President Marlene Doherty welcomed all via zoom and initiated our meeting with a land acknowledge.
Chris Ritter was the greeter today and he recognized Howie Shikaze from Rotary Club of Calgary, Mike Meldrum, and Mary Storry from Calgary Health Foundation.
And now, our speakers today, introduced by Kurt Schurer:
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| Howard T. Shikaze, FCPA-FCA, ICD.D. Howie’s leadership roles in his career, community, and his profession were recognized in 2020 by CPA Alberta with a Lifetime Achievement Award. Howie practiced as a Chartered Public Accountant for most of his career and was involved in several businesses, He has been very involved in his profession and community having served as a past director of the Calgary Japanese Community Association, past president of the Kiwanis Club of Calgary Downtown, past president of the Calgary Performing Arts Festival (formerly the Calgary Kiwanis Music Festival), past chair of the Calgary Police Commission, past member of the Calgary Police Foundation, past Chair of YMCA Calgary, past chair of CPA Assist, and past director of the Rotary Club of Calgary. He currently serves on the Rotary Community Hubs Committee which is in partnership with the City of Calgary and the United Way Calgary and Area as part of a poverty reduction initiative, the Rotary Christmas Hamper Committee, and the Rotary Community Service Committee. |
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| Mike Meldrum is a senior executive with 25 years of fundraising experience. He started his career in healthcare before moving to post-secondary education. In 2013, he completed his MBA and took the position of Associate Vice-President of Advancement at NAIT. In 2019, Mike took the position of President and CEO of Calgary Health Trust now the Calgary Health Foundation, an organization that has been a leader in fundraising for healthcare in Calgary for 25 years. In his current role, Mike works side-by-side senior leaders of Canada’s largest provincial health authority, Alberta Health Services, and represents the community’s interest in health priorities for Calgary. Over the past year, Mike’s focus has been on integrating the organization’s charitable efforts with the long-term vision of both Alberta Health Services and the University of Calgary, Cumming School of Medicine, to seamlessly integrate efforts in creating a world-renowned health system and innovate patient care across Southern Alberta |
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Howie Shikaze began the presentation about Redevelopment of the Foothills Hospital Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. Rotary Clubs of District 5360 and TransAlta have been asked by the Calgary Health Foundation to partner in funding a $4,000,000 gift toward an $83,000,000 project for the renovation and expansion of the Foothills Hospital NICU. This gift will be recognized by naming one of the floors of the health unit in the name of the funding partners.
Howie introduced Mike Meldrum to tell us more about the partnership and Rotary’s history in working together. Mike offered his thanks for being allowed to present to the Club. He offered that his project touches so many people and he and Howie, in the past, have personal connections since they both had a child in the NICU.
Over 25 years ago, Calgary Health Foundation was established by businesspeople led by the late Bud McKay, looking to create a world class health services and medical research. Partners in Health Campaign was created. Rotarian champion, Phil Libin was instrumental in helping establish the Center for Advanced Therapeutic Endoscopy. REACH was formed and had an impact collaborating on research and care. Unique partnerships were formed with The Calgary Flames to make investments in health care. Rotary Clubs have helped in various initiatives throughout the Calgary Health District. Calgary West and Calgary Sarcee Rotary Clubs’ Art from the Heart fundraiser 3 years ago raised $32,000 to purchase a Medi Robot, a walking talking 2-foot-high humanoid medical aid to help reduce pain and anxiety for children during medical procedures. Rotary’s $5,900,000 of contributions have made health care better.
This new project Newborn Needs Campaign emphasizes community and public partnerships. The Calgary Health Foundation has entered a partnership where the Government of Alberta will fund 46% of this project. Calgary Health Foundation will fund $45,000,000, and they are still looking for donations. They will be breaking ground on this project in September with estimated completion in 2028. Then we went back to Howie for his comments.
Howie tells us that Foothills NICU already has 1,200 Level 3 admission yearly, this upgrade will add 19 beds that will increase capacity to 58 beds on par with other similar facilities. One in eight children are born preterm. Mothers will be transported before the birth so they and their baby can receive expert care. The catchment area for users of this facility is virtually the same as our Rotary District 5360.
Howie asks that we consider donations in his 3-fold ask:
Firstly, he asks that we encourage our club leaders to make a 5-year funding commitment.
Secondly, to support funding augmented by District Grant Funding.
And thirdly, consider making a personal commitment to the project.
He currently has personal commitments for $300,000. They are seeking $1,700,000 in funding from Rotary. Contact Howie directly if you would like to discuss a personal commitment for this project.
Q & A:
When are you talking about using District Grants? Are you suggesting this year? Howie offers that it makes sense for future grants years not in the current year.
Can you give us a sense of how many Rotary Clubs are presently on board in the district and their commitments? To date, Howie does not have any firm commitments. Presentations are being made soon. At present, Howie is looking at forming a funding group of 10 Rotarians to make a commitment of $20,000 per year for 5 years ($100,000 in total) and to use this as incentive to other Rotarians to match this $1,000,000 commitment. Currently, he has 3 firm commitments toward this and other irons in the fire. He and his team see this as a legacy project.
Please contact Howie directly with any questions.
Kurt Schurer gave the thanks of the club to both Howie and Mike with a promise to seriously consider funding this Foothills NICU Redevelopment Project.
Back to President Marlene who gave leave to our 2 guests Howie and Mike while we continued with current business of the club.
David Watson shared with us the opportunity of working with ShelterBox to help the Ukrainian people, who as the result of Russia’s invasion, are fleeing their war-torn country for safety. Currently ShelterBox is working in Poland and Moldovia. War has displaced 4 million people. Currently, 6 million are homeless in Ukraine. David is a supporter of ShelterBox which is taking a three-pronged approach, two within Ukraine and one to support refugees leaving the country. Working with their partner, People in Need, helpers provide mattresses to collective centers (safe places for people to gather) and provide shelter kits with high thermal blankets and toiletries. They are delivering coats, and hygiene items for refugees for their journey. ShelterBox works with many different partner agencies on the ground, one of these partner agencies is People in Need who help with distribution. Just under 50% of ShelterBox funding is through Rotary. Donations can be made directly to ShelterBox, and they give donation receipts, but no direct grants are available. The Rotary Foundation has set up a Disaster Relief Fund to donate to Ukraine until April 30. Until April 15, District 5360 will be matching 1:1 donations to this Disaster Relief fund. Federal Government was matching donations to Red Cross prior to March 18. There will be a presentation by ShelterBox CEO to the Calgary Club on May 10.
President Marlene advised that the Board of Directors of Calgary West voted last meeting to contribute $3,000. Please let Don Edie know if you donate.
Marlene presented a PowerPoint presentation on the results of the RCCW Team Evaluation AD HOC Committee. (The PowerPoint presentation was emailed to all Club members by Club Secretary Gail Williams on Friday April 1st, 2022)
President Marlene then passed the program to Gord Cox so he could explain the meeting duties. Gord Cox gave an outline of the procedure using the reporter schedule which is a simple request by email to schedule duties from 9 reporters. The volunteer names are then inserted into the committee schedule spreadsheet. He also reviewed set-up and take down duties, venue greeter and attendance coordinator which are quite straight forward. Then there is zoom host and AV person, zoom greeter and chat monitor, and reporters. Also required are meeting reminders to be sent out, 2 per week.
Questions and Comments:
Tim Anderson suggests that the functions need to be coordinated and agrees with the committee report but does feel that the team approach does foster that personal connection and that we could do something at the meeting to enhance these connections.
Gerry Meek likes the Team Evaluation AD HOC Committee report and supports the changes. Is there any way to formalize the way to recruit to all committees? In response Gord thought that idea has merit.
Des De Freitas wondered if we will really get buy-in because of these changes. President Marlene, in answer to that comment, said that continuity and succession are her biggest concerns. Strong committees are the foundation of the club and relationships are formed and built when working together
David Watson suggested that the committee’s new members should be phased in. Kurt Schurer stated that phase in is on the agenda for the local and international service as suggested.
Barbie Hames agrees to all and is looking at an event or events in May, she calls, Coffee and Conversation at the Blue Flame Kitchen which has the potential to put this relationship building plan into action. This is a place to get it all together and talk it up.
Don Edie added that we all have the opportunity to attend committee meetings to see if we want to join that committee.
Vivian Jones suggested we structure the changes into the committees we already have.
Malcolm Harrison agreed with the report and thinks that what we are looking at is 6 lead persons for each Club Services area.
Marlene asked Des DeFreitas to share his story with us. Des was born on a Caribbean Island named St. Kitts. It is a 56 square kilometer piece of land that was dominated by an extinct volcano. The economy was driven by sugar cane, cotton and salt but now is driven by tourism. The islands were fought over and occupied by many different nations and as a result had pirates, merchants and slave traders that impacted the population and culture.
Des came from a family with 5 siblings, all educated in the Catholic system. His mother was Irish, and a stay-at-home mom and his father was Portuguese and a chemist with the local sugar factory. Des’s first job was with the local Barclay’s Bank as a teller. Eventually because of lack of opportunity on the island, he immigrated to Canada and ended up in Toronto. What a culture shock that was! Having never seen a building taller than 2 stories or cars of this type. At least, he could speak the language. He admits to lapsing into his Caribbean accent at times, even to this day. Eventually he signed on with the Bank of Montreal in the heart of the big city as a teller. His departure was hastened after a year or so by the arrival of the police and his happy feet. All West Indians have happy feet. He said, “We can’t stand still!” Des had mistakenly triggered the alarm which each teller had access to under the desk in his teller box. He did this not just once but twice. It is quite a sight to see the arrival of the police in their SWAT gear ready for action. He was not so happy to take the long walk of shame to the manager’s office to explain. He was transferred to the mortgage department.
Eventually he signed on with the RCAF and was stationed in Penhold which is just outside of Red Deer. He met the love of his life Eileen and has been happily married 56 years. They have 2 children, boy and girl and no dogs, cats, or grandchildren. He states that he is working on those issues. After his military career, he then moved to Calgary to work at a local accounting firm, Collins, and Hames. Isn’t it a small world because our own Barbie Hame’s father-in-law was one of the founding members of that firm?
Des became a chartered accountant in 1971 and became a partner of that firm in 1973 and left in 1986 to become a sole practitioner until retiring in 2013. However, that career, lead Des into Rotary. Another member John Collins, who was an accountant at his firm, introduced Des DeFreitas to Rotary in 1979, to fill the empty second classification spot for accountants. He claims to know nothing about Rotary at that time but was assured that there were no secret handshakes.
In keeping with his belief of: The more you give to the organization, the more you get, Des contributed on different committees in Rotary and was president in 1991 and 1992 he was District Treasurer for 3 terms. Also, he was District Friendship Exchange Chairperson. He noted at that time we had many of the same issues. Money was an issue as well at times. He reminisced about Bingo and Calgary West as a singing club with past members Joe Johanson and Harold Sharlow as the creators and a chicken dinner championed by Sam Switzer. He remembered the District Governor at a meeting dressed as a homeless person at our meeting and Chris Davis falling off the stage. He remembered the 1996 International Convention in Calgary and the House of Friendship and presenting the budget to the International Leaders, as well as singing and dancing on the stage in Nice, France at the Rotary International Convention. Selling cookbooks created by Verneil Martin was also on his list. Friendship Exchange organized by Saadat Keshavjee where meeting Mother Theresa was a highlight. He looks forward to contributing still and thanks all the leaders of the club who step up to get things done.
President Marlene thanked Des DeFreitas now to be nicknamed “Happy Feet.”
Bill Quinney announced all the volunteer opportunities for members for the week of April 24. He has 5 groups who need volunteers that week. Go to the website and sign up. See his email for more information.
Announcements:
Monday April 11/22
Spring Assembly: Members only, Hybrid meeting at the Calgary Golf &Country Club
Dinner at 6:00 pm, Meeting at 6:30 pm
Purchase your in-person meal on our website by Friday April 8/22
Quorum is required to ratify Bylaw motion,
RCCW Team Evaluation Committee motion and President-Elect Nominee motion
Friday April 8/22 at 7 pm
Friday Farkle: Please join us for an evening of the fabulous dice game called Farkle!
BYO Beverage
Hosted by Doherty's - 212 Clearwater Way
Please sign up on the event calendar
The Video of the Four Way Test ended our meeting.
The End
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