Jeff Haynes began the Rotary Year by being the first to ring the bell. Queen Jackie, who will be
serving part two of her monarchy, was out of town doing what a lot of our members were doing this first day, getting away from it all. In Jackie’s case her getaway is at our Nation’s 49th state. This time she drove all the way. We all appreciate Jackie stepping up to the challenge as well as our other past presidents.
Greeters: Bill Potter and Shane Bryan did a great job as greeters.
Invocation: Stephanie Baker -Prayed to reunite Rotary and to for those who lost their loved ones in Texas.
Flag: Ken Quarnberg – What can I say? Ken is the man.
Song: Carol Smith - led us in the Welcome Song sung to the tune of our first established armed services branch, The Army Song.
Visiting Rotarians: Introduced by: Temo Lopez
Marvin who showed up very early-Must have been a Ranger
Jeff Guiterrez – From the downtown Club.
Doug Carothers – Who is currently the Assistant Governor and who hails from West Rotary
Family of Rotary
Tom Burke – Birthday
Sally Selby – Wedding Anniversary - 39 wonderful years
Temo Lopez – Wedding Anniversary – 21 years. It was good he was reminded, since it is on the 10th of July, just one day away. Temo was appreciative.
Happy Spots
Denise Haynes was happy not because she missed the demotion, but because she enjoyed her time at the 50th annual regatta on the Snake River (The River Wild) where she watched the circle boat race. She presented two 
presents to Jeff. One was a picture.
Club Service/Socials
Jennifer Henry, our Club Services Director, announced the social at Chewies on Thursday July 10 at 5:30 with 20 already signed up. She also announced the next social which will be at The Vault on Ming Avenue on August 2.
Community Service
Marty Sanders, Community Services Director, announced that the Back to School event is coming soon.
Announcements
Jeff Haynes will be presiding over our next meeting with back-cracking enthusiasm. Two weeks from now Cheryl Scott will be “behind the mic” and wanted everyone to know to block out two hours. There may be some reality in her comment since a board meeting will follow immediately after our regular scheduled meeting. Why? The District Governor will be visiting our club on that day. So just in case you have client meetings at 8:30 and you are on the BBRC board, plan on blocking out two hours.
Program Notes
Lt. Annenberg of the Bakersfield Police Department gave a great talk about her responsibilities of 
working with our homeless population. With 2,400 homeless people in our community, it is a huge problem. It negatively impacts our businesses. It degrades our neighborhoods, and it makes our streets less safe. Many of the arson incidents are caused by homeless people. Bakersfield like many cities has made it a priority to eradicate homelessness.
Lt. Annenberg has 26 officers assigned to her, augmented with code enforcement officers and counselors. Homelessness is not a problem with an easy solution. Its cause stems from not having the ability to pay for housing and is exacerbated by substance abuse. It is complex and to eradicate it involves more of a long-term approach. Taking a holistic approach is the direction the City is going and it is proving to be effective. Some of the homeless people will take that hand up, but unfortunately a great number are not wanting change. They like their freedom and do not mind living the life of a nomad.
Given that, Bakersfield’s homelessness problem is less prevalent than the larger metropolitan areas in Los Angeles and San Francisco. The homeless encampments in Bakersfield are as prolific as those areas.
Her talk led to many good questions but one that caught my attention was the question about the major raid of homeless encampments along the Kern River that began east of town and concluded at Calloway Drive. One of our good upstanding Rotarians who lives west of Calloway said that that raid caused a surge of homeless people in her neighborhood. If only the push could have ended at Enos Lane. As an aside, that initiative resulted in collection and disposal of 68 tons of trash.
One of the takeaways was that her team would be even more effective if we became involved by reporting locations of homeless people who are trespassing. The City cares and her unit needs more leads to be more effective, so give her team a good backlog. Community involvement and support will make the program work much better.
Drawing
Carol Smith won the opportunity drawing and we made certain to call it that since our speaker, Lt. Annenberg, was in attendance. Carol won $38.
Carol Smith announced after that big win that anyone in attendance is flush and needs no makeups to achieve perfect attendance. That reminds me of when I was in school and the Nun who was our teacher, said everyone has an “A”. Carol said she has insurance – with three makeups already in the bank. I appreciate this announcement coming early on. If my memory serves me, we usually get that announcement a few weeks into the year after I have already missed a meeting due to a mandatory vacati
on.
Jeff Haynes introduced the Board for this Rotary Year.
The meeting ended on time. Great job Jeff!
Past President
Jeff Haynes welcomed everyone this morning. He was led into the meeting by his son Nick playing the bagpipes. Mindy Wilmot led with a Gaelic Blessing per Jeff.
convention but was visiting Michigan this week. There were 16,000 fellow Rotarians there from over 140 countries. The event was held on the Calgary Stampede grounds. The G7 Summit was held the week before in Kananaskis, Alberta (an hour drive from Calgary). The following week the Calgary Stampede started! Every meeting was led by a “Yahoo” to everyone; it seemed that ninety percent of the people wore white cowboy hats!
International convention for the next three years is in Taipei, Taiwan in 2026; Dubai, United Arab Emirates in 
2027 and Minneapolis in 2028. 2030 is the 125th year of Rotary International; Chicago has the assignment of hosting that convention, of course. For the Rotary Foundation this year’s fundraising goal is $500,000,000. The Bill Gates Foundation has once again committed to donating $2 for every $1 donated to Rotary Polio Plus for the next three years.
Jennifer Henry - 