Thank You District 7750

In another two hours, my tour as District Governor will end. I have made my thank you's in the June Newsletter. So in my last blog, I would like to look at the District goals for 2009/2010. Yeah, I know. Probably a real snorer. But the blog has been for me and the goals are worth a last look.

Membership
Membership Co-Chairs Baker and Golden announced that we were up a net 21 members. That does not include 20 new members in the Lake Wylie Club. If it holds, we were close to our goal of a net one new member per club.

Foundation
As of tonight, we had total contributions of $351,000. That was down from a total of $373,000 last year. I know there are additional contributions, including $10,000 of DDF money. Last year represented a 15% increase, and I believe we will be close to last year's number. The biggest increase was for polio, where club contributions went from $42,000 to $84,000. If anyone would like to see the whole report, please let me know.

My biggest disappointment was that there were three clubs who as of today had no contributions. A $5 contribution was made in their behalf. We had eight other clubs that at least to date, had less than $20 per member giving to the Annual Programs Fund. Some of these clubs do significant local service (see total funds raised below), but Rotary is defined by the Foundation and its enormous impact on world peace and understanding. Without significant participation in the work of the Foundation, these clubs would be better off as local service organizations. I hope that when the final numbers come in, many of these clubs will have stepped up.

Group Study Exchange
We had a fabulous exchange with Australia, and we sent a team to British Columbia, even though District 5040 opted not to send a team here. All of our team members said that it was an experience of a lifetime.

Literacy
Most clubs now have a literacy chairman, and Sara Mansbach started a new initiative called Ready for Reading, oriented to early childhood. There were Dictionary projects all over the District. I am very pleased with the literacy efforts.

International Projects
I had the opportunity to see District projects in Honduras and Haiti before the earthquake. The Haitian projects were even more important after the earthquake. I have said that if every Rotarian in the District could observe an international project, we would never have to worry about contributions to the Foundation again.

District Awards
Twenty six clubs won Presidential Citations. My goal was 30, and at least one club would have earned a Citation, but did not apply. There were individual club accomplishments that were incredible. Greenville Evening and Emerald City raised the bar for everyone.

Training
This is an unending challenge for District and Club Leadership. We had training sessions at District Assembly, RLI, Membership, Foundation Seminar, Literacy Chairs, Mid Year Assembly, PETS, Governor Elect, Governor Nominee, International Assembly, Secretary and Treasury efforts online and major training efforts from district officers and Assistant Governors. At every level of Rotary, especially Club Presidents and District Governor, about the time you know what you are doing, you are (happily) put out to pasture.

District Conference and Awards Luncheon
I would like to have had more signups and fewer commuters, but for those that came, it was as good as it gets.

Communications
Like training, communications are a sort of an unending battle. The Blog, some newsletter revisions, an expanded website, quarterly conference calls with AG's, metro club organizations in Greenville and Aiken, all made inroads. We got a PR Grant from RI and had billboards promoting Rotary around the District. PR is now one of three primary strategic objectives of Rotary, along with Strengthening Clubs and Increasing Service.

There are new tools, e.g. social networks, that I was too old to use. Perhaps future DG's will do a better job.

Youth Exchange, Rotaract, Interact, Early,Act, First Knight
What can I say. The programs operated beautifully, largely independent of the District Governor.

Vocational Service
We wanted Rotarians to signup for SC Pathways to Success. Rick Murphy and I pretty much failed, but part of that was a system problem. We will try again next year.

Administration
Pam Weaver was a tremendous addition and will provide badly needed institutional knowledge to future District Governors. She donated more time than she billed. Another thank you to Pam.

At the Montreal International Conference, it was said there were two kinds of Past District Governors. Those that talk too much and those that are in the cemetery. If you printed out my blog, it would run 50 pages. Obviously, I have been well trained to be a Past District Governor.

One of my goals was to track the hours and dollars that Clubs raised. We rolled out the numbers in a slide show at District Conference. District 7750 raised over $1.3 million for charity and contributed some 35,000 hours. We are reworking the slide show and spread sheet to get accurate numbers. My first effort as PDG will be to put this information on the website. Congratulations and thanks to all of the clubs.

It has been an honor to be your District Governor. My goal was to make every district event memorable. We succeeded beyond my expectations. To all those (and there were many) that planned, lead, spoke or participated in any of those events, I offer my profound thanks. And with all of the CART bucket contributions, I hope it is memorable for a long time.

In Becky Faulkner, Gary Goforth and Kim Gramling, you have outstanding future leadership. I hope you will support them as well as you have supported me.