Rotary Bulletin January 29 (Jan. 22, 2026)

Meeting Notes January 22

Posted by Patti Van Cleave

Pledge = Ken led us in the Pledge

Thoughts – Bob B shared thoughts about travel

Announcements –

You should have received dues statements. Please pay! Or check with Patti Van Cleave, Treasurer.

David – Debra has redesigned our bulletin. It’s great and new! Take a look!

Thomas – Mental Healthcare Week – Lotteria #2 night is coming up on Feb 19 at AVLI.

Patti = WNRCF Community Grants awarded. List available and will be posted in bulletin.

Amy- Cyber Security workshop on Feb 12.

Bill – spoke to Pat O’Day this morning. He sends regards to the club.

Happy Bucks

Rich – For Moha in all that he has been through lately, the Moroccan soccer team, the Bears, and also including approval of the Global Grant.

Robert – Happy Buck: 75 degrees where he is now

Whiny Buck: Coming back tomorrow.

Dig N Grin – Rives led us in a rousing rendition of a Scottish ballad.

Program - Tony was our featured speaker for Rotarian Behind the Badge. His wife Carolyn was in attendance.

Tony shared Rotary-based stories and picutures from his history as a Rotarian. His stories of a trip to Switzerland to meet Russians were fascinating, as well as his time in Uganda.

Tony also shared some personal history, beginning with his childhood in Joliet. He considered pro baseball, but his father discouraged him.

As a printer’s apprentice in junior college, he met several famous Republicans. He attended the Republican National Convention where he liked “Ike”.

He met Carolyn in college at Northern Illinois.

Moving into his Rotary years, Tony was president in 1985. Once women were allowed in Rotary, the club admitted 4 women and was no longer an “old boys club”.

He met the RI President in Evanston at the end of his year as president. The RI President began the EndPolio initiative.

He learned at an International Convention about the inequality of women in Africa, Uganda specifically. He and Carolyn began a micro-lending program for women in Uganda. Over the course of the program, they raised over $300K and it became an International Rotary project.

Working with the State Dept, they were able to bring Ugandans to the US to be trained as teachers.

The school currently has 600 students and has grown over the years. The Kambichs have been to Uganda 14 times.

Community Grants Announcement

Posted by Patti Van Cleave

Our Club’s charitable foundation, the Winnetka-Northfield Rotary Charitable Foundation, recently completed our annual Community Grants process. We are pleased to report that this year with a budget of $18,000, we awarded 12 grants to local non-profit organizations that serve our community.

Those organizations are:

Counseling Center of the North Shore

Deerfield Free Store at Holy Cross

Hadley Institute

Hunger Resource Network

North Suburban Legal Aid Clinic

Our Place of New Trier

SaLT: Service and Learning Together

SamaraCare Counseling

Saroj Ghandi Sue's Pantry

TotalLink to Community

Volunteer Center

Youth Philanthropy Board

Grants will be presented at our weekly lunch meeting on Thursday, March 12 at noon at the Community House in Winnetka.

Guests are welcome to attend lunch on any Thursday to meet us and learn more about our Club. Contact info@wnrotary.org for more information.

Meeting Assignments

Posted by David Grant

January 29

Greeter	Bill Leske
Thought & Sgt.	Heidi Sibert
Dig-n-Grin	Robert Mardirossian
Scribe	David Grant

February 5

Greeter	Lee Padgitt
Thought & Sgt.	Liz Taylor
Dig-n-Grin	Chuck Norton
Scribe	Amy Skalinder

February 12

Greeter	Michael Ambrose
Thought & Sgt.	Barb Tubekis
Dig-n-Grin	Peter Skalski
Scribe	Thomas Applegate

If you are unable to fulfill your assignment, please find a substitute.

Homeless Lunch Packing Project

Posted by Patti Van Cleave

The Winnetka-Northfield Rotary Club is collaborating with the Wilmette and Evanston Lighthouse clubs to prepared bagged lunches for Connections for the Homeless; a monthly event, on the first Tuesday of the month at 6:00PM. Location is St. Joseph's church at Lake and Ridge in Wilmette. Sign up for this months event here:

We ask club members to sign up here:

https://www.signupgenius.com/go/904054AAAAC2AA1F58-56057223-lunchpacking#/

We look forward to your participation in this hands-on project to help the clients of Connections.

Questions? Contact Patti.

Attend the Weekly Meeting on Zoom

Posted by Rich Lalley

Here is the log-in info for today's Rotary meeting. Meeting starts at 12:15, with people beginning to gather around noon.

Thursday Lunch Meetings 12:15 pm -1:30 pm

If you log on with this link, you will not need a password.

https://zoom.us/j/198435237?pwd=NTNYbFg3WHpvNDkvVENOVlpaYUc2Zz09

Password: Win60093

Join by Phone:

312 626 6799; Meeting ID: 198 435 237; Password: 798428 (note, if asked for User ID, press #).

Reminder- you can give happy bucks, dig n grin, birthday donations and other donations to our foundation at https://wnrotary.org/page/donate/ or by texting DIGNGRIN to 44-321.

Winnetka-Northfield Rotary Club Creating a Women's Clothing Cooperative in Morocco

The Rotary Club of Winnetka-Northfield is teaming up with The Rotary Foundation and the Rotary Club of Rabat in the capital city of Morocco to establish a women's clothing cooperative in the village of Tomoulilt. This will be a project funded in part with a Rotary Foundation Global Grant (GG#2571461).

The program's objectives are to:

Create a revenue-generating cooperative run by stakeholders of village women/girls;
Empower women to run and manage a long-term sustainable and profitable business operation.

The project funds new equipment and training for the cooperative's participants. Training will encompass technical use of the equipment, entrepreneurial skills, business planning and management, sales and marketing planning, and financial management. The program's vision is to create a self-sustaining long term business enterprise for the participating women in Timoulilt.

Overall program budget is $100,000. The club is seeking cash and District Designated Funds (DDF) support from Rotary Clubs and Districts.

For more information, contact Club Co-President Moha Bouacha at m_bouacha@yahoo.com. Cash contributions may be made online by clicking here.

Support The Rotary Foundation!

At the March 6 meeting, Rich Lalley presented an overview of the work of our two foundations- the Winnetka-Northfield Rotary Foundation (WNRCF) and The Rotary Foundation (TRF) of Rotary International. You can review that presentation here.

The club's board has set a goal of achieving 100% participation in supporting TRF this Rotary Year. To reach this goal, every active member needs to donate a minimum of $25 to The Rotary Foundation. You can do this online by clicking here.

We also aspire to be a 100% Paul Harris Fellow Club. For member who are not yet a Paul Harris Fellow, once your donation level reaches $250 and you have made a contribution this year, our club will celebrate you with a Paul Harris Fellow Award.

We appreciate all of our members who have contributed generously to The Rotary Foundation and to our club's WNRCF foundation. Thank you!

Paul Harris Fellows

Bob Baker, Wes Baumann, David Birkenstein*, Moha Boucha, Debra Campbell, Ken Drummet, Tom Evans, David Grant*, Tony Kambich*, Marie Kuipers, Rich Lalley, Bill Leske, Robert Mardirossian, Ned Meisner, Chuck Norton, Lee Padgitt, ArLynn Presser, Fred Schwimmer*, Heidi Sibert, Peter Skalski, Liz Taylor, Barb Tubekis, Patti Van Cleave.

Bold indicates donation made this Rotary Year. * indicates Major Donor.

Jan 29, 2026

Mary & Mike McLaughlin

Trees that Feed Foundation

Our mission is planting fruit-bearing trees to feed people, create jobs, and benefit the environment. Trees That Feed Foundation believes that tree crops are a large part of the answer to world food concerns. Tree crops are nutritious, yet require less input of labor, agro-chemicals, fertilizers and space than field crops. Trees also restore ecological balance to land damaged by misuse or neglect, capture and sequester carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and create habitats for small animals and birds. Planting a tree is a winning bet all around … for decades to come!

Feb 05, 2026

Moha Bouacha

Update on the Morocco Project

Feb 12, 2026

Valentine's Day Service Project

Feb 19, 2026

Rotarians Behind the Badge

Moderator: Ken Drummit

Feb 26, 2026

Aude Wilkins

Asili: Providing clean water and healthcare in eastern Congo

Mar 05, 2026