ISSUE
NO. 6
AUGUST 11,
2000
OUR 79th YEAR http://rotaryclubofsantamonica.org
“Beneath
the good works of Rotary there is
an invisible power of good will,” wrote Paul Harris, founder of Rotary.
“Rotary has accomplished wonders through bringing opponents and rivals
together in the atmosphere of good fellowship.
Where fires of animosity smolder is Rotary’s opportunity.”
Our club occasionally brings together a few advocates of clashing views.
Their talks, and their answers to questions, almost always remain calm
and polite – thus generating more facts than the shouted set-tos often seen on
TV. This coming Friday will
probably be one more example of our efforts to soothe civic life through
courteous airing of disagreements.
Our meeting will hear discussions of controversial proposals for changes
in Santa Monica employment laws. One,
backed by some business people and the Chamber of Commerce, is on the ballot and
will be voted in or out by Santa Monicans in November.
A rival measure, pushed during the past year by SMART (Santa Monicans
Allies for Responsible Tourism) may or may not qualify for the ballot.
If all goes well we’ll hear about SMART’s proposal from the Reverend
Sandra “Sandy” Richards, pastor of the Church in Ocean Park, a United
Methodist Church that encourages all denominations to attend.
However, Sandy is vacationing and hasn’t confirmed that she’ll be
with us. Maybe SMART will send
another advocate instead. Or maybe
there’ll be an empty seat at the speakers’ table.
In any case, Tom Lorimore, local attorney who often represents employers,
will speak for the other measure.
Our Paul Gaulke, as moderator, may try to make sure that SMART’s views
are made known by one means or another. In
any case we should hear an enlightening and stimulating disaccord.
Most heavily honored at our July
28 meeting, moneywise, was Frank
W. Lavac, Jr. He made a
television appearance which our President John generously ruled was worth a $300
fine.
The other impoverished honoree was Neil Schmidt, the
superintendent of schools, who paid $100 for vague divagations.
Clarence Davis was also honored but adjudged to be cost-free because he was celebrating fourteen years of marriage.
August
18
Tom Donner, Santa Monica College:
Education Initiative
August
25
Mike O’Hara:
Inside the Olympic Games
September
1
Dark – Labor Day
September
8
Capt. Ron Greene:
Teenage Drunk Driving
September
15
Craft Talks by two new members
Like microbes, typographical
errors creep in unnoticed. In Rota-Monica,
for example, near the bottom of the outer page, our valued Executive
Secretary’s name is printed as “Hooper” instead of Hopper.
Just below this item (and also on your big one-page membership list for
July) is the “Rotary Phone Number” which, after we went to press, the phone
company advised they could not transfer. If
you call that number you get a recorded correction.
Our new Rotary office number is
(310) 395-7587 – which is also listed in both places, thanks be.
Dial it, and you’ll get Barbara.
Sad to say, these Rota-Monica errors will stay in place until next July.
The directory on our outer page of Rota-Monica was printed on green
sheets for the whole year in advance, and must remain until a new set of
officers arrive next summer.
Need we confess the other error, which heads Rota-Monica’s list of our
officers and directors: They are
mistakenly listed as our officers “for 1999-2000.”
In reality they are the people we elected for 2000-2001, of course.
In this speedy new age, e-mail may get through instantly – or may not
get through at all, if a sender omits just one of the many symbols or letters in
the supposed receiver’s address. The
club’s listing, on the July roster sheet, of one member’s address was guilty
of two bobbles. Consequently he
hastened to write in for a correction, as follows:
“My correct e-mail address is erik.jorgensborg@weyerhaeuser.com.
On the membership list the . was missing between my first and last name
and the e after the a in Weyerhaeuser was missing.
Thanks, Erik.”
Lastly we should note a changed listing – not a correction – for John
Miller, now that he’s married:
20435 Roca Chica Drive, Malibu, CA 90265-5372.
Yes, “Roca” is right although some of us thought John meant “Boca.” The Thomas Bros. Directory verifies that there is a Roca but not a Boca in Malibu. So we can safely change our Rolodexes and also write therein John’s new home phone: (310) 456-3758.
OUR
SECRETARY IS A BUSY ENTREPRENEUR(One
of a series on this year’s directors)
The first marriage between members of our club took place in October 1996
when Karen Gregory and Bob Baker were wed.
(Soon afterward another Rotary nuptial was celebrated as Erik Brandin and
Rita Kitts took their vows.)
An unusual aspect of the
first wedding was that Bob, a partner in a local law firm, and Karen, owner of
Sylvan Learning Centers in Santa Monica and Culver City, had been in our club
for years before they took much note of each other.
Then they dated for two years before marrying.
For their home they bought a new house on Paseo de Oro in Pacific
Palisades.
Bob, joined the club in 1972, Karen served as a director in 1992-94, and
is the club secretary this year.
Before coming here Karen earned a degree in education from the University
of Wisconsin. Then she learned
management methods under the tutelage of her uncle, former Rotarian M. C.
“Stritt” Strittmatter, in five years with Bay Area Travel Service.
In 1985 she decided to go into the education business. She bought a franchise in a fast-growing enterprise called
Sylvan Learning Centers, and opened a Learning Center here. It flourished. Children
of all school ages come at least twice weekly, for an hour at a time, and meet
in groups of three with a teacher who addresses their individual needs as
spotlighted by diagnostic tests. Later
Karen bought a second center in Culver City as the Franchises grew to 800
centers nationwide.
In 1993 she branched into another field administering tests to many
professional groups. She opened a
computer-based testing center where, every month, about eight thousand hours of
examination are now given. The
computer questions are provided by the licensing agencies, Karen’s staff
monitor the answering by groups of student nurses, securities dealers, medical
doctors, and 200 other groups trying for certificates in various fields.
Karen now meets a monthly payroll for 55 employees. Expansion has left no room for her own desk in either the learning centers or the testing centers, so she does her administering from a desk at home, plus forays into the centers and testing sites. Her chief duty in Rotary is to keep minutes of monthly board meetings. But she likes to think that her unusual background enables her to offer stimulating ideas from time to time in board discussions.