A Message from the Club President

Greetings on behalf of all members of the Rotary Club of Parksville.

I would like to thank the Rotary Club of Parksville for entrusting me with the leadership of the club for the coming year of 2008 - 2009.  I look forward to working closely with the membership and the newly installed executive and I am sure that by June 2009 we will all be a much closer group.

Our theme for this coming year is “Make Dreams Real” and our Rotary International President D.K. Lee of Korea has asked each club to continue their focus on youth and family - internationally and within our local communities.

Community Service is already contributing to family with support to ShelterBox Canada where our box is now helping a family in China.  I would like to see two more boxes sent out under the name of Parksville Rotary during the next 12 months. Perhaps an opportunity to support family in our community will come up this year.  Vocational service is helping families provide an education with our scholarships to Ballenas students. The opportunity to an education in Canada is sometimes taken for granted while young people in third world countries do not share that opportunity.  Rotary is building schools around the world and proving text books and materials.

I would like to see us take a role in Rotary's battle against polio, both in terms of meeting the Gates Foundation challenge grant and in reducing the number of polio-endemic. That challenge is for every Rotary Club in the World to donate $1,000 to defeat polio. 30,000 children die from preventable causes in our world every day of the year. 30,000 per day. We exceeded our goal for last year towards Rotary International Foundation with a new goal of $4,400 for 2008-09.

Many of the projects that Rotary Clubs are already involved in, in the areas of water, health and hunger, and literacy, already saves the lives of countless children every year. I will be prosing to our Club that we take an active role with the Mid Island World Community Service program that is already assisting with Rotary Projects in Mexico and Ghana.

Our programs like Youth Exchange will see Abby Brackett will be leaving for Bolivia in a month or so and our In Bound student Fabian Kochli is coming from Switzerland.  This program I helps young people comprehend the world better. For young people, especially when they are living with host families, it is a kind of experience - an immersion experience - that cannot be duplicated.  It brings rewards that are life-long and benefits that reach far beyond that one individual.

MOASIC offers our local youth the opportunity to showcase their talents on stage and benefits them with bursaries and grants to pursue their dreams. Young students are learning the skills of public speaking that will only help them with their futures as young adults.

Our Peace Park Project is the pride of Parksville along with the AM Club. Every Parksville Rotarian should be extremely proud of this accomplishment. It is my hope that 'our club, which celebrates 30 years of Service Above Self during 2009, will take on a new legacy project within the City of Parksville.  A new picnic shelter or amphitheatre in our Community Park.  Big dreams?  Perhaps.  Achievable?  No doubt.

Part of why Rotary is so exciting for me is that we are able to do more through Rotary than we could do alone.  We can do more as a club than we could as an individual, we can do more as a district than we could do as a club, and when you look at all of global Rotary, you can really dream big dreams.

If you every have the opportunity to visit our paradise on Vancouver Island we welcome you to please drop by and visit our Club.

Yours in Rotary Service

Bill McKinney

President

2008 - 2009