March 2, 2009 Spokesman

Guests:

Shirley Van Nostrand

Sarah Brooks

Gail Auslander

Tim Kehrli

Student of the Month - Vera Hong, LWHS

Former Student of the Month - Gabby Patelia (?) gave her remarks on having been selected by our club as Student of the month.  Pres. Bob presented her with a certificate.

Birthdays:                   Anniversaries:

Carl Boruck                 John Pruitt

Don Dicks                    Carl Boruck

John OverleeseBill Woods

Mike Hunter

Tom Sturgell

Tom Gant

Announcements:

• We have 2 new proposed members whose names will be published for the club to review:  Scott Rathke, and David Dubois.  They will be inducted next week.
• The March 16^th meeting will be at the Wilde Rover.  Club members are encouraged to bring guests.
• Pres. Bob spoke with Chuck Morgan, and reported that Chuck is doing well in his new environment in Wenatchee.
• Brandon Honcoop announced upcoming scholarship interviews.  Mary-Alyce Burleigh could still use a couple of volunteers to assist with the March 11^th interviews at JuanitaHigh School.  Contact Mary-Alyce if interested.
• Steve Shinstrom sent around the sign up list for volunteers for Scribe and Greeter.
• Rich Bergdahl will be doing a presentation on the Rotary Foundation at next week's meeting.
• A plug was made for purchasing meal tickets - The Rotary "Great Meal Deal"- cost is $250 for 10 meals.  Makes life easier for the folks at check in and saves $1.00 per meal.

Speaker:

Steve Brown introduced Dave Ramsey, Kirkland City Manager, who needed no introduction.  Dave began by repeating one of Churchill's quotes, "If you are going through hell, keep going." And the Chinese proverb, "May you live in interesting times", as a way of introducing the State of the City. Not an auspicious beginning!  He explained that the city is on a two year budget cycle, and that the previous $19 million dollar challenge was balanced.  The city's #1 source of revenue is the sales tax, which was down 19% in January, and down 22% in February.  The city's budget is currently in the hole by $600,000 after the first 2 months of the year.  He said that the next big question is whether people will be willing to pay for a utility tax increase from 6 to 7.5%.  He then gave us a spin around town, beginning with Juanita area (I had to go to the bathroom so missed this part).  I think he must have talked about the annexation question as this came up in the Q&A session afterward.  He then moved on to Totem Lake Mall - its just not happening.  N. E. 8^th - the Aurora of Kirkland, is going through an extreme makeover with an investment of approximately $6 million in improvements.  Costco will be adding gas pumps, and there will be a new South Rose Hill park.  He talked about the Google campus on 6^th, saying that Google will be leasing out part of that project.  The Houghton Market is looking at having an upscale Metropolitan Market.  The SouthKirklandPark and Ride is being developed to include housing over parking similar to Eastlake.  Kirkland Waterfront update on the master plan which has conflicts between buildings and shoreline.  Apparently somewhere in here the big fish eat the little fish.  The Kirkland Police Chief sitting at my table commented that "life sucks if you are a small fish".  The McLeod project (Hector's) is on hold, but the B of A development project, which includes senior living over retail is moving forward thanks to private ownership by the Merrill family.  There is a scheduled makeover at 3^rd and Kirkland that will include a new traffic signal.  The Park Place project has finally been approved and will include 1.8 million square feet multi-use in the new construction.  As far as pending lawsuits, the B of A suit has been settled, but the Park Place suit will proceed.

On that bright note, Dave took questions from the audience and the program ended with the presentation of the book to be given to John Muir Elementary.

Honey Pot:  Alice Volpe had the lucky number and won the pot with lucky #5!

Submitted:  Pat Dye