State College Downtown Rotary Weekly Newsletter, Paul Rutter-Editor

March 2 Joint Meeting with Evening club at the Nittany Lion Inn: 5:30 p.m.
March 4 No meeting; see March 2
March 11 Bernie Punt, BJC
March 18 Barbara Farmer, Principal of Houserville/Lemont School-diversity
March 23 Prep night for Spaghetti dinner
March 24 Spaghetti Fund Raiser
March 25 TBA
April 1-30 Group Study Exchange to South Korea
April 1 Club assembly
April 8 Dean Thomas, IST Building
May 6-8 District Conference

Visiting Rotarians: Mr. Patel from India (with greetings from everyone in India), Geoff Wilson of the evening club; Dana Catalano from the Lewistown Rotary club(and prospective member with us)
Make-ups turned in: Paul Rutter & Darren Johnston
Guests:
50/50: Marshall Goldstein drew the jack of clubs and failed to take away the pot of about $300. There are 39 cards left to draw from next week.
Auction: Meg Moose provided the auction item, a gift certificate to Talbots. I think Meg was hoping that a male Rotarian might need to make amends for missing Valentines Day. The potential forgetful husband may have been Ron Taverno. Ron was the high bidder at $35.

ANNOUNCEMENTS: (Please send announcements for the newsletter to Paul)

Dec. 18 Christmas/Holiday Party-Gary Brytczuk with help from Chris Hickey

Dec. 16 PSA's - Rutter on CNET & Don Bedell on radio

Dec. 10-14 Festival of the Trees-
Carl Hill and Jim Eberly organized this effort. Helpers included Geise, Meckstroth, Kauffman, K.Kerner, Hickey, Ferguson, Friedman, DeArmitt, Brytczuk, Aungst, Biddle, Bedell, Taverno, Walsh, Coble, Turley, Gambone, Amato, Eberly, Bell, Martin, Moose, King,Zimbler, Christian, Fetter, G.Wilson, Johnston, Eberly(2), Davis, Bacastow, Held, Rutter

Dec. 3 Bell Ringing-Kauffman, Brytczuk, Biddle, Johnston, Meckstroth, Bedell, Myrick, Zimbler, Mose, Moose, Davis, Eberly, Hill, Aungst, Rutter

Nov. '03 Coupon Book committee- Linda Friedman, Pam Ferguson, Teresa Davis and the club.

Previous Mystery member's experience: This person played golf at the North Pole. click for answer
MARCH 13. On this Saturday, it's not St. Patricks Day it is the District Assembly. In Altoona... at the Casino over at Lakemont Park on Saturday, March 13. The meeting starts at 9:00 am and should be over by 4:00 pm. President Hugh says, "If I recall correctly, the Club pays the registration fee." If you are interested in learning more about Rotary and the district try to attend.
The coupon book sale continues on. Please do all you can to sell these books now early in the year. The coupons are good through 2004. Linda Friedman reported earlier that the coupon book sale has reached the break even mark so every additional book is profit for the club. Great job Rotarians...Keep selling!!
Spaghetti dinner tickets have been handed out. Each of us is responsible for selling 12. Please change the dates on your tickets to read the 24th. Some say the 19th. We each need to sell, sell, sell these tickets!!
A motion or suggestion has been made that in lieu of a member not selling his or her 12 spaghetti tickets, the member would be responsible for a $50 contribution to the club. The reasons I personally see this is a valid suggestion follow: in the past members would buy all of their tickets unable to be sold causing the club to purchase meal preparation materials and food stuffs that get spoiled from us having less diners actually using the tickets. The second reason is easier-- this IS a club FUND Raiser. In the past members have balked at having to sell. Again my personal take is this: the $50 bucks can be a check written to the 501(C)3 part of the club and one can take a deduction if itemizing as allowable by law please consult your tax advisor for your personal circumstances.-JPRIII/editor
The District Newsletter is online at the district Web site.
Our club has been approached by the Evening Club to start an Interact Club. A meeting is being coordinated to get something happening at the High School.
The evening Rotary club now has a list serv like us. Their address is RotaryEvening-L@lists.psu.edu. Contact Mary Johnston if you want to be added to their list.
The club has a list serv. All active members are on it. The email address for it is SCDTROTARY-@LISTS.PSU.EDU. Email Paul Rutter to see about your admission. It is a private listserv not open to the public. If you are already on it and want help with it please call or email me.
mystery answer: It was me, your editor, Paul Rutter. Here's a picture from my Submarine service days at the North Pole with Santa.

-TOP-

Previous Week's Speaker: Club Assembly

We had a club assembly and covered many issues. The meeting started sort of with many greetings from a Rotarian visting from New Delhi, India. It was very interesting to hear from him. He spoke of water management projects underway in India that Rotarians have had a part of in implementing.It makes one feel good about what Rotary is accomplishing!

For the treasurers report, Ron filling in for a vacationing Carl Hill said he would be staying after the meeting for a half hour to cover any questions from the statements that he passed out. We are still in the black.

Secretary's report: Attendance is hovering in the 70-72% range. Historically this is pretty good, but it sounds like Doug wants it higher.

Membership: Terry Edwards has agreed to take over duties here for the remainder of the year and next year. We accepted a resignation from MaryAnn Eberly since no one has heard from her regardign status and she hasn't asked fora suspension again. Scott Rawson will be back active when his leave of absence is up.

Mark Whitfield told us about the parklet for the Centennial project. It sounds liek it is going to be great.

Youth Exchange: Doug Holmes is the club chair of this. He let us know that we need to be thinking about including our two Youth Exchange students (Paul & Mayumi) when we are planning activities for our own families that Paul or Mayumi could participate in too. Paul Beauregard Blanc, from France, is staying with the Johnsons (number is available from Doug Holmes or Carl Hill) and Mayumi Doi from Japan is staying with Doug Holmes now and in March will be staying with Harry Zimbler.

Activities could be going to a PSU basketball or sports game, or a State College High School game, or going to workout, or if you are playing sports, for instance soccer. Or if you are going to a show, perhaps including Mayumi or Paul in your plans is possible.

Additionally, the club needs to find a host family for Paul (France) for the final third of the year. Ideally this would be with a family that is involved in sports. Paul speaks English well and easily adapts to new families and situations. He is interested in sports. Please call Doug Holmes if you can help out or have questions about what is involved. Doug's office number is: 865-2513. His home number is 238-3205.

For the Foundation 2 minutes, Linda Friedman spoke about the Rotary Foundation Peace Scholarship.

The board decided to add $47 to the money collected by Rotarians for the Chemba Africa project. This puts the club at the district level requested $5 per members suggested donation.

The Rotaract club is collecting used cell phones. These phones will then be rehabilitated in some fashion and given to women's shelters. As you know or might not know, cell phones, with battery power, will always connect to 911 even if there is no service contract with a cell provider. Please bring your used cell phones to our next meeting. Paul Rutter will take them to the Rotaract collection point at the HUB.

The District Assembly is March 13 at the Casino in Altoona. This is a great event if you are interested in learning more about Rotary and being a leader in Rotary.

The District Conference is May 5-7 in Maryland. You can download a registration form online.

This week’s note taker: Carol Walsh

DATE	AUCTION	INVOCATION	NOTES	THANKS
Feb. 26, 2004	Meckstroth	Rutter	Whitfield	Eberly
Mar. 11 , 2004	Moose	Taverno	Zimbler	Assembly
Mar. 18, 2004	Mose	Turley	Abramson	Edwards
Mar. 25, 2004	Myrick	Walsh	Amato	Ferguson
April 1 , 2004	TBA	Whitfield	Aungst	Fetter
	April 2004 to be published later

Contact club webmaster: Paul Rutter