David lived his very interesting life to the full and his work with Rotary Hawthorn and the District was covered off in Simon O’Donoghue’s reflections at the Service. David was also very active in fund raising for the Epworth hospital and programs for the prevention of child abuse; it was easy to see he was well deserving of the AM awarded in 2001 for “service to the community”. Judi and the Rosback family were very appreciative of the support provided by Hawthorn and District Rotary in recognition of David’s long-term association with Rotary.

As mentioned in last week’s Bulletin, the Sensory Garden renewal project at Box Hill Hospital has been completed by Katrina and her team. Staff at Box Hill have invited the Hawthorn Rotary team to a special lunch on Friday 2^nd February to thank the Club for supporting the project, and Sue Felton will be joining us in recognition of the John Carre-Riddell bequest funding the project.

Anne Scott has initiated a project called “Every Rotarian Every Year” to commemorate the 119^th anniversary of Paul Harris establishing Rotary on 23^rd February in Chicago.  Anne would like members to consider a donation of $100 at the meeting on Tuesday 20^th February to support the Rotary Foundation and we can collect these monies on the day via the front desk credit card facility. 

As outlined in a recent email and last week’s Bulletin we are having discussions with Kooyong LTC on their proposed increase for the meals and a new room charge to use their facilities for our in-person meetings.  We have investigated alternative venues with mixed success; some will offer a cheaper meal option but lack AV equipment, want to charge similar or higher room charges, or have issues with local parking for a 2 hour meeting session and none of the alternatives offer the same level of ambiance. 

We are working with RC Glenferrie to see if Kooyong will reduce the level of increase to continue our meetings at their venue.  Mark Howlett and I met with the Kooyong CEO and Events Manager today and were told they will review their offer and respond to us within a few days.

I will plan to give members an update on the Kooyong discussions at our meeting on Tuesday 6^th.

Announcements

The next Club meeting will be at Kooyong on Tuesday 6^th February. The meeting will include the induction of Alan Thomas as a new member.  The guest speaker is Jacqueline Kuruppu and her topic is Exploring the Response to Child Abuse and Neglect in Primary Care Settings.  Jacqueline is passionate about improving children’s health and wellbeing and completed a PhD on the response to child abuse in Australian primary care.

Annual Award for Service to Seniors on Tuesday 19^th March. Our special guest speaker is Gerard Mansour former Commissioner for Seniors.  Gerard is President of Winteringham, a not-for-profit welfare organisation created to address the scourge of elderly homelessness and will present our award.  We would encourage members to invite family and friends to this very special meeting.

Rotary District Conference Bendigo Weekend 12^th – 14th April.   David Pisterman, as Club Conference Coordinator, has been in contact with the Shamrock Hotel in Bendigo and they no longer have any rooms available for Hawthorn Rotary members. If you are planning to attend the conference it would be worthwhile locking in your accommodation prior to booking in for the Conference.

I look forward to catching up with as many members as possible at our first meeting for 2024 next week.

Doug McLean

President 2023-2024