Our President, Lady Grizzly, a.k.a. Colette Lay, started our meeting off by reminding us that Mark Daniel Maloney from Decatur, Alabama is this year’s Rotary International President. The theme is “Rotary Connects the World”. Garth Riopelle was the greeter, whose Thought of the Day was: Vocation is in the very DNA of Rotary. It is the second of four ideals set forth in the Object of Rotary: “High ethical standards in business and professions; the recognition of the worthiness of all useful occupations; and the dignifying of each Rotarian’s occupation as an opportunity to serve society.” So, take a moment to reflect on the importance of vocation and how it impacts our conduct as Rotarians throughout the years.
After the flag salute, and a less than impressive group rendition of a patriotic song, Garth Riopelle shared a few interesting facts about himself. He’s a been a practicing dentist in San Ramon for 30 year. Married to his wife, Michelle, who is a doctor and a former club member. He has three sons, two of whom are working in the tech field, and the third finishing his degree at University of Colorado, Boulder after which he will be heading into tech. He noted his inability to interest any of them in the medical field.
VISITING ROTARIANS
One visiting Rotarian, Peter Callahan, from the Lafayette Club. He is new to Rotary, having joined only six months ago. He works in rural Uganda building water wells. It was commented by a member that he may only have officially joined Rotary six months ago but seems like he’s been a Rotarian for much longer. His wife, Valerie Callahan, was also in attendance.
HONORED AND WELCOMED GUESTS
Craig Stevens, San Ramon PD Police Chief, and Ann Lucena, CEO of San Ramon Regional, were both in attendance this week. Both have submitted their applications for membership! Thank you to members Glen Weber and Gary Sloan, respectively, for their roles inviting both Craig and Ann to join.
Speaking of Glen and Gary, both had their lovely wives – and loves of their lives - in attendance. It was a pleasure to have Ginny Weber and Barbara Komas as guests this week.
NEWS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS
Karen McNamara shared a thank you letter received from the Trinity Center expressing their sincere thanks for the gift card and donations.
Colette Lay shared a similar thank you letter from the San Ramon Valley Education Foundation for the club’s generation donation, which totaled $57,757.88!!
Ray Giles talked about making it easy to donate to the Rotary International Foundation. We are all committed to do it but sometimes the best plans get waylaid. For those that don’t know, your Foundation donation – one time or recurring - can be added to your San Ramon Rotary monthly bill. How much easier does it get? He had a sign-up sheet for members wishing to do that. Colette Lay then presented him with a grizzly pin along with her sincere thanks and appreciation for all he does not only for the Foundation, but for the club.
PROGRAM
This week’s speaker, Michele McKay-McCoy, was introduced by Gary Sloan, and what an introduction it was.
Ms. McKay-McCoy spent many years as a prosecutor, first for the Contra Costa County District Attorney’s Office, then for Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office. She specialized in crimes against children (yes, it was just as grim as can be imagined). She ran for judicial office in Santa Clara County in 2007 and won. She’s worked many different criminal calendars as a judge, but for the past three years has been assigned to the competency calendar, dealing with mentally ill and mentally disabled people who commit crimes.
She retired on January 17, 2020. Her plans for retirement include volunteering for nonprofit organizations and giving talks on the U.S. Constitution to schools, service clubs and anyone who will have her. Although not technically a constitutional law scholar, she’s a self-proclaimed “big fan” of the Constitution, and she is disturbed by the amount of misinformation floating around about it these days.
After passing around copies of the Constitution in booklet form and inviting each of us to sign the back pledging to uphold it, she proceeded to give a presentation that would leave anyone with the impression that she is, in fact, a constitutional law scholar!
Giving a brief history of how we came to get the constitution by describing the first go-around known as the Articles of Federation, which was a disaster. Each state was its own entity, and had it’s own currency. Nothing got done unless there was a unanimous vote. It needed to be scrapped. James Madison led the idea to get delegates from the states to help. Many essays were written by James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay. These were known as The Federalist Papers. If anyone has seen Hamilton (the musical) you will have the impression that Hamilton wrote most of the papers. In fact, James Madison wrote just as many, and Ms. McKay-McCoy observed perhaps he will get more love when he has a smash musical written about him.
The Constitution consists of three parts: 1) the Preamble, which is like a mission statement, 2) Articles 1-7, which describes how the federal government will work, and 3) the amendments, the first ten of which were passed at the same time as the Constitution and are collectively known as the Bill of Rights.
Thankfully, along with our copies of the Constitution, Ms McKay-McCoy, included the cliff notes version of the most important parts.
RECOGNITIONS AND GOOD NEWS
Brent Tucker shared what he did earlier this month to celebrate his birthday, and then recognized himself for $72.
Guy Greco recognized and shared his appreciation of Glen Weber for his role in helping Guy to procure proper hearing devices. Guy is pleased to announce they are working brilliantly and now he can hear everything someone says. It might have been a warning, not sure.
Geoff Disch shared that his son is getting married, while noting that just two years ago same son swore he would NEVER get married again. Never say never!
Kathy Gailey and husband, Scott, are in escrow on a property at Lake of the Pines. Exciting!
Sergeant of Arms, Julie McKinney, is looking for informants/snitches to help liven up the Recognition portion of the meeting. Please reach out to her if you have any information on fellow members that you feel should be shared.
RAFFLE
Edgardo Carrillo headed up the raffle this week, and interestingly his ticket was drawn for both the greeter’s gift AND the marble pull. Hmmmm…. In true Rotarian style, he immediately donated by the $20 GG and $10 marble pull to Interact.
Meeting was adjourned at 1:15 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Julie McKinney, Scribe
