President Kayla Mudge opened the meeting noting that there are 302 days until the next Star Wars Movie and that today is National Tequila Day, National Cousins Day, National Thermal Engineer Day, and National Amelia Ehrhart Day.
Exavier King led the Pledge of Allegiance and Dick Myren gave the invocation.
Pam Cohen handled the raffle today. Kayla won today’s pot of $45 and a chance to draw the Ace of Clubs. But she did not, so the large pot carries over to next week!
Next, today’s guests were introduced:
- Troy Campbell from Mesa Rotary Club and is the District Interact Chair
- Raychelle Hernandez the Senior Director of Admissions Benedictine University
- Diego Felix-Davis, our newest club member and his spouse Jeff Davis
- Ignacia Conchas a friend of Diego's from Phoenix Rotaract attended via Zoom
- Kerwin Brown from Tanner Community Development
Following introductions was Diego’s formal induction into the club. His sponsor Colleen Coons discussed that Diego was a good fit with our club due to his involvement Rotary Youth Exchange, Rotaract, and RYLA. He has a bachelor’s degree in Media and Communications, and a Master’s degree in Human Resources. She showed the video that Diego created to promote RYLA. Diego talked about what inspired him to join Mesa West, including the wonderful friendships that have already developed. Kayla performed the formal induction and had Jeff fasten the official Rotary pin on Diego’s shirt.
Next, Pam Cohen presented Kerwin Brown with an $1100 check from for Tanner Community Development to help with building the Tanner Thomas Village for Veterans.
Kayla then presented some surprise awards, including
- Paper Plate Award to Lola McClaine being a magical memory maker and taking tons of photos for our weekly bulletin, the Messenger.
- Partner in Crime Award to Ed Koeneman who will answer texts at all hours of the day or night to assist Kayla.
- Rotarian of Month from Mesa West Award to Andy Bradford. And Andy will pick the award winner for next month, and so on!
Next, Sergeant of Arms, Andy Bradford did Happy Bucks:
- Pam was happy to welcome Diego to the club and announced that his coffee is fabulous
- Ted Williams -was happy that his 2nd great-grandchild was born, a couple of his grandsons are getting married and more great-grandchildren are due by the end of year
- Dick Myren was glad to be back at Rotary after a couple of meetings off due to a fall
- Harry Grossman was happy to have purchased his first raffle ticket, even though he didn’t win
- Colleen Coons was happy that her husband, Dan had his knee replacement surgery on Friday and is now walking without a walker, and was happy to see Raychelle at today’s meeting
- Diego Felix-Davis is happy to be a Rotarian and happy to be a part of Mesa West because we have projects in Mexico, his home country
- Deb Koeneman was happy to report that past RYE students from our District, Olivia, Lotte, and Carlota are vacationing together at Carlota’s sister’s house in Majorca, Spain
- Ron Thompson thanked Diego for all the things he said about Mesa West as they made him feel better about himself
- Jay Paulus was happy to announce that the Benedictine food pantry program will be expanding and that on August 5th, a USAID rep will be speaking at the Mesa Gateway Satellite Club
- Ed Koeneman is happy to be home from his travels, that Diego is part of our Rotary Family, and that Troy Campbell was at today’s meeting
- Warren Williamson was happy to tell his weekly joke. He told a story about a young woman who went into coma having her twin babies. A month later when she woke up she found out that her brother had named the girl “Denise” and the boy “De nephew”
- Kayla was happy that an Interactor who was in a car accident on the way home from the Interact retreat is home from the hospital (has a broken femur and other injuries)
Today’s speaker was Ed Koeneman, who talked and shared pictures of his recent travels to the Rotary International Convention in Calgary, to Kenya with the Interact Crutches for Africa program, and to the Interact retreat in Prescott.
Kayla closed the meeting with announcements of upcoming events.