Message from the President

Make Dreams Real

It is an honor to serve as president of the Rotary Club of Topeka for the 2008-09 Rotary year. Our international president, D. K. Lee has chosen “Make Dreams Real” as the theme for the upcoming year. He has asked that we look for ways to reduce childhood mortality through traditional Rotary programs aimed at alleviating hunger and poverty, as well as promoting health and literacy.

Indeed, Rotarians are helping to Make Dreams Real in our local communities and around the world. Our club is involved in a number of literacy programs, has helped with medical and dental clinics here in Topeka, as well as sponsoring cataract surgery in Pakistan, polio reconstructive surgery in India and we are currently working to put together a grant to help sponsor an ambulance in Bangladesh.

Of course, no organization has done more to make the dream of polio eradication a reality than Rotary. We are very close - -new polio cases have been reduced by 99% since Rotary launched Polio Plus in 1985. There are only four countries where polio is endemic, Nigeria, India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. With the help of a $100,000,000 matching grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Rotary International is ready to tackle the final obstacles of reaching the goal or complete eradication. You will hear more about what you can do to help with this project in the next few months.

Are there unmet needs in the Topeka community where Rotarians could be of service? If you have a good idea, please don’t hesitate to let me, or a board member know.
A special thanks to past board members Anita Wolgast and Mike Welch who recently completed their term in office, as well as Gordon Lansford who remains on the board as Vice President. Thanks are also in order to John Christiansen for many years of maintaining our website and sending out the weekly meeting reminders. Finally, I offer one last THANK-YOU to Joan Wagnon for her leadership this past year.

The coming year should be fun as we work together to make others’ dream become real!