There will be an election of Directors for Rockford Rotary at our June 5th meeting.  We will be electing 3 members to serve a 2-year term as Director starting July 1, 2025.  The following members, in alphabetical order have announced their intention to run for this election: Tom Huber, Brian Martin, and Suzanne Shelain.  Those three will be on the ballot unless more candidates come forward.  There will also be a chance to nominate more candidates at the meeting.

     In order for the election to be held, a quorum of 1/5 of the active members must be present to vote.  This means that we need 19 members to show up on June 5th and vote.  Our by-laws say that we must vote by ballot so there cannot be a simple voice vote.  We encourage our members to show up and vote for these directors who will be leading the club for the next two years. 

 

     Angela Kay Larson is a proven business leader, strategist, and marketing professional with a recognized talent for building collaborative working relationships and driving execution through leadership, coaching, and team dynamics - all toward translating business strategy into action.  Angela has experience in several sectors including manufacturing, non-profit, tourism, economic development, healthcare, and agriculture.

     Before joining the Greater Rockford Chamber of Commerce in August 2024, Angela served clients through her consulting firm, Grindstone Strat3egic.  Prior to that she served as Vice President of Marketing for Woods Equipment Company, a Division of Oregon Tool where she was responsible for new product initiatives, pricing optimization, channel communication, brand awareness, and facilitation of overall business strategy.

     Earlier in her career, Angela served as Director of Marketing for SwedishAmerican Health System, now UW Health.  Currently, Angela is Chairman of the Board of German American Bank, a Foresight Financial Bank, and serves on the board of Hargrove Association Insights, a research and collective intelligence firm.

     Angela is married to a fourth-generation farmer and lives on a farmstead in the rolling hills of Pecatonica.

     Angela will bring us up to date on what is happening at the Greater Rockford Chamber of Commerce and what she sees in the future for the organization.  This will be an informative program and one you will want to bring a guest or prospective member to join us in person at Memorial Hall or via Zoom.  Suzanne Shelain will introduce our presenter and act at Rotary host.

 

 

     Due to a conflict with the 2025 Rotary International Convention in Calgary, Canada, we had to reschedule our "Order of the Shelf" program to June 12th.  Roast Master Paul (Logli) will be leading the festivities as we welcome Paul Von Driska as our 2025-26 President.  This is always a fun meeting because Paul (Logli) and his gang have been digging around the Internet for information about Paul (Von Driska).  I hope we don't get the Paul's confused, or we could end up with Paul Logli as President again.  As usual, because of the nature of this program, we discourage visitors on June 12th.

     PP Pete Rundquist will discharge his last duty as Past President and host the program and try to keep things under control.

 

     I met with both Julie Clark and Amanda Becker on Friday morning at Auburn, delivering the 2 $550 checks. Julie will give them the checks at the graduation ceremony on Saturday June 7. Julie thinks the girls will be very much surprised.        Thanks to each of you for helping move the gifting process along, and many thanks to our Rockford Rotarians for their generous and timely responses.

 

Warren Heinke, liaison to the Auburn Interact Club

Road Trip Recap

 

     Our May 29th Meeting was a road trip to the Perks Family Equine Center at Lockwood Park.  We learned about the different programs the Park District is conducting in conjunction with horses.  After great presentation by Kayla Tilly, we were able to go out into the arena and pet 3 of the 4 horses that were out there.  As you can see from the pictures below, a good time was had by the 23 Rotarians who attended.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

     On May 15th, nine members of our club assembled at the Rockford Family Peace Center for our annual planting of flowers in the flower beds in front of the center.  Thank you, Mike, Eric, Paul, Suzanne, Mary Ann, Mary, Becky, Pete and Tom for your effort to make the Peace Center a bit more beautiful.  We have heard from the Peace Center that they get a lot of compliments on the flower beds.