March 21, 2016 Spokesman
The March 21, 2016 Kirkland Rotary meeting was called to order by president Rich Bergdahl at 6:30 PM. Steve Shinstrom led us in the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America.
For one inspirational moment, Rick Walter reported a close encounter of a bird kind where a massive eagle nearly collided with his windshield carrying his captured road kill. That my friends was a different kind of inspirational moment.
Ernie Norehad followed with a short prayer that the Lord bless our food, fellowship and our service to others, Amen.
Diana Lanspa was our capable greeter.
The guests recognized tonight were Ashleigh Lansing an accounting systems consultant who by the way is a Duck Dash sponsor this year. Doug Ghaemi accompanied her as our guest. Doug Seto was with us again as a regular makeup Rotarian from Seattle Four. David King our Student of the Month was here for the third week and was happy to announce he has a part time job at Bellevue Square learning retail sales.
For announcement we were informed that the Kirkland Downtown Rotary Club has its fund raiser this weekend (3/26)called Hops & Vine.
Scott Becker announced that the Teen CEO Program had its judging event for individuals with their established businesses with $8,000 in prizes for the winners. Scott also called our attention to Howard Jacobs the very capable manager of the Woodmark, so supportive of Rotary activities on this site. David Mutal announced the 520 Bridge Open Run, a 20 mile bike ride event is coming soon. Member Bill Taylor announced that his company has the bridge link for the opening connector apparatus sitting at his plant.
Patty Smith announced we need $3,000 more in sponsor donations and mid-April is the deadline. The sites for Duck ticket sales will be Safeway, a different QFC and the Kirkland Wednesday market.
The next Board meeting will be held on April 13th. It was announced that Jason Overleese and Veronica are being married on April 4th.
Our Speaker tonight was attorney Lewis Hunter and his paralegal Adaisu Dubale was also in attendance. The subject was a report on the effects of heroin addiction in our area. His Therapeutic health Services Program is valiantly striving to ameliorate the terrible effects of heroin addiction in our community. Their program is not pain management but therapy to aid the escape from the clutches of heroin addiction. The pain killer OxyContin has had a terrible effect on drug addiction in the area. Until recently when the chemical composition of the drug was changed, it caused peripheral suffering by conversion to different methods of obtaining the desired escaping highs. 15,000 people die from prescription overdose effects, nationwide. The King County Council puts a cap of 350 patients in his clinics and there is a waiting list in King County of 2000 addicts. Is the Council afraid of the appearances of lines at clinic doors? There are four clinics in King but only one so far in Snohomish County. 25% of addicts get treatment but 75% are not able to get treatments. Annually drug addiction costs all levels of governments in the US $180 Billion. Statistics show that with adequate treatment drug arrests are down 81%; property crimes down 64%; medical care costs down 64% so there is a cost effective result of the therapy in clinics.
Heroin and other drug addictions are a terrible problem for the community but organizations like our speaker’s are doing a marvelous work. As Rotarians we should applaud their efforts.
The meeting ended at 7:34PM
John E. Woodbery
Scribe
NEW MEMBER PROPOSED
Patty Doherty
Classification: Insurance Consultant
Sponsor: Rich Bergdahl
Mentor: Joanne Primavera