Meeting Call to Order and Welcome
Scott led the singing of “O Canada” and Don provided the invocation.
Jerry welcomed our guests/speakers, Sarah Dunham and Christina Shephard from Roots of Empathy.
 
Membership Categories:
Deidre reminded members that clubs can now consider offering new categories of membership and it appears that no there are no additional by-law requirements to introduce new options.  Deidre emailed everyone the new categories and their respective fees earlier this week, (individual and family memberships as well as corporate 1-2-person memberships) and both Deidre and Jeff asked everyone to review the options and let Jeff know before the end of the week. 
 
Meeting Venue and Food

Individual bills versus automatic payment: 
Membership have been weighing-in regarding the option of paying a standard fee each month for breakfast or paying their own individual bills at each meeting.  Jeff reminded the membership that should we move to individual bills, that the membership fee would have to be increased to cover the guest breakfast costs.  It was agreed that this would be explored further at the executive meeting, and the executive would bring a recommendation back to the regular business meeting.

Venue:
Further discussion regarding concern with Ricky’s being able to meet our timing requirements for breakfast service.  We can stay at the Pacific Inn a little longer than originally indicated, and we will use this time to also consider other options.
 
Rotary Minute
Rick provided the Rotary Minute and quoted from the new RI President’s comments about the need to ‘Be the Inspiration’ and remove barriers.
 
Golfun
Golf Event is scheduled for August 17 at Linden, Wa.  $125 US.  Looks like we have a foursome! Register on the District Website.

Social
This month’s club social will be held on July 18.  First considered the new Imperial Garden at Semiahmoo Mall but they do not yet have a liquor license.  It was suggested that we schedule the Imperial Garden once their liquor license is approved. Rick recommended a Thai restaurant in Cloverdale that allows you to BYOB without a corkage fee, and he will get back to us with details. 
 
Future Meetings
July 18 - Executive Meeting – Rickys – Pat to Chair
July 25 – Regular Meeting with Guest Speaker – Pacific Inn
August 1 – NO MEETING – Long Week-end
August 8 – Regular Meeting – Pacific Inn – New District Governor, Linda Murray, to attend.
 
Project Update
Orphanage – Battambang
Deidre reported that the Global and District Grant requests have been submitted.  She gave special thanks to Chip for his work on this as well.  We should hear from the District grant by the end of August, with final determinations around November-December this year.
 
Sgt of Arms
Membership had lots of happy dollars (and a sad dollar) to donate to Scott’s effective canvasing.
 
Members Update
Jerry and Roberta will be volunteering in Africa – leaving July 12 and returning August 3.  They will also be away again for 8 weeks in September/October.
Deidre and Brian are planning to in Ireland from the end of July for an anticipated couple of months.
Scott will away for a month – leaving the following week. 
 
Guest Presentation – Roots of Empathy
Jerry introduced the guest speakers, Sarah Dunham and Christina Shepherd from Roots of Empathy.
Founded by Mary Gordon, a kindergarten teacher, this program’s main objective is to stop inter-generational cycles of violence by teaching/demonstrating to young children what empathy looks like.  Trained instructors bring babies into the classroom and encourage the children to observe and start to identify what the baby is feeling and communicating.  They report that research confirmed that this increases empathy and pro-social skills in children while decreasing aggression.
Sarah and Christina are asking for a donation of $1,200 (to be matched by a private donor) to cover the costs of training one instructor.