BRAINERD ROTARY Rick zumBrunnen's In-Coming President's Message June 28, 2011

First of all, I would like to thank Theresa again for the fantastic job she has done during her term as President. I would also like to thank our Board members and all our committee chairs for their hard work and dedication. We have accomplished many goals this past year and have been well recognized for being an outstanding club.

 I thought long and hard about what I wanted to say to you tonight. There were many things that came to mind. Things like:

increasing our club membership;

developing a better club member training program;

funding and providing computers for our school in Haiti;

funding our Rotary Riverside Park;

helping with the Community Garden;

I could go on and on.

WOW! – It is impressive how active our club is!

Just recently, I heard a quote by author, Max Lacado. It went like this: “No one alone can do what everyone together can do”.

This put it all together for me and summarized my thoughts beautifully – the road to obtaining our club’s motto of “Excellence in Action” is best achieved through everyone’s involvement.

This should to be our number one goal this year! If this happens, everything else will fall into place, making our goals and challenges much easier to attain.

At the recent District Conference in Grand Forks, Past District Governor Roly Turner mentioned in his talk that being governor for him was like being the captain of a ship. This analogy can also be applied our club.

As captain, I will be attempting to steer the course for us this coming year and I know I will have great guidance from our experienced, capable crew - our Board. However, if we can have our engines firing on all cylinders (everyone working together), our effort in steering the course, weathering the storms and reaching our planned destination will be much improved.

So – “All aboard – engines full ahead!” Let’s have a great year!

 Thank you.

06/29/2011