2004-05

Don Simpson was the President, Glen E Estess Snr was the International President, District Governor was Mani Seneviratne, and our Assistant District Governor was Carol Small.

We started the year with 20 members and during the year we inducted 4 members to finish with 24 members.

This was the year of the Centenary of Rotary with many celebrations planned throughout the year. Of which the highlight was the Centenary celebration dinner held on the anniversary of Rotary’s founding February 23^rd, when all clubs throughout the world held their meeting on that day. We had a joint meeting with Rutherglen and Yarrawonga/Mulwala with retired former Deputy Prime Minister the Honourable Tim Fischer the guest speaker.

Our major fund raising continued to grow with the Scholarship Fund Raffle and Dinner Dance again proving a great success with over $9,600 raised for the cause and the Military Vehicles catering raising another $3,500.

This year also saw the last Kidney Foundation fundraiser as the club decided to concentrate on its own fundraising with a more localised focus. However we still gave $2,500 to the charity.

We again participated in our regular events of football finals gates for the Coreen & District Football League, the race gates for the Corowa Race Club, cooking the BBQ at the Karinya House Fete and the Pride of Workmanship Dinner. Other events that we participated in were, Youth Exchange, Year 10 High School Mock Interviews, Christmas Cakes and Puddings.

Jacklyn Webb was our outgoing exchange student and she began her adventure in January 2005, when she left Australia to spend a year in the USA.

The club nominated and sponsored Eliza Williams to attend the Murray Darling School of Freshwater Research. In May 2005 the club also nominated and sponsored Tessa Lee to National Youth Science Forum, which was held in January 2006.

Also during the year Neil Davis and his wife Wendy took part in a FAIM trip to India, as part of the Indian National Immunisation Polio Day, where they handed out polio vaccine in the city of Agra.

During the year we also purchased a 250 litre barrel full of Muscat, so we can create and bottle our own Muscat, reducing our reliance on wine from wineries and saving ourselves considerable money in the long run.

Our donations to charities and causes also increased over the previous year by $6,872, to $15,630. The major contributions were for the awarding of the first of our scholarships for $5,000, the Kidney Foundation $2,500, Rotary Foundation $2,300, Tsunami Appeal $1,800 and the doubling of bursaries to local schools $1,300.