President Karen Philbrick called the 5,429th meeting of the Rotary Club of San Jose to order.
The group started the meeting by singing "America the Beautiful" together, led by Sarah Clish. President Karen thanked The Next Big Project Committee and its Chair Vince Sunzeri for hosting the greeting line. Birthdays for the week of March 16th to the 22nd were celebrated today.
Traveling with the microphones today for guest introductions and Ring the Bell were Red Badgers Eddie Truong and Kelly Dippel.
Matt Bell provided a membership update, where he described momentum happening toward the goal of 40 new members this year. To date, there are 24 new members. Matt emphasized Spring as the time to bring in new members in several different ways: by having each committee commit to one new member this year; by inviting people to a free no-pressure lunch; and by using social media to reach out to our friends and colleagues. Finally, Matt recognized Rotary members who had already recruited members this year.
A Rotaryland Gala update was provided by Matt Roben who thanked the sponsors. He highlighted some of the auction items: Cocktail Party, Go Speed Racer, LivenUp’s Tony Preview Trip to New York City, A Slice of Old San Jose, Gold Country Getaway, Choose Your Cruise, Napa Overnight Winemaker Dinner and Lavish Champagne Brunch, Experience San Miguel De Allende, One Week at Historic Normandy Château, and more!
President Karen shared that Rod Diridon just published an essay in the Rotary magazine on high speed rail and climate change. She also thanked President-Elect Heather Lerner for bringing Disney legend and original Imagineer Bob Gurr hosted by Winchester Mystery House, sponsored for Rotary by Glydways. Also, for the Mini Masters on Saturday, President Karen thanked Doug Smith and Brenda Swiney, and mentioned that Alex, who is Anna Rudel’s son, got the Happy Gilmore award for making a shot that ended up on the wrong hole.
There is a request from Rose Simmons of the RotaCare Committee related to the clinic at Washington Elementary School for the provision of dinner for the volunteers. If you have connections to restaurants or would like to volunteer, you can contact Rose. President Karen mentioned that there were cards available for Marie Barlahan to help send her all of our love and support. Finally, President Karen mentioned that the Refugee Support committee is looking for a place for a young Afghan family to reside, so reach out to Mark McKenna if you can help.
Red Badger Shiloh Ballard led a cheer to kick off today’s speaker. Larry Donatoni introduced the speaker Danielle Slaton, co-founder of Bay Football Club (BFC). Danielle began her comments today by talking about their game last Saturday, which was the first game in the Club's history. She described the high emotions that day walking into the stadium being akin to the opening day of the World Cup. She described how proud she was to see the women players walk out onto the field, and how excited she was that BFC scored the first goal against Angel City Football Club.
Danielle talked about the heart, grit, and passion that the players poured onto the field, and how they had been working for the last 4 years leading up to that day. In June 2020, the four co-founding United States Women’s National Soccer Team legends who call the Bay Area home, Aly Wagner, Danielle Slaton, Brandi Chastain and Leslie Osborne met to start the planning. Danielle told the group about how fundraising was achieved by connecting to people who shared the vision of putting players front and center. She said “if we can change how women are valued in the sport of soccer, we can change the way women are valued in the world”.
BFC has turned the page in women’s soccer, with a vision of partnership with the local community as well as the biggest brand in sports. The BFC is looking forward to the season ahead, and they have signed some international players with remarkable stories and backgrounds. There are 9,000 season tickets already sold, and the home opener is almost sold out. The BFC plays at PayPal Park, and Danielle asked Rotarians to support the Club by coming to games and watching on television on NBC 4 Bay Area.
President Karen thanked Danielle Slaton for today’s program, and announced that a donation would be made on her behalf to Loaves and Fishes. Next week’s speaker will be Matt Spangler speaking on "The Kite Runner". President Karen shared a thought with the group: “It is not the words of our enemies that we remember, but the silence of our friends”.
In honor of Women's History Month, a group photo was taken of all female Club members who were present.
Meeting Summary prepared by Martha Wapenski.
Photos taken by Carl Cilker.
To view a video of the full meeting, click here.
To view all photos of the meeting, click here.