President Rob opened the meeting at the meeting site: Holiday Inn Express of Brattleboro, VT. Rob welcomed all to the March 27, 2025 meeting of the Brattleboro Rotary www.brattlebororotaryclub.org

Invocation:

Frank Rucker provided the invocation.

Rob lead the club with the Pledge of Allegiance

President Rob presented the Rotary Motto Service Above Self

Chris Hart lead the club in reciting the Rotary four way test.

Four Way Test -

Is it the TRUTH? Is it FAIR to all concerned? Will it build GOODWILL and BETTER FRIENDSHIPS? Will it be BENEFICIAL to all concerned?

25 Members, 0 Student Rotarians and 2 guests attended the meeting.

Guests:

Tom Franks introduced his guest, Franz Reichsman, a loyal public
servant and a great member of our community. Frank Rucker briefly introduced his guest, Chris
Chapman, who will be our speaker today.

JOKE OF THE WEEK - For our joke or song of the week:

Stay tuned.

ED NOTE: 2023-24 weekly assignments are posted on the club website.

Rotarians for Rotarians:

Bill Bedard rehab at Pine Heights. It would be nice if Rotarians could give him a call or stop by to see
him. He is on the 2nd Floor at Pine Heights. Rob mentioned that Paul Gustafson from Putney is
also at Pine Heights. Bill McKim said that Paul has a piano in his room and Bill plays for him
every week.

New Members:

ROTARY MINUTE

Carl Lynde spoke about how he got involved in Rotary. In the 1980’s, Jesse
Corum and Joe Little invited him into Rotary and he actually got accepted. At that time there
were about 90 – 100 members, but we were the only Club in the area. Banking was
experiencing some challenges with the significant real estate collapse at the time. Carl was a
Commercial Lender and was working a lot of hours. The Club was very strict back then about
attendance, so commitment was a big deal, but he found it was a respite from work. At the
time most of his participation was as a worker bee. But he was also involved in many other
organizations. He worked at TD Bank, and they were very supportive, all he had to do was get
his work done and meet all his goals. He has great memories of Rotary over all these years. He
remembers the big projects, the deck at Living Memorial Park which took place over 3 days
with a crew of 9. Art Greenbaum of GPI Construction ran the project, and he was amazing.
Another project was the access ramps that were built at Cersosimo Lumber Company over the
winter. Christmas Tree sales – back then there were 900 trees sold and we had to go to the
farm and load them up. At that time the Golf Tournament’s big award was a single golf ball and
it became an amazing fundraiser.

Note for future presenters; The Rotary Minute could also have the speaker talk about their personal involvement in Rotary or personal background.

Years of Service in our Club for March:

On Behalf of our Club and all Rotarians, thank you for your Service Above Self

Student Rotarian updates:

Stay tuned.

Birthday greetings -

BIRTHDAY ANNOUNCEMENTS FROM RUBEN -

Ruben announced that today is Cindy Jerome’s birthday. Next week Jerry Theberge
has a birthday. After the Rotarians sang Happy Birthday, Cindy was given the opportunity to
speak, and she said that she is feeling very blessed. She is grateful to live in Vermont and in
West Dummerston, and she loves Brattleboro. Her kids are doing well. She is getting married
in 51 days. A homemade flourless chocolate torte is waiting for her when she gets home. Life
is good!

Announcements

Stan announced the following community projects:
Connecticut River Conservancy Clean Up – Saturday, April 26th and Sunday, April 27th. We will
be cleaning up the Brattleboro shore along the Riverfront Park. This is the area around the old
Brattleboro/Hinsdale bridge. This is a joint project with Sunrise Rotary.
Brattleboro Downtown Garden Clean Up – Saturday, May 3rd – Vermont Green Up Day
We have done this project for several years. It involves a spring trimming for the summer
season.
Stan has a conversation going with Brattleboro Area Hospice regarding the cleanup of their
Memorial Garden.
More details will be provided prior to each event. Please check your calendars to see your
availability.
We are all set for Groundworks meal on April 10th. Stan wanted to thank everyone who is
contributing. 45 people are being served and our efforts are appreciated. These meals will
continue on Wednesdays, that seems to be the best day of the week.
Rob announced that we will be moving Rotary items into the new storage unit this coming
Sunday. Betsy and Rob are leading the charge for moving things in. Items being stored are a
grill, ski jump stuff, banners, sandwich board and disc golf tournament related items. Betsy said
if you have any items to be stored, please get them to her house on Sunday at 11:00. Mara
mentioned that there are 2 or 3 large blue tubs currently stored in the old apple storage place
on Bonnyvale Road. Those boxes contain our Charter and some of our most important objects.
Cheri Ann mentioned that she is concerned that the unit is not weatherized so it may not be
appropriate to store some of the items. Cindy Jerome asked about where the old Naugahyde
briefcase is, and Rob said it was being delivered in two months. Bill McKim has a very big
collection of Rotary songs that were bestowed on him by another Club member, and he would
like to bestow them on another member. Rob asked him how long it was going to take to sing
them to him.

Gina- Golf tournament June 5th

Annual Disc Golf Tournament October 4th and 5th.

Happy Dollars and Brags

Rick Manson bragged $5 for Cathy being the scribe for him today. One of the things that
happens when you have Parkinson’s Disease is that you can’t write worth a hoot.
Tom Franks bragged a $1 for Stan who keeps us busy. That is one of the things Tom loves about
Rotary, he doesn’t have to manage or organize anything, all he has to do is just listen and show
up. He is so grateful for that.
Betsy fined Ruben because she saw his picture in the paper for Town Meeting. Ruben’s defense
was that he did not see it. The fine passed. Chris Hart wanted to add to Ruben’s fine, she
noticed that there were a couple of people at her table who did not have their badges on.
Someone mentioned that that would be a table fine, and Chris said she would pay $1 for the
table. Rob asked Ruben if he had any defense and he said he didn’t see it.
Carl bragged $3 for some recent projects that he was involved in. One for Sugar on Snow which
was well organized and a good event. Another for Betsy and the Ski Jump event. Carl lent his
pocketknife out and the third brag is that he got it back a couple of days later.
Bill McKim noticed that Chris Chapman was wearing his Rotary pin. Chris said it is a Paul Harris
Fellow pin. Bill was wearing his pin as well as Mara, so Bill wanted to brag for the three of them
in hopes that it will encourage others to wear their pin. Bill mentioned that Marty Cohn, a
former member of our Club and a current member of the Springfield, VT Club, wears his Rotary
pin everywhere he goes, and Bill thinks it is really wonderful.
Rob bragged that the 10th Annual Disc Golf Tournament is coming up in the fall. 10 years ago,
they were making plans to build the course and it was built in the heat of summer. The
Tournament will be held on October 4th and 5th.

ED NOTE: Weekly assignments for the invocation or motivational thought can be found on the club website.>

UPCOMING PROGRAMS

Jim announced the upcoming programs as follows:

4/3 Brattleboro Music Center
4/10 Director of the Career Center
4/17 Windham & Windsor Housing Trust
4/24 Vicky Senni, the new Executive Director of Green Mountain Camp in Dummerston

REMINDERS

Please bring your bottles and cans to the Putney Road redemption center to benefit APPN. Pure Water for the World is no longer operating in the USA; it continues in Honduras as APPN.
Maria Inestroza, the PWW country director for Honduras is continuing the work in that country under the name APPM, acronym for Agua Pura para El Mundo, or Pure Water for the World in Spanish Pure Water for the World. Please remember to inform the staff that the bottles and cans should be credited to the club.
“Like” the club’s Facebook page

PROGRAM

Speaker: Chris Chapman
Introduced by: Frank Rucker
Program: Brattleboro Walk in Clinic
Chris complimented us on the food today, it is much better than it used to be when he was a
member of our Club.
Chris said he has served for 21 years on the Board of Directors of the Walk in Clinic. There is
not a lot of board turnover. At last night’s meeting they received a check and a letter from the
Rotary Gift Giving Committee, signed by Cindy Jerome. He thanked our Club for our
contribution on behalf of the Walk in Clinic, which subsists on contributions from the
community, no grants are involved. They have one part time employee who is the
Administrator, everyone else is a volunteer, including the physician’s, RN’s and NP’s.
They are open on Tuesday’s from 5pm – 7pm. Their numbers are down significantly since some
people have been able to get on Green Mountain Healthcare. The population they serve is
mostly between ages 18 and 65, people who have no insurance or are unable to find care.
The Brattleboro Walk in Clinic was founded in 1993 by Dr. Tom Evans and his wife, Barbara.
They recognized the need in our community for those who lacked in aid or a medical provider.
It started in the Holstein Building and then moved to Belmont Avenue. 3-4 years ago, they
purchased a building from Dr. John Daly on Clark Avenue, just off Canal Street.
They provided 20,000 free patient visits over the years, fully 1/3rd of them are new to the
organization. They suspended patient visits in 2019 due to COVID and reopened in 2021. In
between that time the patients were managed by telephone. Dr. Tortolani called them back
and made follow up phone calls.
They have recently taken on providing assistance to help people get health insurance which has
been a big success. They have a trained nurse who is highly skilled in the healthcare system and
knows how to get someone signed up for insurance.

Scribe: Rick with the skills of Cathy

DISCLAIMER

Weekly changing scribes and questionable IT may have resulted in oversights and errors. We regret any mistakes.