Club President, Kristin Keller welcomed all to the meeting at Palmera Inn and Suites
Kevin Courtney offered the prayer and led the pledge to the flag.
 
Announcements:
 
Next week's meeting is off site at Mitchelville Freedom Park.
 
June 24th is Founders Night - all members and spouse/guest are invited.  Invitations with details will be coming out.
 
During the month of July we will be meeting at Palmera Inn and breakfast will be catered by Roy.  This will be a trial to see how it works out.
 
Sergeant at arms, Suzi Oliver collected Happy $$
 
Speaker:
Speaker this morning was Bernie Riedel, End Polio Now Coordinator for Zone 33. Bernie is a member of the Rotary Club of Hilton Head Island (the lunch club)
 
The Rotary Foundation was started in 1917 and in 1929 gave its first grant which was $500 to the International Society for Crippled Children which later became known as Easter Seals. Fast forward to 1979 when Rotary became involved in the eradication of polio - we viewed a video.  Why was polio chosen?  At the time, there were 1,000 cases a day; there were proven vaccines that had been tested and effective; the oral vaccine could be administered by people other than medical personnel.  Rotary did a pilot project in the Philippines and proved that it could be done.  1985 Polio Plus began and at the end of 3 years $247 million was raised (the goal was $120 million).  In 1988 partnership was formed with WHO, Unicef and GPEI.  Today there are 6 organizations involved.  The following chart shows the current status.
 
Our club was number 4 in the District for Total Polio Giving  this year - $10,496,  which is 638% of the goal of 1645! The Run with Bernie challenge had only 23 teams participating raised $103,000 and clocked 56,595 miles.  Our club did 6,730 miles and raised $2,708.  Bernie expressed appreciation for all the support that the club gave.  The new Rotary year Bernie will be doing - Run with Bernie, the Sequel and is encouraging all to participate.  Raise money for polio, participate and walk/run/row/bike/swim, etc.- anything that can be measured in miles.  More details will follow - it will begin July 1 and run to October 24 - World Polio Day- watch for opportunities to sign up with the team.