The program will be an update on what is happening down town.

 

 

Fletcher McCusker currently heads up UA Ventures, a venture capital firm.  He was the CEO and founder of Sinfonia HealthCare Corp., a medical home health care business.  Sinfonía focused on the rapidly expanding home health industry driven by the changes in the Health Care Affordability Act. Prior to Sinfonia, Fletcher was CEO and founder of Providence Service Corporation based in Tucson.

 

A native Tucsonan and a graduate of the University of Arizona, he attended graduate school at Arizona State University after being turned down by the UofA. He has returned much to the community; serving on the boards of the Eller School and the Social and Behavioral Sciences College, the YMCA, St. Gregory School, The Metro Chamber, TREO and participates in numerous charitable causes.  Fletcher has been very active in downtown revitalization.  He resigned these boards to serve as the Chairman of the Rio Nuevo board after being appointed by state legislature.

 

He is co-founder of 2^ND Saturdays Downtown. An entrepreneur and a contrarian, Fletcher has a knack for being in the right place at the right time, which he attributes to creating opportunities for luck to happen and surrounding himself with smart people. A pilot, a Harley rider, an avid skier, a father, husband and a great friend of Tucson.

Past President DON ROLLINGS gave a touching inspiration marking his daughter’s first wedding anniversary and parents’ seventieth. DON’s father is a wonderful man who recently entered hospice care.

 

President CHUCK gave an update on the improving health of SANDY SANDERSON and asked everyone to sign the get well soon cards circulating the room. GARY SCHEER gave an update on JIM & JOANN SUMWALT noting that Jim thanks everyone greatly for their concern and good wishes. The Club sends its love to Jim and Joann and wishes they could be here with us.

 

DARRELL STEWART led us in the Pledge and song, accompanied by Past President ELLIE PATTERSON. ELLIE made a valiant attempt to get us to sing “America The Beautiful” to the tune of Auld Lang Syne, but as usual, most of us could not follow the tune.

 

New member NICK JONES introduced our guests and visiting Rotarians, and we had three Birthday Rotarians:

 

 

Past President DAVE GALLAHER and current Sergeant at Arms BOBBY LARSON introduced and presented a blue badge to our very newest member KURTIS DAWSON. KURTIS recently became CEO of the YMCA of Southern Arizona and hopes to make a tangible impact in the community by volunteering with RCOT. TED FORSBERG introduced his 12th new member, BOB HOPKINS who is a self-described pocket protector wearing, slide rule carrying nerd (since he studied nuclear engineering, BOB is more likely a true rocket scientist…)

 

Sergeant at Arms BOBBY LARSON recognized Past President MARY MARTIN for her photo in Tucson Lifestyle participating in The Event to support the Boys and Girls Club. For announcements, we had:

 

 

KEN TUCKER introduced our speaker, Allen Fore, Vice President of Public Affairs for Kinder Morgan. Allen is a former Judge Advocate General and member of Rotary One in Chicago. He spoke about the country’s energy resources and delivery systems. There are over 2.6 million miles of pipeline carrying petroleum, natural gas, and LPG products across the country, all of them underground. Kinder Morgan manages 80,000 miles of pipeline, including the main line serving Tucson. America is now energy independent and starting to export significant amounts of natural gas to Mexico and other countries. For those of us who are nerds, he answered several key questions such as the difference between premium gas from one station to another is determined by the special mix of additives put in at KM’s terminal station (the gas in the pipeline is all the same.) Allen signed a book for our lending library: “Shh! We Have a Plan”.

 

President CHUCK ended the meeting with a toast celebrating sustainability in our energy, businesses, and Rotary lives.