Niskayuna Rotary

We will be gathering at the home of Rita Badami this Wednesday night to knuckle down and make scarves for our upcoming fundraiser at Craig School. The Fundraiser will run from 6:00 to 8:00 PM. We will be selling handmade scarves in the Niskayuna School colors for $10 each in an effort to raise money for our Back to Work Initiative and our Blankets for Babies project. Anyone who may be able to lend a hand please let us know and will are more that happy to find something for you to do. See everyone tomorrow at 7:00 PM

Just a reminder for everyone, Friday, February 5th is Glenville Rotary’s twenty-first annual Ziti Dinner from 4:00 – 7:30 PM at the Glenville Senior Center. The proceeds from the dinner will go to benefit the Northeast Regional Food Bank, Scotia-Glenville Food Pantry as well as other Rotary Service Projects. The cost will be $8.00 for adults, and $6.00 for senior citizens and children. There will be entertainment, prizes and much more. For those who will be unable to stay and enjoy the festivities, take-out dinners are available. For more information please contact Charles Lindholm at cdlinholm@gmail.com.

We would like to take a moment to thank all of you who heltped make the Alesandrini Family Benefit Dinner a success last week. We raised a little over $1300 over the course of the evening between Ticket Sales, Silent Auction Items, and Private Donations.

We would also like to thank the local businesses that showed their support by donating either supplies such as plates, and silverware, or items for our silent auction. Without their support our efforts would never have amounted to so much. We are currently awaiting replies from a few of the winners of the silent auction, and once that is taken care of, all of the proceeds will be delivered to the Alesandrini family.

Lastly we would like to thank the area Rotary clubs who came out and showed their support. There were a total of 8 Clubs represented (Scotia, Glenville, Twin Bridges, Burnt Hills Ballston Lake, Schenectady East, Rotterdam Sunrise, and of course Niskayuna) at the benefit dinner.

Again, Thanks to all of our sponsors:

-Price Chopper
-Hannaford
-Niskayuna Wine and Liquor
-Gershon’s Deli
-I Love NY Pizza
-AJ Floral
-The Right Touch
-Good Memories
-The Crown Plaza Hotel
-Bowtie Cinemas
-Lennon’s Irish Shop
-Two Spruces Pottery and Glassy Beads
-Ben & Jerry’s
-Friendly’s
-Haigen Daaz
-Tony Dileva

Last week a member of our local community lost most of his home to a tragic fire. He is a small buisness owner, a husband, a father, and he is only thirty three years old. Due to a miscommunication with his insurance company, the amount of money he is recieving will not even cover the rest of his mortgage payment let alone any reconstruction costs or living expenses. In order to help out him and his family, Niskayuna Rotary is hosting a Ziti Dinner Fundraiser and Silent Auction on Tuesday, November 10th from 6-8pm at the Immanuel Lutheren Church on Union Street. tickets are $10 a piece and all proceeds go to the Alesandrini family. Members of the Niskayuna Club will be visiting local clubs with tickets available to purchase. You can also contact Emily L. Miller if you would like to purchase tickets at emily.lauren.miller@gmail.com. Thank you all for your support.

Just an update on some of the upcoming events:

Farewell to Blase: Join us to wish Blase well as he heads South for the winter. Hors d’oeuvres at Rita’s this evening beginning at 6 PM.

Speaker Event: Tuesday Morning, 7:15 at the Blue Ribbon Diner. Susan Appe will be joining us to talk about her Ambassadorial Scholarship.

Burnt Hills- Balston Lake Apple Pie Fest.- Tuesday night at Burnt Hills High School. Tickets are $5 for adults, $4 for children. Please join us and show your support.

In attendance this morning were Blaise, Phil, Dave, Emily, Lon Penna, Rita, Derek, District Governor John Eaton, and prospective new member Ravi. We were very pleased with the great turnout for our program this morning, thank you all for coming!

A little buisness got taken care of after the bell, pledge and invocation by Derek. There was a fire on Fillmore Ave in Niskayuna destroying a home yesterday morning. the club decided a pancake breakfast owuld be a nice fundraiser to help out the Alesandrini family. The date is tentativley scheduled for November 13th, 2009, a Saturday at the Immanuel Luthern Church in Niskayuna. Wmily will reach out to the homeowners before proceeding with ticket printing and selling.

Rita spoke to the group about her time at RLI this weekend, she brought up some great things that she learned about the foundation, as well as the inverse pyramid and the whole structure of Rotary.

Blankets for Babies is coming along well. Emily has a lead on a venue for a 24 hour sew-a-thon. Shipping is $1.65 per blanket and we ship in large quantities. Jorge will contact John Eaton to see what we can do about district funding.

Our highlight of our morning was however, our speaker!! Phillip Morris, CEO of Proctors joined us this morning. It was very interesting and informative and we all send our thank yous to him for joining us. He explained how Proctor’s is reaching out the community through programs he developed called The Third Way and the Ambassadors Program which helps bring together people of different backgrounds from weekly chess games to city mission residents working at shows to help people cross the street and welcome the guests. He also explained to us about how theater is not really a money making business, the cost andthe expense of bringing in big shows like Wicked and the Phantom of the Opera and how the financing actually works. He also mentioned someting that was really interesting, Proctor’s has its own power plant in the building that heats itself and multiple surrounding buildings!! How cool! It was great insight into a landmark in Schenectady and a center of the community itself. Thank you again Mr. Phillip Morris.

Lastly, a reminder that next tuesday night, November 3rd is the Burnt Hills-Ballston Lake clubs fundraiser, the Apple Pie Festival, it is taking place at Burnt Hills High School and tickets are $5 each for anyone who would like to attend.

Happy Tuesday!

I just wanted to post a quick thank you to not only those from our club that were in attendance, but also to District 7190 as a whole, John Eaton, and Christine Harvey-Berry for making it all happen. It was not only insightful but also a great opportunity to get some new ideas for projects, and build new friendships that will help facilitate our efforts in the future. We also have a prospective new member joining us for our speaker event tomorrow, His name is Ravi, he is an employee of Key Bank and we look forward to his visit and possible continued participation with our club.

On another note, we’d also like to take this opportunity to remind everyone that Rita and her husband Vivek will be hosting an event on Wednesday wishing Blase farewell for now as he makes his way South for the winter months. This event will be held at Rita and Viveks home and will have hors d’ourves. Event starts at 6, please contact Rita for more information or join us tomorrow morning at the Blue Ribbon Diner from 7:15 to 8:15 am.

See everyone in the morning.

Just as a reminder to all, Lon sent out an email last night regarding the New Member Orientation for District 7190. This event is not limited to only new members, but is a great way to meet fellow Rotarians and network to help us achieve our goals.This is a free event open not only to new members, but also perspective members and those who may have been Rotarians for some time already. Orientation will be held on October 26th, starting at 6:00pm at the Holiday Inn Express in Clifton Park. The address is 18 Clifton Park Village Road, Clifton Park, NY 12065. If you are able and plan to attend please contact Christine Harvey-Berry at frank_christine@yahoo.com. Food will be available, but again contact Christine for further details.

In attendance today were Rita, Blaise, Jorge, Phil, Emily, Dave, Lon, and Derek (briefly before his surgery). Today was a day of exciting news and prospects. Derek stopped by quickly this morning to give a treasurers report, we are all very thankful for his hard work!! Rita then announced some more exciting news in that the state has agreed to fill in all of the cracks at the traffic circle by the end of October and if not then before the snow hits!! This will go a long way to help make the community more pretty!!

Also, Blaise and Emily visited two 3rd grade classrooms at the Yates School yesterday to distribute dictionaries, they were well recieved. They will visit the Martin Luther King Jr. School next Monday, 10/26 at 11:30am. Cans for a Cause is going strong, Rita has been collecting from her work, Emily has also ben collecting. Rita proposed a contest for whomever brings int he most money for Cans for a Cause Rita will purchase their Rotary t-shirt. The next fundraiser is the gift wrapping at Barnes and Noble which is scheduled for Saturday December 5th from 2-4 and Sunday December 13th from 12-2 at the Niskayuna Barnes and Noble.

A new project idea was introduced, a literacy program for a local Schenectady Elementary schools whereby we stem it off of the old Pizza Hut readers contests. A Stewarts free ice cream coupon for every kid who reads ten books in a month, a blue ribbon at the end of the year to commemorate their participation in the literacy drive. If we get a booklist from the teachers perhaps we can look into getting books donated and every kid who reads the whole book list would get a gift card to buy more books for themselves. Dave will chair this project and get back to us.

Just a reminder, next week is our speaker event, Phillip Morris CEO of Proctor’s will be joining us. All are welcome to attend, and we are encouraged to bring a friend in an attempt to hopefully increase membership.

In Attendance today was were Dave, Rita, Blaise, Emily, Derek, Jorge, and Lon Penna. We also had the pleasure of Don’s company, a visiting rotarian. After the bell was rung, pledge and prayer said, we got down to business. First item on the agenda was the upcoming fundraiser in December. We were presented with a contract from Barnes and Noble allowing us to gift wrap in their Niskayuna store on December 5th, 2009 from 2-4 pm. We decided to acecpt this date and ask Barnes and Noble if we could also have the following Sunday December 13th, for another two hour slot. More information to follow on that next week.
Blaise then brought up the concept of membership and what we can do and must do to increase our numbers. The club decided that we must create a unique idea that will draw in members, have activities that will bring in the families of rotartarians instead of pulling rotarians away from their families. The idea was brought up to also reach out to thriving rotary clubs for tips on how to increase membership. The club disucssed the reasons why we all joined rotary, most felt that as the community has given to them, they feel an urge to give back to not just the community and the country, but the world as a whole.
The club decided that as the weather should be perfect on Wednesday 10/14, we will plant the tulip bulbs in the traffic circle at 6pm. Hope to see everyone there!