioned about the up-coming 6-way meeting on Thursday Jan 18, 2018 at 12pm at the Del Mar Hilton where we meet for our usual Friday meetings.

There will be NO regular Friday meeting on Jan 19th.

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6-way meeting and Random Acts of Culture by Joey Landwehr of JCompany

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jan 05, 2018

Today's meeting started with Steve Weitzen inspiring everyone to attend the 6-way District meeting to be held at the Del Mar Hilton (our regular venue) on Thursday Jan 18th at 12 pm. Due to this, the regular DMSB meeting on Friday Jan 19th has been cancelled.

Joey Landwehr is the proud Artistic Director for JCompany Youth Theatre. Joey has won over 40 awards for his work with young artists in San Diego, including a special creativity award for shaving his head with his lead in THE KING AND I, Yul Brynner style, and raising over $10,000 for Rady Children’s Hospital's Cancer Unit - earning him the title Joey "Do Anything For The Arts" Landwehr. His favorite slide shown above talks about how EARTH is meaningless without the "ART" in it, since earth becomes just EH :-). According to Joey, theater CHANGES lives and it also SAVES lives. He said that school kids that are involved in arts and theater on average scored 100 points higher in Math and Verbal.

Joey moved to San Diego after being a professional actor and director in New York City working on and off Broadway, national tours, regional theatre and directing and soloing at Carnegie Hall. Joey received his MFA in acting and directing from The Ohio State University and has had the great privilege of working with such greats as Phyllis Diller, Sam Harris & Howard Keel.
Since moving to San Diego, Joey has worked for the San Diego Performing Arts League as Membership and Community Development Director; in 2007 he received the “40 Under 40” Award from San Diego Metropolitan Magazine for outstanding leadership in the arts. Joey was also honored as the 2011 Newsmaker in the Arts. In 2016, Joey was further recognized when the City of San Diego proclaimed October 18th Joey Landwehr Day.

At JCompany he has had the privilege of directing Rumplestilskin is My Name, Oliver!, Yours, Anne, Annie, Disney's Beauty and the Beast, The Story of Hansel and Gretel, Disney's The Jungle Book, Elton John and Tim Rice's Aida, Disney's 101 Dalmations, etc.

Joey was also accompanied by Suzan Sencan, who has the title of JCompany Mom and she talked about how JCompany & Joey welcomed her autistic son into the a summer program 10 years ago and ever since her son has improved significantly and that has made her son and the entire family extremely happy and productive.

Finally Bill awarded the famous Rotary certificate to Joey where our club donates school supplies in the name of the speaker to schools in Malawi.

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Who Am I: Patricia Case

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jan 05, 2018

Today we had a wonderful talk by Patricia Case, who is a long time member of the Del Mar-Solana Beach Rotary club since 1997. She talked passionately about the beautiful Chaffey High School in Ontario, CA that she attended. Apparently this school is among the top 20 schools in the country for its beautiful campus that was built in 1911.

In 1945 the newspaper for whom Patricia's mother worked sent her to Balboa Naval Hospital to interview wounded Navy men recovering from war injuries.. Being from New York City she did not drive and took the train. It was love at first site. After she met Patricia's father she took the train weekend thereafter until he was released which was six months later.

She also spoke about her various career path that led her to Pacific Bell, Honeywell, AMN Healthcare and finally now at Aya Healthcare. She is passionate abut Christmas decorations and spends a lot of time decorating it. She also talked proudly about her grown-up two sons and shared a picture of a fully decorated Christmas tree with her grand-daughter.

Favorite Movie: To Kill A Mocking Bird - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_Kill_a_Mockingbird_(film)

Morning Ritual: Get her coffee and then read 2 inspirational books.

Big Billboard Sign Would Say: If God is your co-pilot, change seats :-).

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The Impact of the Farmers Insurance Open Golf Tournament

Posted by K2 on Dec 15, 2017

Hosting a golf tournament has evolved a lot over the last several years. Instead of just attending a golf event, people want more of an experience - a lifestyle and entertainment event. That's the challenge Peter Ripa faces as CEO of the Century Club of San Diego. The Century Club is responsible for planning and executing the Farmers Insurance Open, San Diego’s PGA TOUR Event.

The organization is composed of 12 staff and more than 50 San Diego business and community leaders dedicated to the mission of uplifting San Diego and local charities. This is achieved through the Event’s broad economic impact and programs that utilize the profile and magnitude of the Event to provide fundraising, engagement, awareness and experiences for charities, local military families, community organizations and schools.

Event Highlights:

More than $25 million economic impact for the City of San Diego including more than $6 million in local hotel revenue
Excess of $3 million in funding and in-kind value delivered to charitable partners annually
Unmatched exposure for San Diego with 18.5 hours of live TV coverage to 117countries on CBS and Golf Channel.
Plays host to over 126K guests from all 50 states and 20 countries.
PGA TOUR has recognized the Farmers Insurance Open the last two years as a finalist for Best On-Site Staging amongst a 47-event schedule and WON THE HONOR IN 2017.
PGA TOUR recognized tournament charity, The Monarch School as PGA TOUR Charity of the Year in 2015.

Three additional things to note that Peter shared:

Patriots Outpost - The Century Club donates tickets to 1,200 members of the military and their families and provides a separate hospitality tent for them. Early in last year's tournament, relatively unknown Spanish golfer Jon Rahm made a special appearance in the tent to say "Thank You!" and handed out Taylor Made hats. Jon would eventually make a thrilling, 60-foot eagle putt on the 18th hole to win the tournament.
Executive Women's Day - Women’s Day is an inspiring program filled with compelling speakers, leadership topics, personal and career development mixed with meaningful networking opportunities. It is a unique environment for women to grow personally and professionally while also connecting guests to the Farmers Insurance Open’s commitment to giving back to the community. This year will include a special appearance by Scout Bassett, a challenged athlete with is a sprinter, triathlete and world record holder.
97% Would Refer - To illustrate just how incredible the experience is of attending the Farmers Insurance Open. Of the past attendees, 97% would refer others to attend. That's incredible!

Peter previously served as the Tournament Director at the PGA TOUR’s Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial in Fort Worth, Texas for five years. Colonial was recognized with four PGA TOUR “Best of Awards” – Most Engaged Community, Best Marketing/Sales Plan (twice) and Best Use of Players.

Prior to his role at the Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial, Peter served as Assistant Executive Director of the American Junior Golf Association (AJGA), Georgia PGA, Florida State Golf Association and Innisbrook Resort over the last 30 years.

Peter currently serves on the Board for the San Diego Tourism Authority and completed two terms on the Board for the PGA TOUR Tournament Advisory Council (TAC). Member of San Diego Sports Innovators (SDSI). His wife and son live in Escondido. His daughter is currently attending Auburn University.

Who Am I: Ken Barrett

Posted by K2 on Dec 15, 2017

Ken grew up in Texas before heading to New Hampshire to attend Dartmouth College. While there, in addition to his studies he was also active on the crew team and competed in cross-country skiing. After graduation he headed to Japan for 5 years. He became one of the first Americans to every work for Mitsubishi on Japanese shores. Upon returning to the U.S. he went to Harvard Business School and then moved back to Texas. During that time he met his wife, Bebe.

Several years later, looking for a career change, Ken went back to college to learn about Industrial Bio-Tech at the University of Arizona. That's also where their two children were born, Isara and Natiya. That career change is also what brought Ken to San Diego where he joined a company called Diversa (which has since been acquired by BASF). Ken is still highly active with his family and the community and finds time to paraglide and surf whenever he can.

Answers to the three questions:

- Favorite movie: Life Is Beautiful

- First 60 minutes of the day: Get up, walk the dog, make coffee and get ready for work

- Saying on Billboard: Enjoy Life - It has an expiration date

Casa de Amistad Making a Difference

Posted by K2 on Dec 15, 2017

Deanna Wolf, Program Coordinator at Casa de Amistad provided an update on the great work they are doing within our community. Since it began in 1997, Casa de Amistad's academic mentoring program has grown from serving just 3 children on its first night to over 250 children and adults annually. Students participating in Casa de Amistad are from school districts throughout coastal North County San Diego. Currently, 204 students come from Solana Beach School District, Del Mar Union School District, Encinitas Union School District, Cardiff School District, Carlsbad Unified School District and San Dieguito Union High School District. Over 100 individuals volunteer weekly as tutors/mentors.

Most of the children they serve are first and second generation students. The program is highly successful and they currently have over 50 students on the waiting list.

DMSB Annual Holiday Party

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Dec 10, 2017

What a GRAND party at the Fish's beautiful home! Thanks to Jon and Barbara for their wonderful hospitality. The early-comers were able to see a beautiful orange sunset from Jon's backyard.

The food was wonderful. And the dessert in the end was superb! In the end we had a wonderful White Elephant gift exchange game with Patricia's MYSTERY GIFT changing hands many times. It turned out to be a singing Santa :-).

A big thank you to Patricia for managing and organizing this wonderful event and to Jon and Barbara for sharing their home.

More pictures can be seen at this Google link that Jon sent. PLEASE CLICK HERE.

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The Science of Compassion - Debra Dupress

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Dec 08, 2017

Dr. Debra Dupree is considered to be a top expert on the Brain-Body Connection and how to master relationships. She is a dynamic and engaging international public speaker; business, communication, and relationship consultant; as well as a published author. She presented a very inspirational talk with great statistics about empathy and compassion.

For more than 20 years, she has been igniting her audiences to fire up their brains to inspire positive changes in their relationships up, down and all around. The information she shares helps those who hear her accelerate their success in life and business through discovery of their natural gifts.

Dr. D’s educational background is vast. She studied Psychology, Career Development and Organizational Psychology at the University of California where she obtained both her Bachelor’s and Master’s Degrees. She has advanced certifications in disability management for when medical conditions change the course of life. She is an Advanced Mediator specializing in workplace and family issues as well as a Professor in Negotiation, Mediation and Psychology. More recently, she returned to school to achieve her Doctorate degree in Psychology at Ryokan College where her dissertation revealed the Psychology of Good Bosses vs. Bad Bosses and its impact on leadership.

She has done extensive research in the areas of Personality Types, Communication Styles, Brain Function, and the Brain-Body- Mind Connection. Her published books include “Unlocking Your Emotional Potential” and “Leading Consciously Now: Managing Up, Down and All Around.” Debra actively teaches at live events and webinars worldwide.

Her research shows that the United States consumes almost 25% of all resources in the world and still lot of depression and loneliness exists. She focuses on the law of reciprocity, which says that you have to give to get back. She talked about Zig Zigler's quote "F.E.A.R." - False Expectations Appearing Real. She also talked about the comparison with iceberg. Most folks react to the top of the iceberg, but one needs to dive deeper and look at bottom of the iceberg.

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Who Am I: Molly Fleming

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Dec 08, 2017

Despite vicious rumors Molly is not a former SNL cast member, however she is a charismatic real estate agent for Coldwell Banker who worked her way through SDSU as a telemarketer. She has the Irish background and grew up with two brothers in Anaheim. Moved to DC for sometime and worked in many software companies. Eventually found her way back to San Diego and got her real estate license. During her growing years itself she was heavily involved in charity and feeding the less fortunate with food every week. Later on in 2014 she found her spouse via online sites.

Favorite Movie: Dead Poet's Society - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Poets_Society

Morning Ritual: Go to gym, watch Today's Show, hit the office.

Big Billboard Sign: "This nation will remain the land of the free only so long as it is the home of the brave."

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Healing the Brain, Body and Spirit in Addictions and Eating Disorders - Dr. Carolyn Ross

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Dec 04, 2017

Dr. Carolyn Coker Ross (CarolynRossMD.com + FindingYourAnchor.com) is an internationally known author, speaker, expert and pioneer in the use of Integrative Medicine for the treatment of Eating Disorders, Obesity and Addictions. She is a graduate of Andrew Weil’s Fellowship Program in Integrative Medicine. She is the former head of the eating disorder program at internationally renowned Sierra Tucson.

Dr. Ross is a consultant for treatment centers around the US. She is the author of three books including one of the first books on Binge Eating Disorder: The Binge Eating and Compulsive Overeating Workbook and her recent book, The Emotional Eating Workbook. Dr. Ross currently has a private practice in Denver and San Diego specializing in Integrative Medicine for treating eating disorders, addictions, mood and anxiety disorders and obesity.

Eating disorders (ED) and substance use disorders (SUD) co-occur in many individuals. This talk clarified the causes of both and why you or someone you care about is struggling with these disorders. Dr. Ross will offer a specific integrative approach to heal brain, body and spirit.

Overdose of drugs and alcohol led to 65,000 deaths in Vietnam in 2016. According to Dr. Ross, there is no such thing as a "30-day cure" program to fix overdose or abuse issues. It takes lot longer since you have to understand the root cause, transform one's life and heal the pain.

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Who Am I: Gary Schneiderman

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Dec 01, 2017

This week we have the first of two new member "Who Am I" presentations. Gary is a neuroscience doctor who started his career by operating on the brains of house cats. His father was a big influence on him in many aspects. One of the big things that Gary admired about his dad was that he worked at JPL and manages mission to Mars and other planets. He would bring interesting exploration items home to show to the family.

Later he went to medical school and met wife Kathy on the 2nd day and been married to her since then. They will be celebrating their 40th anniversary soon.

They are blessed with 3 wonderful kids - Laura, Dan, who is an attorney and 3rd son followed dad and became an orthopaedic surgeon.

He likes surfing, plays rock-'n'-roll in a band and enjoys making surfboards in his backyard despite his neighbor's complaints :-).

Favorite Movie: Casablanca

Morning ritual: Coffee, read paper and go for a swim.

Big Billboard Sign: Quite from Dalai Lama - "Open heart is open mind."

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DMSB + JIT party at the Sutton's

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Nov 30, 2017

Bill and Suzanne Sutton hosted a Just In Time group party at their home. Herb, Bev and Gary also attended the event.

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Who Am I: Lou Oberman

Posted by K2 on Nov 19, 2017

Lou was born in Manhattan . . . New York City. His parents were from Poland and his father was a retail jeweler. Growing up, Lou was nuts about baseball and wanted to be a Major League Baseball player. He played every position except for pitcher, spending most of his time behind the plate as catcher. During his senior year, his high school baseball team won the 1949 NYC Baseball Championship. He even tried out with the NY Giants and received an invitation to go to Florida, however a serious leg infection at the time prevented him from going.

Lou joined a real estate firm while also taking business courses at City College of New York. His weekends were still filled by playing 4-5 games of baseball against a variety of college and service teams, and he even played at Sing Sing Prison.

In 1950 the Korean Conflict started with Lou entering the USMC in February of 1952. He did boot camp at Parris Island, SC then was ordered to MCAS in El Toro, CA where he served as an Instrument Flight Instructor to Reserved WWII Pilots.

Following the Korean Conflict Lou was release to the Reserves for 6 years and returned to real estate. He got married in 1954, the same year he was recruited by a life insurance company. In 1961 he moved to Engelwood, NJ and joined the Englewood Jaycees, serving as President in 1962, chairing the 1963 North Jersey Soap Box Derby and earning Man Of The Year for his local achievements.

His career took a turn in 1963 when he was recruited by a financial planning firm, becoming Director of Financial Planning two years later. What made it interesting is that their office was in the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. In 1967, Lou started his own firm in New York City. During a trip to California he saw an opportunity to do financial planning in Las Angeles so he moved in 1969 and joined a Beverly Hills financial planning firm.

Two years later he decided to go on his own and opened a firm in Torrance, CA. In 1988, he joined LPL Financial Broker/Dealer and moved to Vista Valley Country Club in Vista, CA with his office in Rancho Bernardo. LPL Financial is where Lou met his future partner, Steve Van Houten. They moved to Encinitas and changed the name to Lifetime Financial Advisers. Lou sold his practice to Steve in 2003 while staying on as a consultant a few days a week.

Over the years Lou has also been involved with different projects as an entrepreneur investor:

1979 – Orthotic shoe inserts primarily for athletes and runners with back or foot issues. Lou worked with a Podiatrist who fulfilled the final product to the end user, however the Podiatrist eventually backed out with pressure from others.
1991 – Lou purchased a franchised Mexican fast food restaurant with a client for his two sons to operate. Both sons stayed for 6 months and were not impressed. So Lou sold the business to his partner who eventually sold out to a very large California fast food chain.
2008 – Invented golf clubs (wedges and a putter) with shafts which would separate into two equal sections, by a connector, which Lou patented. The assembled clubs were used for practice only, indoors or outdoors, with special plastic golf balls which wouldn't harm cars, walls or windows. The package included a putting cup, hitting mat and a case to hold all the pieces. Lou abandoned the project when he became a caregiver for his loving partner, Gloria.

Lou has been married twice, with 3 children by his first wife, plus 3 grandchildren. He’s also been in 2 serious relationships and recently met Nancy who many of us have met. He divides his time between golf, volunteering at the Flying Leatherneck Aviation Museum, and as a Convention of States volunteer (District Captain 4 years). Lou has also been very dedicated to Rotary, He first joined in 1981 and is a 5 time Paul Harris Fellow. He join the DMSB Rotary Club, his 4^th club, in 1996 and is honored to be a member. And we are honored to have him as one.

Answers to the three questions:

- Favorite movie: Amadeus

- First 60 minutes of the day: Get up, get on computer, read Wall Street Journal, check emails (still involved in many things)

- Saying on Billboard: Yesterday was History, Tomorrow is a Mystery, Today - the Present - is a Present.

Mike and Cambria Perry - Functional Medicine Specialists
Finding the Root Cause of Chronic Disease

Posted by K2 on Nov 19, 2017

Functional Medicine is a fascinating field with remarkable benefits. Cambria Demarco Perry, a Functional Medicine Practitioner and Mike Perry a Functional Medicine Wellness Coach and Micro-Current Pain Management Technician own Functional Medicine Specialists in Encinitas. Their practice focuses on treating the root cause of disease, not just band-aiding the symptoms. Cambria and Mike closely follow the researched based medical protocols and philosophy of the Institute of Functional Medicine.

Cambria has over 25 years of experience in traditional medicine. She is Board Certified in Acute Care and spent 18 years working in the Emergency Department of Columbia Medical Center, Mount Sinai Hospital, UCLA and Rady Children’s Hospital of San Diego. In addition to her 5 years of Functional Medicine experience, she specializes in Neurological Health and works in collaboration with Dr. Dale Bredesen, a World Renowned Neurologist who just published a book called “The End of Alzheimer's. He developed a program to Prevent and Reverse Cognitive Decline”. Dr. Bredesen has documented over 100 cases where his protocols have reversed the progression and symptoms of Alzheimer's. Cambria was trained by Dr. Bredesen and colaborates directly with him and his organization on almost all of her Alzheimer’s cases.

Cambria also has a personal passion for treating children with special needs like Autism, ADHD and has over two decades of experience in this area. She is trained and listed with Medical Academy of Pediatric Special Needs as MAPS Practitioner. Cambria grew up in Del Mar and in her spare time enjoys the natural beauty of her home in Elfin Forest. Her favorite place in the world is on a nice trail nearby with one of her Arabian horses.

Mike is a Certified Functional Medicine Wellness Coach, a Certified Nutritional Consultant and a Certified Micro-Current Technician. Mike helps clients identify wellness goals and helps to implement a wellness plan that is created by the client. He works with clients on how to make the lifestyle changes necessary to get there. His more recent area of focus in on micro-current nerve stimulation and pain management therapies. He works with a machine based on Nobel prize winning research, guided missile and lie detector technologies. In Mike’s spare time you might see him on a road bike or catching a wave in North County somewhere.

Learn more about the great work they do and the benefits of Functional Medicine by visiting their website at www.FMScal.com.

DMSB Rotary Donates $8,858 to Reality Changers

Posted by K2 on Nov 19, 2017

The Del Mar / Solana Beach Rotary proudly presented Chris Yanov and Lauren Tullis from Reality Changers with a donation of $8,858 to support the great work they do with area youth. From 1996 to 2001, Chris worked as a youth director near downtown San Diego. The majority of teens with which he first worked with were involved with drugs and gangs, often leading to violence, vandalism, teen pregnancy, and even death. To respond to this challenge, Chris started Reality Changers in 2001 with just four students and $300 to its name. It is based on the principle that it is just not right that most inner-city students today know more people who have been shot or killed in the street than people who are on the road to college.

Nearly a decade and a half later, Reality Changers now serves nearly 1,000 youth from disadvantaged backgrounds every year (its College Apps Academy course is available to 12th graders from all backgrounds). The program’s 1,300 graduates – including 29 Gates Millennium Scholars – have now earned over $100,000,000 in scholarships from all sources. Reality Changers has begun to scale its programs so that this feat can be accomplished on an annual basis beginning in 2018. The work they are doing has also caught the attention of Mexico President Vicente Fox who has joined their Board of Directors. Here is a story about it in the San Diego Union-Tribune.

We are proud to support the tremendous impact they are making. Learn more about the great work they are doing at www.realitychangers.org.

Global Grant update from Ottapalam Rotary club

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Nov 17, 2017

We are making good progress on the Paraplegic global grant in partnership with the Ottapalam, Kerala, India Rotary club. They are preparing a detailed response to all the questions raised by The Global Grant foundation. In the picture above they are displaying our DMSB flag at a meeting where the club senior members were discussing and preparing responses to the questions raised on the global grant application. They plan to send the final revisions to Sanjiv and Venky by next week. Sanjiv had met them last month in India and also visited one of the quadriplegic beneficiaries of the grant money.

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Veterans celebration day & new members!

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Nov 10, 2017

We had an amazing audience today to celebrate Veterans' Day. George brought out his teddy bear that sang the "Great American" song.

Then we had several of our club veterans give a brief talk on their involvement.

These were the club members that spoke. I tried my best to capture notes and so if you see any mistakes please let me know and I will correct it ASAP. Charles Foster could not attend but sent his summary via email.

George Sousa - Married his wife Lou in Dec of 1950 and few weeks later in Jan 1951 he joined the army. He then went on to fight the Korean war. His plaque with his name and picture is also displayed at the Mt. Soledad memorial.

Bill Sutton - Was in the Marine Corps, anti-aircraft officer, showed some pictures with Suzanne and his senior officers.

Lou Oberman - He joined Marine Corps, did the boot camp at Parris Island, was involved in Instrument Flight Instructing School, he had the privilege to train Jerry Coleman.

Paul Butler - Was in the Navy from 1979 to 1989, 2 years in flight training, then advanced flight training in Virginia. He flew jets off aircraft carriers for 10 years!

Jon Fish - He joins the Navy and then was later posted on a ship along the Meekong river in Saigon and it was quite peaceful at that time he said.

Malcolm Koll - Served in South Africa 1976. After boot camp was trained to be a land surveyor and sent to the Angolan border to survey the center line for a road through the Caprivi strip. Did annual camps thereafter until he emigrated.

Arnold Fernandes - George's friend and a guest today. He served during World War II. He is 94 years old.

Herb Liberman - He was in the reserves for 6 years, when he was active duty in the army, they found out he was a teacher and so he was assigned to teach some of the recruits so they received the minimum qualification certificate for GED. He was also an ambulance driver.

Charles Foster - He was in the Navy 1968-1972. Was a Lieutenant. Ran ship overhauls at Charleston (S.C.) Naval Shipyard. Last job was as Ship Management Officer responsible for the planning and execution of the overhaul and modernization of the USS Sampson (DDG-10), a guided missile destroyer. This was an experimental compressed overhaul with monthly reporting to the Chief of Naval Operations in D.C.

Ken also made some announcements today of 2 new members! Molly Fleming & Gary Schneiderman. Welcome to DMSB!

This was a celebration of migrating two long-time guests Molly and Greg from sticker badges to the official DMSB red badges :-).

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Danial Casara - Purple Heart Recipient and much more

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Nov 10, 2017

Sergeant Daniel Casara served his country proudly for nearly 15 years. He deployed in 2005, and on September 23, his M113 rolled over an anti-tank mine. The explosion flipped his tank, killing two and injuring four. Sgt. Casara suffered bilateral fractures to his right tibia and fibula, a shattered left tibia, shattered heel and ankle bones to both feet, and a dislocated right hip. To date, he has undergone 24 surgeries and countless hours of physical therapy.

For his service, Danny has been honored with a Purple Heart, Army Achievement Medal, Army Commendation Medal, Global War on Terrorism Service Medal, Iraqi Campaign Medal, Combat Action Ribbon, and the Presidential Unit Citation.

Still in rehabilitation for his injuries to this day, Danny has also worked with over 20 non-profits to raise awareness and money in over 15 states for the wounded veterans’ community and their families. Using sports and recreational activities to support his rehabilitation, he has continued to strengthen his legs.

Sgt. Casara cycles, golfs, plays baseball, softball, snowboards. He sits on the board of directors of Open Hearts For Purple Hearts Foundation, board of governors for Morgan Run Club and Resort, and is the Executive Director of the Veterans Golfer’s Association Western Region. He was also the Chairman of the 2016 and 2017 Charity Classic (an annual nation-wide charity event hosted by ClubCorp). Sgt. Casara is a 2016 graduate of the Golf Academy of America in San Diego, California and he is currently pursuing a degree in criminal justice.

In 2009 he married Barbara “Basia” Gasienica, who emigrated from Poland in 1987. They have resided with his son, Denali, and his mother, Elaine, in the 52nd district in San Diego County since 2012.

In 2016 Danny was selected as a subject for a portrait painted by President George W. Bush for his book on “Portraits of Courage: A Commander in Chief’s Tribute to America’s Warriors”. The painting of Danny is on the cover of the book.

He gave credit to all the Vietnam Vets for paving the way for others. He also credited the Korean war and World War II vets and their spouses. He talked about Honor Flight (https://www.honorflight.org/about-honor-flight-networtk/) that aranges a trip to WWII veterans to go & see the museums in DC.

He was finally awarded the Malawi school project certificate by DMSB President Bill. This is a program by our club where school supplies are donated to Malawi schools in honor of the speaker.

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Who Am I: Suzanne Sutton

Posted by K2 on Nov 03, 2017

Suzanne was born in Burbank, CA in the San Fernando Valley. Her dad was a single family doctor who practiced out of the same office for over 50 years, even doing house calls in his 60's.

Her parents were originally from Shreveport, LA. Here mom was born and raised on a plantation in the country and while her dad's family lived in town. Every year her parents and her older brother would make the trek across Texas by car or train to stay with her grandmother in the country. It was a great place to be in the summer, except for the heat. Every day Suzanne would ride horse in the cotton and corn fields, then help move cattle from pasture to pasture or check fences. It was great!

Right after high school Suzanne went to a boarding school in Lausanne, Switzerland where girls as young as 12 attended. She met some wonderful girls there including 6 that she still keeps in touch with. They are currently planning a 50+ year reunion. Upon returning Suzanne went to the University of Missouri, the same college her dad attended, and earned a degree in Business.

Six months later her and Bill got married and began their service in the Marines, moving 11 times in 3 years. Everything they owned could fit in a Dodge Coronet. After the military they moved to Santa Monica. While Bill attended law school, Suzanne began work at Security Pacific Bank.

Eventually they moved back to San Fernando Valley to be closer to family where Suzanne spent the first 9 years working for a private school. Then began a 25 year stretch where she worked for multiple people at the same time including a CPA, realtor, landscape architect and a wealthy business man. This allowed her the flexibility to do things like join her mom on many family cruises. For the last one, after her mom passed away, they had a special ceremony with the captain, several officers and family members as they buried her mother at sea.

These days, Suzanne enjoys spending time with her 2 children, their spouses and her 3 grandchildren (including a new grandson). She also volunteers at the library and garden club. For fun Suzanne reads and scours travel magazines trying to figure out where to go to next. If it's in Europe, it will have to include a trip to Latvia.

Answers to the three questions:

- Favorite movie: To Kill A Mockingbird

- First 60 minutes of the day: Coffee, checking what time it is in Latvia

- Saying on Billboard: Be Kind

Dr. James Veltmeyer Shares a Fresh Approach to Health Care Reform

Posted by K2 on Nov 03, 2017

Dr. James Veltmeyer is the Chief of Family Medicine at the prestigious Sharp Grossmont Hospital in La Mesa, CA. He has been voted San Diego's "Top Doctor" in 2012, 2014, 2016 and 2017. He experienced first hand the challenges patients face in getting good healthcare, including with his own wife who has been battling breast cancer.

As Dr. Veltmeyer shared, a majority of his time is spent in making sure the medical care procedures he recommends for his patients are compliant with insurance coverages and have the proper medical codes (there are over 65,000 of them). It's common to have his recommendations questioned or denied, resulting in serious delays to getting the proper care.

He has developed a new approach to health care reform that provides "Health care by the people, for the people". It offers a realistic path to reducing costs of health care through a three-part approach:

A Medical Association Membership (MAM) for routine and preventative care. This provides patients access to doctors for a low monthly fee of $50-$100 per patient.
Emergency Catastrophic Care (ECC) for life-threatening health events, emergencies and accidents. This would cover up to 2 weeks of hospitalization or ICU care.
National Health Savings Accounts (NHSA) to cover costs of pre-existing conditions, specialists and longer-term hospital care.

Click here to download a pdf of Dr. Veltmeyer's "Health Care By The People, For The People" plan and read more about his remarkable story.

DMSB Rotary Donates $7,973 to Just In Time for Foster Youth

Posted by K2 on Nov 03, 2017

As the video below shows, Just In Time for Foster Youth has a power impact on helping transition-age foster youth achieve self-sufficiency and well-being. Every youth leaving the foster care system that they work with has a community of caring adults waiting for them so they can thrive and enjoy productive, satisfying lives. That's why the DMSB Rotary was so proud to be able to present Just In Time Executive Director, Don Wells, and Youth Services Director, Nathan Brunetta, with a donation of $7,973.80. An amazing organization doing amazing work. (Pictured above: Jon Fish, Nathan Brunetta, Don Wells and Susan Hennefent)

Who Am I - Steve Weitzen

Posted by K2 on Oct 27, 2017

Steve was born in San Diego at a cost of $8. He followed by his two brothers, both 1 years and 2 months apart. His father was a court reporter and mother was a secretary with SD Unified.

He had a lot of great experiences growing up. At 9 years old he learned to play golf, a sport he enjoyed as a way to make business connections throughout his career. At 13 he was the ball boy for the San Diego Rockets NBA team and got to meet many famous players including: Jerry West, Elgin Baylor, Wilt Chamberlain, Bill Russell, Oscar Robertson, Earl Monroe, Walt Frazier and Bill Bradley. At 17 he went to Japan as an exchange student at a time when you had to make a reservation with an international operator to make a call home. At 18 he studied in Mexico his first semester and met David Alfaro Siqueros, one of Mexico's famous muralist. In 1976, Steve backpacked throughout Europe and Israel, a country he has been to 12 times.

Eventually Steve went to law school, met his wife Ava, worked for two insurance defense firms, then opened his practice January 1, 1990. His daughter Shana was born one week later. His son Aaron made Aliya to Israel.

Steve joined our club in 2006, has served as President of the club, District Assistant Governor, Chief Assistant Governor and is a candidate to become our District Governor a few years from now.

Answers to the three questions:

- Favorite movie: The Godfather

- First 60 minutes of the day: Eat breakfast, read two papers and meditate

- Saying on Billboard: It's Mind Over Matter and If You Don't Mind It Don't Matter . . . Don't Sweat The Small Stuff

Gary Sinclair - Changing the Face of Therapy

Posted by K2 on Oct 27, 2017

Gary Sinclair is “Changing the Face of Therapy” through the use of memory energy therapy. His patented process, Soul Link, has proven to neutralize the negative charge out of ANY memory in seconds, including PTSD. Soul Link is passing 10,000 clients with no failures or abreactions and a medical peer review confirmed success in 100% of 2,200 clients they studied.

While at our meeting Gary shared his incredible story, including overcoming 80% mobility loss after 14 years of Multiple Sclorosis. At the age of 36, he then went miraculously from 1/3 lung capacity, which started as birth defects, to full capacity in 15 minutes with a large group of witnesses. Six years later he became our National Amateur Senior Olympic Gold Medal Figure Skating Champion for the USA. In July of 2015 he overcame 14 TIA strokes within 30 minutes of each stroke even with body paralysis and loss of speech while staff at the UCSD Neurology Department monitored it all.

Today, at age 72, Gary Sinclair IS “Changing the Face of Therapy” by training people across the country and around the world how to use his memory energy therapy techniques to help others. For more information check out www.MemoryEnergyTherapy.com.

Sanjiv in India Meeting With Global Partners

Posted by K2 on Oct 27, 2017

DMSB Rotary member Sanjiv Prabhakaran recently met with our global partner club for a Paraplegic Project in Ottapalam, Kerala, India. This Global Grant will support the clinic in Ottapalam that trains paraplegic individuals to become independent and self-sustaining so they can start their own business or find jobs that they can handle independently.

During Sanjiv's visit he met the paraplegic care unit's chairman Mr. Ravi, the highly motivated patient Ajay, Ottapalam Rotary President Raj Mohan, Rotarian Koman and International chair Ram and his wife Rotarian Nirmala. The Ottapalam Rotary club will provide necessary business training and on-going support.

Ajay was a bright engineering student who got pushed out of a crowded speeding train and became quadriplegic for life, BUT never lost his attitude towards life. He kept working hard towards rehabilitation and using his voice to control his computer and become productive by building web sites and helping Sanjiv's company with miscellaneous Word and Excel tasks. The grant we are working on will provide equipment such as; specialized wheel chairs, sewing machines and 3-wheel motorized scooters for patients like Ajay.

The Fellow Who Received His Paul Harris Fellow... Again

Posted by K2 on Oct 20, 2017

Paul Butler, along with President Bill Sutton, presented fellow Rotarian Kevin Ehlinger Wilde with a Paul Harris Fellow pin. The Paul Harris Fellow recognition acknowledges individuals who contribute, or who have contributions made in their name, of $1,000 to The Rotary Foundation of Rotary International. It was established in 1957 to show appreciation for and encourage substantial contributions to the Foundation. Kevin's pin represents being a Paul Harris Fellow plus 3, meaning this is his 4th pin overall.

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Words Alive Addressing Illiteracy in San Diego

Posted by K2 on Oct 20, 2017

Volunteer Program Manager Christina Meeker shared the mission and magic that Words Alive is doing within San Diego. Words Alive proudly serves 5,500 students and families monthly through the support of their cadre of volunteers who donate thousands of hours.

Volunteers in their Read Aloud Program read weekly in 181 classrooms from preschoolers through 3rd grade students, to connect with the joy of reading while developing cognitive and verbal skills. Their Adolescent Book Group currently engages 450 at-risk teens across 22 classrooms and has expanded to not only include book-club style discussions, but also writing sessions and developmental workshops that build language, reading fluency, and critical thinking skills.

In addition to these two initial programs, they have since developed a Family Literacy Program and the Westreich Scholarship Program. Here's a snapshot of their impact today:

3 core programs - Read Aloud, Teen Services & Family Literacy
5,725 program participants
5,723 literacy program sessions
500 + volunteers delivering over 8,800 hours
215 classrooms
22,251 books donated
30 collaborative partners

Words Alive is actively seeking volunteers who wish to experience the fun of reading to kids. Christina also serves as a council member to the Volunteer Administrators Network of San Diego, is an active USD alumni, a traveling yogi, an avid dancer and volunteers with her local Kiwanis Club.

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Who Am I - Susheela Narayanan

Posted by K2 on Oct 20, 2017

Susheela was born in Chennai, India and grew up in New Dehli. Her father was an officer in the Royal British Air Force and won several awards for meritorious service above the call of normal duty. Because of his work they eventually moved to Bangalore, South India.

She graduated from Delhi University with a B.A. in English Literature and then went on to earn her Masters, after which she taught college a few years. She got married in 1968 and move to Toronto, Canada which was a bit of culture shock, especially experiencing snow. She received a B. Ed degree at University of Toronto, then they moved to Syracuse, NY where their children were born. During that time she earned an M.S. degree in education from Syracuse University.

Finally, they got tired of the snow and moved to San Diego in 1977. They didn't know anyone except . . . Venky and Meera who were of great help to them. Here Susheela opened a Montessori pre-school and eventually became a full time professor of Child Devleopment at San Diego Mesa College.

Susheela enjoys music of all kinds (especially the 60's & 70's, books on different subjects,

Answers to the three questions:

- Favorite movie: Roman Holiday

- First 60 minutes of the day: Get up, brush teeth, make tea and watch CBS News

- Saying on Billboard: Try Everything Once

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Pivot to Success by A. J. MacQuarrie

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Oct 14, 2017

A.J. MacQuarrie is a 29 year old entrepreneur who founded KarmaBox Vending, one of the world's first healthy vending companies that can now be found in over 70 cities across the United States. He writes for Entrepreneur Magazine and Huffington Post and is the author of the upcoming book "Pivot To Your First Million: How to start a business without money, experience, or any idea what you're doing." After turning a $20,000 investment into a multi million dollar business, he started LaunchPad Nation, where he puts on a startup bootcamp.

Pivot to Success! Are you a “Wantrepreneur” – an entrepreneur with an idea, business, or goal that is slipping further out of reach?

In this talk, A.J. MacQuarrie shared his top mindset strategies to help one achieve the success one desires when “the big win” seems unattainable. How one handles the adversities in one's path will determine one's success. His key slogan is "If your business is not where you want it to be, A.J. will share his simple mindset pivot to get you and your company re-calibrated for success."

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Who Am I by Phil Campanelli

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Oct 14, 2017

Phil is the NEW GUY! He's also the general manager of the Hilton Del Mar with over 20 years of hospitality industry experience so he has a lot of practice in "being nice to people". He is originally from Italy and ended up in San Luis Obispo area. He also had a wonderful time in Japan where he attended an All Male Christian Academy via a Rotary Club. He taught English to Japanese kids in San Luis Obispo. He proudly claims that the Italian therapy is Eat when happy, eat when sad and eat when people die :-). They have 2 boys and they all moved to San Diego 2.5 years ago when he got his job at the Hilton Del Mar.

FAV. MOVIE: Blind Side - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Blind_Side_(film)

MORNING RITUAL: Wake up at 4:30 am, visit mom and have coffee with her and then get to work.

HIS BILL-BOARD SLOGAN: Why Can't We Just All Get Along! (quote from Rodney King)

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Red Badge to Blue Badge

Posted by K2 on Oct 09, 2017

Congratulations to Herb and Beverly Liberman and Charlotte Jones on earning their blue badges. We appreciate how active and involved all three have been, and the tremendous knowledge and talents they bring to our club. We are excited to have you a part of our Rotary story.

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Who Am I by Bill Sutton

Posted by K2 on Oct 09, 2017

Bill Sutton shared his Who Am I story of being born in Eugene, OR, and then moving to California as his father began work at UCLA. He actually met his wife, Suzanne, in Junior High and the began dating in High School. After graduating from UCLA he went to Officer Training School in the Marines and became a 2nd Lieutenant. After his service he graduated from law school and practiced law his entire career.

Favorite movie: Gunga Din or Zulu
Morning ritual: Get up, Make coffee, Grab the Wall Street Journal, Drink coffee while reading the Journal and watchng TV
Saying on Billboard: Life is good

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Dr. Axel Meierhoefer - Diamond Formation Leadership

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Sep 29, 2017

Dr. Axel Meierhoefer is an expert in Diamond Formation Leadership (DiamondFormationLeadership.com & AxelMeierhoefer.com). He brings an informative and inspirational approach to the subject with anecdotes, analogies and metaphors to explain the advantages of using these effective strategies for continual improvement.

Diamond Formation is a term that originates from military aviation and indicates the art of staying in a three-dimensional position with four fighter jets. Axel has 22 years of experience in Air Force flying and teaching other aviators how to perform Diamond Formations. After retiring from the military, Axel studied Leadership and discovered that there are four core pillars to success in leadership that behave and have similar importance as the Diamond Formation in aviation. Collaboration, Globalization, Team Building, Cultural Sensitivity.

Collaboration – the way you expand your area of influence beyond your team and immediate network to generate profits

Team Building – the way you form the kind of relationships that last, attract new clients and employees all the time and give you access to the secret of “6 degrees of separation”

Globalization – where you explore and tap into the amazing opportunities the global economy has to offer you so that your products and services have a clear competitive advantage.

Cultural Sensitivity – the new way to expand on diversity to the clear advantage of your business and run circles around the competition.

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Who Am I by Jon Fish and medal for George Sousa

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Sep 29, 2017

This was another day of stories by Jon Fish and Ambassador award for George Sousa. Jon grew up in New Jersey and was inspired by nature when he went to a summer camp in Maine. He also developed a passion for skiing. He went to Harvard to do MBA and met Charles Foster there. Later he joined the Navy and to his surprise met Charles there again! His first employer was (Viks?) and he worked there are treasurer and apparently he said it went bankrupt. That brought some laughter from the audience and someone asked what did he do to bankrupt it :-). He had a son and a daughter from his first marriage and then in 2003 married Barbara and now they have 8 grand children. He has been a member of our Rotary club since 1995. He also made 3 trips to India with other club members.

FAV. MOVIE: Tom Jones - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Jones_(1963_film)

MORNING RITUAL: Walk his dog, check emails and work on Bocce :-).

HIS BILL-BOARD SLOGAN: Make Today Count For Others!

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George Sousa displayed all his pictures and the special Ambassador award presented by Republic of Korea for his service during the Korean war.

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Rotary Foundation Seminar Event 23sep17

Posted by Paul Butler / Sanjiv on Sep 23, 2017

It was a great morning with coffee, juice & breakfast fellowship and then a summary of a lot of accomplishments of our district. Venky spoke about our Colombian shoe project where we were able to provide shoes for about 1300 kids.

Everyone left the seminar very inspired and proud to be a Rotarian.

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Kiurani Boarding School, Kenya - by Herbert & Beverly Liberman

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Sep 22, 2017

Herb and Bev gave an exciting talk about their immense mission in Chogoria, Kenya where they have been helping build a day and boarding school.

Beverly is the US Representative for CISA, a Christian immersion school in Costa Rica. She is also the President of Mission Voz Que Clama, a nonprofit established to serve the indigenous in Costa Rica. She also recruits sponsors to pay school fees for needy children in Kenya. She was the co-founder and Executive Director of the One at a Time Foundation, serving the homeless population in San Francisco. In her professional career, Beverly held Vice President positions at both Bank of America and Tiffany & Co.

Currently Herb works as a business consultant to start ups and small businesses, arbitrator in the financial industry and partner in a nut business in Kenya and Spanish Immersion School in Costa Rica. Herb’s first career was in education where he started as a classroom teacher and ended his career as a Superintendent of Schools. His next career was in the business world involved in manufacturing, computers, office equipment and printing industries.

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Who Am I by Vicky Mallett

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Sep 22, 2017

Today we had an exciting and emotion-filled story from Vicky Mallett. She grew up in Texas and her family owned 5 retail clothing stores. She ended being in few commercials and people would come for her autograph. She was Vicky White then with a Texan accent :-). She left Texas at age 24 and had an advertising degree. She landed in San Diego 22 years later after going through many other states. In San Diego she became a media buyer for the Del Mar Fair. She later became part of the grand promotions team at Legoland and had the opportunity to work with Shaquille O'neil on one promotion.

She later got heavily involved in Rotary and was part of a large group from our club in setting up a school in El Salvador.

FAV MOVIE: Field of Dreams

MORNING RITUAL: Coffee, emails and Wall Street Journal.

BIG BILLBOARD SIGN: Are we having fun yet!

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Senior Home Team - Kristin Gaspar

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Sep 15, 2017

Kristin Gaspar is the Vice Chairwoman of the San Diego County Board of Supervisors and part of the Senior Home Team. She was accompanied by Corrine Busta.

Prior to becoming Supervisor, Kristin was an Encinitas City Council Member and went on to become the city’s first elected Mayor. She has a background in business, serving as CFO of the physical therapy company she and her husband started in 2002.

As Supervisor, Kristin is focused on reducing homelessness, enhancing public safety and improving our streets, infrastructure and neighborhoods. One of her passions is volunteering with her Rotary Club to help those in the community who have Alzheimer’s and other related dementias. She has cleaned their homes, bought household items they desperately needed and worked to spruce up their neglected gardens. This week she'll share her ideas on "Senior Home Team".

She promotes volunteering to help those in need, especially seniors. For those who are interested, there is a website through the county that you can sign up to be a volunteer. The site is xxx (to be updated later). As projects come up everyone is sent a notice and those who are available to help can let them know they’ll do it.

Interesting fact about Kristin: She studied to be a journalist at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism in Tempe.

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Who Am I by Diane Huckabee

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Sep 15, 2017

This week we had our long time member Diane Huckabee give her interesting story. It seems she spent 21 years in college to complete a 4-year degree since she took one course at a time :-). And she worked in commercial banking for over 20 years and in the securities industry over 17! All in beautiful sunny San Diego!

Favorite movie - Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (because of Robert Redford).

First 60 minutes of her day - She says she’s a “hard sleeper” so her day starts out with - hit the snooze, hit the snooze, hit the snooze, get up.

Big Billboard would say - Mahatma Gandhi quote “Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.”

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Stand Down update by Steve Binder

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Sep 08, 2017

Steve Binder is the head of the San Diego Public Defenders that help the homeless vets get their legal affairs in order. He co-founded the Homeless Court Program (HCP) in 1989, at Stand Down, and the Veterans Treatment Court (VTC) in 2011. He will provide an update about the progress that is made at Stand Down.

Matt Wechter is a deputy public defender with the San Diego Office of the Primary Public Defender, where he has practiced since 2009. Since 2013, he has been one of the Public Defender “Gang of 5” crew that organizes and coordinates the Homeless Court Program at Stand Down.

They both provided tremendous statistics on how the veterans have benefited from this wonderful program that started some 29 years ago. The HCP program helps resolve minor cases, such as, public nuisance cases, smoking within 25' of a bus stop, multiple DUI, domestic violence, etc. At stand down these vets get to have a nice shower, shave, medical checkup, vision tests, etc.

Bill Sutton (President) presenting them with a "virtual" certificate of appreciation :-).

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Who Am I by Robert Halleck

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Sep 08, 2017

Bob Halleck shared his life story with our members. He is CEO of Vulcan Trust and has been a member of DMSB club since 2011. He retired in 2002 and has been enjoying his race cars (Porsche & Miata). His 2 Q&A were answered as follows --

FAVORITE MOVIE: The Third Man (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Third_Man)

MORNING RITUAL: Read NU Times, check his financial portfolios

BIGG BILLBOARD SIGN: It's Been A Blast!

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Who Am I by Dr. Seymour Myers

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 25, 2017

We had Seymour return after a long recovery from his back surgery. He shared the fact that he is one of the two founding members of our DMSB club, who is still active in the club. Seymour is a family medicine doctor affiliated with Scripps. He received his medical degree from University of Toronto Faculty of Medicine and has been a member of our club since 1992.

Favorite movie: Casablanca

Morning ritual: Wake up at 5am, take dog for a walk, read paper and head to work

Big Billboard Sign: Happy to be here, keep working till you drop dead.

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Inspiring Women for STEM: The Power of an All Girls' Education

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 25, 2017

Lauren Lek, Ed.D. serves as the Head of School at the oldest and only all girls’ high school in San Diego, the Academy of Our Lady of Peace (OLP). She graduated from UC San Diego with a B.A. in Literature, St. Mary’s College with an M.A. in Educational Leadership and her Doctorate in Educational Technology Leadership from Pepperdine University.

She has won many local awards in her short time here in San Diego, including the Athena Pinnacle Educator of the Year award for 2016, Women Who Mean Business, and 40 under 40 awards by SD Metro Magazine. Lauren is a member of the Downtown Rotary 33 and serves on the STEM Committee with several Rotarians to bring opportunities in learning to the lower-socioeconomic schools.

In just four years at OLP, Lauren has helped to create a coordinated STEM Certificate program, launched a Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) program, added Engineering Design, AP Computer Science, Bio-Technology, Theater Design, Entrepreneurship, Orchestra, and Architecture.

As an advocate for women in leadership, Lauren has also helped create at OLP a hub for successful women to share their journey with the 750 students. In its third year, the OLP Women’s Symposium attracts 25 of the top women leaders to inspire the next generation, and welcomes over 250 community members.

According to Lauren, there are only 34 women governors compared to 2319 men governors in the U.S. It seems 89 countries have more women in legislative roles compared to the U.S. And finally, she added that in our own world of Rotary there are only 27-33% that are women. She indicated that the track record at OLP is that 100% of the students go on to a 2 or 4-year college for higher studies.

Lauren married her college sweetheart and they have three beautiful children, Lucas is 8, Willem is 4 and Emma just turned 2.

Dr. Lek had the student partnership of Sanjana Paye, a junior, who focused on the impact of all girls education as the vehicle for inspiring interest in STEM. Sanjana is quite a remarkable young lady who as a junior is top in her class with a 4.63 GPA. Ms. Paye has the experiential lens of witnessing the transformative power of an all girls' education and its impact on her own development and interest in STEM. Sanjana intends to pursue higher ed. in the study of neurological sciences. In addition to the top level math courses in which she is currently enrolled, Ms. Paye is now taking her first computer programing class with intention of understanding better the machines necessary for academic and professional engagement.

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Finding Yourself at the End of the World - Antartica by Alex Myers

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 18, 2017

Upon graduating from Amherst College with a degree in Economics in 2010, Alex developed his passion for startups and became the controller for TransPower, an electric vehicle startup formerly located in Poway. He continues to build upon this interest today by working with two startups: as a remote, academic tutor with Elani Learning and as the part time controller for Hyperlight Energy, a solar technology startup in Lakeside. Both opportunities provide unique strategic problems to solve which is what he tries to spend as much of his time doing.

He, along with his wife, Daria and son, Nikolai, shared their unique experience of traveling to Antartica.

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Who Am I by Malcolm Koll

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 18, 2017

We had an exciting Who Am I talk by Malcolm Koll with an international twist :-). Found a nice picture of this handsome South African gentleman, who recently opened a fabulous brewery/restaurant in Del Mar called Viewpoint Brewing Company. He also owns the Charles Koll Jewelry store in San Diego's Fashion Valley mall.

Favorite Movie: None

Morning ritual: He hits the SNOOZE button 6 times :-)

His Big Billboard Sign: If the darkness bothers you, light a candle.

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Supporting Veterans Through Operation Game On

The DMSB Rotary once again was a proud sponsor of Operation Game On. Operation Game On gives returning combat-injured troops suffering from physical and mental disabilities a form of rehabilitation through golf. Golf is good for the mind and for the body. It allows them to compete, laugh, relax, focus, and challenge their muscles outside of regular PT. It gives them hope of a clearer future after their tragic injuries and experiences of war. This years event was held at the Fairbanks Ranch Country Club with DMSB Rotary members Bill Sutton, George Sousa and Kevin Ehlinger Wilde enjoying the day together on the course.

George teeing off and trying to hit the lawn mower man.

Saving Lives, Two At A time; by Graham Bloem / And President gets his badge!

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 11, 2017

Graham is a sought after professional dog training expert who has been training in San Diego for over 15 years. With his passion for helping rescue dogs, serving our troops at home, and with the staggering statistics of veteran suicide and canine euthanasia, he has made it his life's mission to give back through Shelter to Soldiers. Because of his work Graham has achieved awards like the ABC 10 News Leadership Award, 2016 Waggy Award in Animal Welfare and a nomination for the Community Spotlight Award. He has utilized each acknowledgement as a vehicle to support more rescue dogs and veterans in need.

As per Graham, the 12-18 months of training these service dogs cost anywhere from $25,000 to $100,000. They help the vets from recovering from loud noises, provide them comfort, help avoid suicides, etc. It seems almost 1.2 million dogs are euthanized each year and their organization is trying to save as many of those dogs as possible. Their tag line is "Saving Lives, Two At A Time".

*Interesting fact: Graham was born in South Africa, immigrated to Canada and then to the US. He is now a proud US citizen, who feels a duty to give back to those who serve our Country.

Finally, Bill Sutton gets his new President's badge in a grand presentation by all the Past Presidents. Jan managed to avoid the $68 FedEx shipping fees :-).

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Who Am I by Paul Butler & the MISSING GAVEL :-)

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 11, 2017

It was exciting to hear Paul Butler give his Who Am I speech. Did anyone know that his real name when he was born was Paul Demingos. Yes, his family came from Mexico. His mom later re-married and that's how he got his last name as BUTLER. He had the exciting opportunity to visit the 1976 Olympics with his dad, who was a huge Olympics fan. Paul graduated from Arizona State University and joined the Navy in 1978 and he flew the F4.

His Favorite Movie: Top Gun!

Morning Ritual: Get up at 5 am, do some spiritual reading, write in his gratitude journal and then work!

His big Billboard Sign: Forgiveness is key to Happiness!

With that big billboard sign he returned the stolen gavel to our president Bill Sutton :-).

Finally, Malcolm announced that the dress-code for Rotary lies some where in-between the dresses worn by Paul and Steve :-).

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Rotary 5340 District Governor Scott Carr & Bocce update

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 06, 2017

It was exciting to listen to our District Governor Scott Carr. He had his first experience in Rotary as part of Rotaract, a Rotary-sponsored program designed for college students and young professionals looking to develop leadership skills and career connections while supporting the community. “Rotaract was connecting young professionals together long before social networks even existed, and continues to be an incredible resource in our community,” added Carr. Through Rotaract, he helped launch programs to support foster youth, as well as homeless and low-income seniors in downtown San Diego. It is also the place where he met his wife, Heather Rosing, a shareholder and Chief Financial Officer at the law firm of Klinedinst PC.

As District Governor, Carr is charged with leading nearly 65 Rotary Clubs. During the 2017-18 year, Carr has identified several areas of focus, including women leadership development, environmental sustainability, active and retired military, and youth. His key message was to focus on the "WHY" we are involved in Rotary. He indicated that almost 112M children have been saved from polio.

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Paul Butler and Vicky Mallett announced that Bocce fundraising has reached almost $40,000!! YooHoo... Our goal is $60,000 and we are close. Vicky has urged all members to bring in at least one sponsor by end of August. Phil, the General Manager of Hilton Del Mar provided an auction basket worth $750 of various items including stay at the Hilton.

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Who Am I by Kevin Cahill

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Aug 06, 2017

We had another exciting Who Am I talk by Kevin Cahill. He was the founding member of DMSB Rotary back in 1992. He was born in Los Angeles 59 years ago and was always involved in acting at very young age. He graduated from UCSD and his big accomplishment was winning a $10M law-suit for his company. His favorite countries are Switzerland and Austria. He raised his 2 sons as a single father from the ages of 2 & 4.

Favorite Movie: Wizard of Oz

Morning ritual: Prayers, 3-4 mile run

His Big Billboard Sign: BE NOT AFRAID - Carpe Diem.

India Paraplegic Global Grant and Who Am I by George

Posted by Ssanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 28, 2017

It was George's wonderful Who Am I story that got everyone dancing :-). As Bill Sutton wrote in his summary -- An inspiring "Who Am I" was given by our own Sgt. at Arms GEORGE SOUSA who told of his military service during the Korean Conflict ("Bloody Ridge", "Heartbreak Ridge", and others), his fishing for tuna from San Diego and his dedication to his wife (Lou) of more than 65 years. George's 3 Q&A were as follows:

Favorite movies: Gunga Din and Singing In The Rain.

Morning ritual: Feed dog, go for walk and then breakfast.

What will his big billboard say: Thank God you are in America - God Bless America!

Sanjiv Prabhakaran presented the history and motivation behind the Paraplegic Project in Ottapalam, Kerala, India. He talked about how a bright engineering student got pushed out of a crowded speeding train and became quadriplegic for life, BUT never lost his attitude towards life. He kept working hard towards rehabilitation and using his voice to control his computer and become productive by building web sites and helping Sanjiv's company with miscellaneous Word and Excel tasks. This Global Grant will support the clinic in Ottapalam that trains such individuals to become independent and self-sustaining so they can start their own business or find jobs that they can handle independently. The grant will provide several equipment, such as, specialized wheel chairs, sewing machines and 3-wheel motorized scooters. The local Rotary club will provide necessary business training and on-going support. Venkat Mandyam has already helped in securing approval from the district and is now waiting for the Rotary International Global Grant Foundation to provide final approval and funds. A total grant of about $35,800 will be provided, which includes a pledge of $5,930 from our club.

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ThinkergyUS - TIPS Profile Assessment & Casa de Amistad

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 28, 2017

Anyone who has taken an assessment before realizes they provide some unique insights. The TIPS Profile Assessment (www.thinkergyus.com/tips) is a breakthrough assessment tool being used by some on the top companies in the world. It helps everyone understand their natural strengths and how they can best contribute to an organization, as well as those they work with. Few of the DMSB members took the test and provided a view into the diverse strengths and talents within the member base.

Susan presented a $2,000 check to Casa de Amistad. Nicole Mione-Green was there to accept the check. Charles and Alicia matched portion of the funds.

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DMSB supporting Veteran's StandDown event

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 23, 2017

(Lou Oberman, Bev & Herb Liberman, Katie A volunteer)

(Charlotte, Rema, Kevin & Sanjiv)

(Music & dance at Stand Down)

(View of Stand Down)

(DMSB sponsor sign)

(Ken, Glens & Kirk Collins (former President DMSB) Mark & Susan Hennenfent)

(Ken, Bill, Kirk, Mark & Susan)

(A grateful homeless vet)

(Ken the MACHO guy with two 20 lb ice bags)

This was StandDown week and we had many DMSB members and their family members volunteering at the event. Our club was distributing cold chilled water bottles throughout the event. Fun music and dance was sponsored by the Wounded Warrior Project. A brief history of Stand Down can be read here - http://nchv.org/index.php/service/service/stand_down/.

Fostering A Spirit of Service Through World Music

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 23, 2017

FEATURED SPEAKER

Monica Emery - Executive Director, Center for World Music

Fostering A Spirit of Service Through World Music

Monica believes in the value of the arts and exposure to the world’s diverse cultures as a pathway to greater understanding and empathy among people. She has more than 15 years of experience working in organizations with international missions. Monica has also prepared hundreds of young people for international service and studies through Rutgers University, University of Maryland, and Princeton in Asia. She's had the great fortune to serve, twice, alongside a team of medicals professionals providing much-needed attention to populations in remote areas of the Philippines.

We also had a guest from Oceanside and club flags were exchanged with DMSB Rotarian Ken Barrett.

WhoAmI by Susan Hennenfent

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 23, 2017

It’s always amazing where life, and choices, take us. For Susan to grow up in North Dakota and have the experiences of living in Canton, spending a year in Finland, working in the defense industry here, being involved in the early stages of the internet and cell phones, and see the impact of your work with the Kindle . . . what a great adventure . . . so far!

Here is what we have for Susan's 3 questions:

Favorite movie - Castaway

First 60 minutes of your day - Take Thyroid med which means you can’t eat or drink for 30 minutes, so you read and make an espresso, then anxiously wait until you can actually have that first cup.

What you would put on a billboard - Can we all just get along!?

Neighborhood Legislature Initiative - TINY districts

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 14, 2017

John is committed to the ideals of limited government and personal responsibility, and is the author of the Neighborhood Legislature Initiative. Born, raised and educated in Chicago, from his very early life John was greatly influenced by his mother and stepfather who spoke often on corruption, waste and inefficiency in public schools and the post office system - both government-run monopolies. John attended the University at Chicago, graduating with honor and a degree in Accounting and Political Science and would go on to found many companies, building his businesses from scratch to having assets of over $200 million with almost 100 employees over the past 35 years. His primary goal in CA is to push the idea of TINY districts so that smaller groups of people are represented directly. He is running for governor of CA in 2018. Also, he said he is looking for grooms to marry off his 4 daughters :-).

SNAP Director Dorell Sackett gives overview of spay & neuter units

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jul 07, 2017

It was an exciting talk by SNAP Director Dorell Sackett. SNAP is the model organization for many mobile spay and neuter units through out the country. As director of SNAP programs, Dorell oversees the over 55,000 dogs and cats that have been fixed in San Diego County aboard the 38 foot, high-volume mobile unit, in addition to educating many, many more families on the importance of pet care. Other SNAP guests Haley Evans and Lori Walton were also present.

We had our new President Bill Sutton introduce all the new Board and Chair members. And the FUNNY part is that Bill LOST his gavel before the end of today's meeting :-). So, question is WHO STOLE IT :-).

Finally, our new Program Chair Kevin Ehlinger-Wilde introduced his new program to have each member do a "Who Am I" talk every week. He started off with his "Who Am I" talk today. Surprising fact we learnt was that he grew up on a farm with 10 siblings!! Kevin's 3 Q&A: Favorite movie: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang; Morning ritual: walk, meditate, read; Billboard message: Never settle for ordinary.

Gadgets, Gizmos, Good Health and review of Manav Chakravarthy's India project.

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 30, 2017

Susan Taylor, Director of External Affairs at Scripps gave an excellent review of all the Health related gadgets that has saved many patients' lives. She talked about the amazing recovery and care of athlete Phillipe May, who chose Scripps to take care of his irregular heart issue. A two-time world champion and a 12-time Swiss champion in speed skiing, he is one of only five skiers to exceed 156 mph down the slopes. Scripps hospital implanted an ICD (implantable cardioverter-defibrillator) to ensure his heart would not suddenly stop should he go into cardiac arrest.

We also had Venky's grandson Manav Chakravarthy talk about his website project that he designed and built for a clinic in India that helps disabled children.

Diane gets Paul Harris recognition & Liam's last day!

Posted by Sanjiv Prabhakaran on Jun 30, 2017

Exciting last day for Liam Murphy as President! He comes with a hammer since his gavel is gone :-).

Also, Diane Huckabee received the honor of becoming a Paul Harris Fellow. Congratulations Diane!