Events

Join us for Decorah Rotary Club's annual chili supper.  The event will be held at the Decorah High School cafeteria on Thursday, January 12, 2023.  Menu includes chili, hot dogs, cinnamon rolls, carrots, milk and coffee.  Vegetarian option is available.

Tickets are $6 each and can be purchased in advance from Rotarians or at the door.

DRC Sponsor: Ward Budweg

Water To Thrive is a faith-based non-profit that brings clean, safe water to rural African communities in need. Our speaker Ed Scharlau will be joining us to describe the program and its activities.

The organization has build hundreds of wells where they were badly needed, with their projects costing less than $10 for each person who uses the well.  Hundreds of thousands of people in rural Africa has clead, safe water for the first time in their lives.

To learn more about the program please visit their website at watertothrive.org.

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**Please complete your meal sign-up prior to the meeting, preferably not later than close of business Monday. Our face-to-face meeting will be hosted at the VFW. The meal sign-up, meeting announcment, and any other logistical information will be distributed in advace to all members by email.

DRC Sponsor: Shannon Duncan

Jackie Cooper serves as Community Relations Manager for Mosaic in the Decorah and Waukon communities. She will be joining the Decorah Rotary After Hours group to provide an update on Mosaic and its ongoing operations, services, and plans.

Mosaic recognizes that people with intellectual disabilities desire and deserve greater independence and closer ties to the community. By developing and expanding community connections, they create new social, volunteer and employment opportunities. Mosaic supports people with intellectual disabilities to bring awareness to issues that affect their lives. They actively advocate for disability rights, encourage self-advocacy and promote public policy that positively impacts the people they serve.

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DRC Sponsor: Ward Budweg

Francisca Munoz is from Santiago, Chile and is spending the year in Decorah as our Rotary International Exchange Student. Fran will share some of her experiences here thus far as well as her life in Santiago.

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**Please complete your meal sign-up prior to the meeting, preferably not later than close of business Monday. Our face-to-face meeting will be hosted at the VFW. The meal sign-up, meeting announcment, and any other logistical information will be distributed in advance to all members by email.

DRC Sponsor: Lorraine Borowski

The Upper Explorerland Regional Planning Commission (UERPC) Safe Routes to School (SRTS) Program plans and coordinates the Decorah Walking School Bus (WSB) and Biking School Bus (BSB) activities. The WSB and BSB offer a safe, fun and active way for students to get to school with adult supervision. SRTS is an international movement to encourage active school travel and safe community routes. Northeast Iowa is home to the state's first rural, regional SRTS program, managed by UERPC.

UERPC SRTS Coordinator April Bril will join our noon meeting to provide more information and opportunities for supporting SRTS locally.

For more information on SRTS please visit the UERPC website at https://uerpc.org/safe-routes-to-school/.

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**Please complete your meal sign-up prior to the meeting, preferably not later than close of business Monday. Our face-to-face meeting will be hosted at the VFW. The meal sign-up, meeting announcment, and any other logistical information will be distributed in advance to all members by email.

DRC Sponsor: Shannon Duncan

Holly Reily works for Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Dubuque as a school-based therapist in three local Catholic schools. She will be sharing what her position entails, current challenges facing students in school systems and how her efforts and work are making a significant impact on student's lives.

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DRC Sponsor: John Moeller

Steve Hopkins, Nonpoint Source Coordinator with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources (DNR) Watershed Improvement Section, will visit our club to provide insights into historical practices, local initiatives, and recent developments in northeast Iowa watershed management.

From a guest posting by Steve in the online blog Iowa Learning Farms, "Healthy watersheds are those that act like a sponge to soak in rainfall, enabling the watershed to minimize flooding and reduce runoff that carries pollutants to our lakes, rivers, and streams. Every time a single action takes place that adds more runoff in a watershed, such as adding more paved areas or converting land from soil-covering, deep-rooted perennials to tilled row crops, it reduces the watershed’s ability to act like a sponge and soak in rainfall. When this happens, a watershed “catches” less and “sheds” more. When multiple “single actions” take place in a watershed, it results in flooding and water quality problems. Our primary course of action after that point is to invest lots of time, money, and energy to fixing the flooding and water quality problems that we did not prevent in the first place. Many of us are already very well aware of the many practices that are available to soak in, trap, or store rainfall before it runs off our watersheds in Iowa. Many are also working to develop detailed watershed improvement plans to help fix flooding and water quality problems across the state."

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**Please complete your meal sign-up prior to the meeting, preferably not later than close of business Monday. Our face-to-face meeting will be hosted at the VFW. The meal sign-up, meeting announcment, and any other logistical information will be distributed in advance to all members by email.

DRC Sponsor: Don Arendt

In August of 2022, retired Decorah Police Deputy and Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) instructor Tim Felton completed an eight-day trip to the war-torn country of Ukraine, assisting in the conduct of humanitarian and community relations training for local police and military departments. This was the second such trip for him, having previously traveled there in 2019. He will be sharing his captivating and fascinating experiences with our club.

The 2022 Ukraine training team was comprised of Felton; Greg Young, Chaplain for the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Head Chaplain and Critical Incident Stress Debriefer for the Germantown Police Department in Germantown, Wisconsin; Ukrainian translator Alex Gerasimov from Atlanta, Georgia; and John Sheahan, an educator for DARE America and an ordained Lutheran pastor in Roland, Iowa. Gerasimov fled Ukraine in 2014 and has been back to the country on humanitarian missions three times since the war started. The team traveled around the country and trained with police recruits, officers, civilians, and soldiers on Critical Stress and Moral Injury Debriefing. Moral Injury Debriefing is geared towards combat veterans who have emotional burdens and guilt, and Critical Incident Stress Debriefing focuses on individuals like first responders who saw people get hurt or killed.

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**Please complete your meal sign-up prior to the meeting, preferably not later than close of business Monday. Our face-to-face meeting will be hosted at the VFW. The meal sign-up, meeting announcment, and any other logistical information will be distributed in advance to all members by email.

DRC Sponsor: Lorraine Borowski

Decorah Public Library Director Kristin Torresdal will join us to provide a status report on the Library and provide information on recent developments and ongoing initiatives supporting this valuable local resource.

Kristin Torresdal assumed duties as the Director in July 2017. Prior to that time she had served as the Library’s administrative coordinator, a role that has allowed her to develop expertise in many different aspects of library work. She has over 25 years of experience in libraries, and has Level V library director certification through the State Library of Iowa. She has been the catalyst and has overseen many exciting developments at our library.

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**Please complete your meal sign-up prior to the meeting, preferably not later than close of business Monday. Our face-to-face meeting will be hosted at the VFW. The meal sign-up, meeting announcment, and any other logistical information will be distributed in advance to all members by email.