Video 2 on Vimeo

On October 13, Col. Davis Stevenson, Ret., the Club’s International Service Chair, updated the group on the status and details of the project to get aid to the Burned Children’s Hospital in Asuncion, Paraguay.   He provided background on the geography of Paraguay and on the medical needs there.  With the common practice of open flame cooking, accidents occur with young children, and these children need a better equipped facility than is currently available.  He showed pictures of the bare and minimal hospital and surgical rooms and noted that many children die from infections.  Our Club is helping out by paying $18,000 plus shipping for a MedShare shipment of medical supplies and used equipment to that hospital and a couple of others. Volunteers for MedShare repackage damaged goods and used equipment which would be discarded, store them in a large warehouse, and then ship them out.  Each container has $154,000 worth of equipment and supplies.  He and other Rotarians plan a trip to Paraguay to be there when the equipment arrives.

Gwinnett County Tax Commissioner Richard Steele addressed his fellow Rotarians of the Lawrenceville club on October 6 and updated them on developments at the Tax Office over the past year.    He first reminded the group that he was an elected official who had nothing to do with the bottom line of the tax bill.   His job is to advocate for the taxpayers and bill and collect the taxes that have been passed by state, county, and city agencies.  In 2013 his office, with 119 employees and a $11.4 million dollar budget, served over a million customers and dispersed 83% of the General Fund revenue.  Most monies came from property taxes, but Motor Vehicles saw an increase this year because of the new title tax . The office has concentrated on studying four main areas: net cost of operation, motor vehicle transaction costs, collection rates, and payment behavior.  He emphasized that it is cheaper to renew a tag online than it is to come into the office.  He ended by looking to the future, pointing out issues that the legislature may well address and improvements he would like to see made.

https://vimeo.com/107520555

On Sept. 29, 2014, Dr. Dan Kaufman updated the Rotary Club of Lawrenceville on Gwinnett Chamber of Commerce activities since he spoke to the group a little over a year ago.  He focused on population growth, the growing economy, the diversity in the population, and the types of businesses in the County.  He held up the County with its ethnic mix as a prototype for the U.S. of tomorrow. His message was an encouraging and upbeat one, noting the growth in small businesses, especially minority owned businesses.  He focused on the strengths of Gwinnett  County, particularly its strategic assets like accessibility to the metro area, nice weather, established infrastructure, a well-educated workforce, a relatively low cost of living, and at-will work policies.  He praised community leaders and touted the synchronization of the major educational and medical assets in the County.  He recognized key challenges like Balkanization of our diverse population groups and the need for investment in transportation improvements like MARTA expansion and new roads.  He emphasized making our communities friendly to young professionals. He closed by elaborating on the Chamber’s motto, “Think globally and act locally.” Forthcoming trips to Europe and Asia will promote Gwinnett County globally and free entrepreneurial workshops help local small businesses.

At the September 22 meeting President Art Kleve conducted a Club Assembly in which we reviewed the various duties of officers and committee members and got an update on activities of the club.  Art introduced the current officers, President-Elect Freya Myers, Secretary Russ Weekly, Treasurer Richard Steele, and Sergeant-at-Arms Marshall Boutwell.  He  called on each committee chair to report briefly on current activities and then called on Marshall Boutwell for a classification talk.  Two other talks by recently inducted members were planned, but we ran out of time.

https://vimeo.com/106814996

At the Monday, Sept. 15, meeting of the Rotary Club of Lawrenceville, Jayne S. Kulp, Director of Cardiology Services at Gwinnett Medical Center, brought the group up-to-date on the full service cardiac unit at the Center.  After defining what constitutes a heart attack, she described the various services, from non-invasive testing to the surgical  and rehab stages.  GMC has proven better than average with a “door to balloon” time of only 45 minutes.  She described some of the interventional procedures, described the four cardiac catherization labs, and passed around samples of stents and pacemakers.  She discussed not only the “plumbing” aspects of treatment but also the electrophysiology treatments.  GMC offers cardiac surgery for those needing surgery and also rehabilitation services for post-treatment.

Featured speaker at the Sept. 8th meeting of the Rotary Club of Lawrenceville was Darrel Hulsey of the UGA Small Business Development Center, the SBDC. Available through the University of Georgia, this group provides aid to small businesses to develop a profitable expansion into global markets. The SBDC provides in depth one-on-one business consulting and international business training programs. After a brief history of the program, he focused on three major areas in which the consultants could help business owners develop expertise: market intelligence, sales and marketing, and global payment and logistics. He described the positive impact of the SBDC which has helped with the start of 1,427 new businesses with over 9,000 jobs and $299 million in raised capital. He shared statistics about Georgia’s export businesses, pointing out that Canada, China, and Mexico are the top importers of Georgia goods and that agriculture, particularly chickens and peanuts, and aeronautic supplies account for a large proportion of the $3.7 billion in Georgia exports.

On August 25 the District Governor for Rotary District 6910, Bill Strickland, spoke to the Rotary Club of Lawrenceville at the noon meeting.  In explaining what Rotary means to him, his summary characterization was “fun!”  He then discussed various elements of Rotary that were important to him. First was the Foundation and all the good that it does locally and in the world.  He characterized it as “our charity,” which incidentally returns benefits in the form of district grants. He cited specifically projects delivering medical equipment, providing water resources, aiding the Alliance for Smiles, and helping in the eradication of polio. He recommended the experience of attending an international meeting of Rotary, next year in Brazil.  He is proud of Rotary’s interaction with young people through Interact, Rotaract, RYLA, the Youth Exchange, and GRSP.  He challenged members to introduce two new members to Rotary this year.  After encouraging members to attend the Leadership Institute in January in Athens and the District Conference at Hilton Head in April, he closed with the poem “To Be a Rotarian.”

Annie Valenty is the Community Outreach Liaison for Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta (“Children’s”).  She spoke to the Rotary Club of Lawrenceville on August 18 about the history and mission of Children’s in our community.  Made up of three major pediatric hospitals (Scottish Rite, Egleston, and Hughes Spalding), Children’s is among the largest providers of pediatric clinical care in the country.  Marcus Autism Center is also part of the group.  It impacts the community with its 8,900 employees but most of all with the care it makes available to young patients.  The Gwinnett facility is on Satellite Blvd.  Not only do they provide surgical, sports medicine, and general medical care for children, but they have actively been involved in getting anti-concussion legislation passed in Georgia.  They support public schools with their Strong 4 Life Program.  As a non-profit organization, they solicit donations and volunteers.