Our speaker on April 4, was Cassie Wilkins, Executive Director of All Faith Community Services in Buckeye.  All Faith has been serving Buckeye for 27 years and last year served 5,000 households per month.  This is up from 2,500 households in August 2022.  Ms Wilkins attributed the increase to the weakness of the economy and the burden of inflation which is felt most acutely by people at the lowest income levels. She said $1 used to provide 7 meals and now it can only provide 5.  Cassie also mentioned that serving these additional people has been challenging as grocery stores are also more aggressive with their inventory management because of inflation and as a result there is less food available for donation.  The building All Faith currently occupies in downtown Buckeye is 106 years old and they are seeing a grant which would allow for the the upgrade of insulation, windows and doors which would make it much more energy efficient,  The $75,000 grant requires a match of $5,000.  Our club has a long record of supporting All Faith through donations and food drives.  

 

We are also happy to welcome 5 guests at our meeting and hope they each will consider joining our club.  

 

President Mike reported the board meeting held on April 3 and reminded everyone that the deadline for submitting a request for funding for the 2023/2024 Rotary year is Saturday April 15.  Click here for a fillable form or here for a PDF.

 

Come join several of your club members at the annual Rotary District 5495 Celebration and Conference on May 5 and 6, 2023.  The conference schedule:

 

May 5:  11:30 am  Conference Opens

May 5:    5:30 pm  Hospitality Suites are open 

May 6:   Conference and Service Project. 8:00 am to 8:00 pm. Conference concludes at 8:00 pm

May 7:    Fundraiser for The Rotary Vocational Fund at Arizona Diamondbacks Game

 

The conference will be held at The Renaissance Hotel Phoenix, 101 North First Street, Phoenix (Corner First Street and Adams in downtown Phoenix)

Rotary has arranged a room block with excellent rates and special onsite parking for people attending the conference.

 

For more information, register and make hotel reservations go to the Conference Registration Site.  If you plan to attend sign up soon as the hotel block has a limited number of rooms and expires soon.

 

NOW is the time to sign up for the Verrado Road Clean Up and breakfast afterwards.  The clean up is on Saturday, April 29, 2023, and begins at 7:30 am at the Palo Verde Education Center.  For more information and to RSVP, please click HERE.

 

The Rotary Week of Service Bed Build is scheduled for April 15 at 7:30 am. This project is being held at American Furniture on 99th Avenue south of Top Golf.   Please click HERE for more details and to sign up.

 

Your Verrado Rotary Club and Foundation are soliciting your ideas for project funding for the next Rotary year.  Project funding requests are due by April 15 and will be considered at a joint board meeting in May to set the annual funding budget.  Click here to download the project funding package:  PDF Package   Fillable Word Form