HAPPY NEW YEAR! And Happy Half Year of this Rotary term.Many thanks are due to your 2025-2026 Board members Brittany Battle, Jason Grabosch, Michael Guymon, Diana Madaras, Alan Schrope and Jonathan Walkup as well as Sergeant at Arms Dan Kalm, Secretary Jenn Delaney, Treasurer Glenn Ewing, Past President Kurtis Dawson and President-elect Bobby Larson. Congratulations and welcome to 2026-27 Board members Cami Evans, John Duval and Bill Tong! Special appreciation is due to our amazing Dorinna York and Deborah Munoz-Chacon!
Unite For Good is the RI motto for this year, and our RCOT goal is to Unite Southern Arizona through Connections, Collaboration, Community, Compassion and Cookies!
Thanks to our Cookie Monsters this quarter: Joni Condit (La Posada), Bruce Tunze (Medicare A to Z), David Lex (Pak Mail), Jim Wood (Merrill Lynch), Charlotte Harris on behalf of the Ride to End Polio, Alan Schrope and Camp Bow Wow, Jonathan and the Walkup family. Appreciation for our meeting sponsors Pat Zumbush and Well Spring Financial (Tommy Lloyd meeting), and Kym Adair and the Snoop Dog Arizona Bowl for sponsoring UofA President, Suresh Garimella.
Connections:
We celebrated accomplishments of our members with a Way to Go, welcomed our Virtual Viewers and promoted the Red Badge Selfies. Thanks to the hosts of our successful EAT (Events Around Town) program, which has enabled members to meet throughout the community for fun, food and fellowship! Our mixers have been well attended. Many thanks to George Larsen for hosting our holiday mixer at his Car Cave.
Fellowship gatherings: First meeting of the new Agave (Mescal and Tequila) and Axe-throwing groups. The Book Club, Cycling, Golf, Hiking, Whisky and Wine Fellowships are very active and popular.
Collaboration:
Our Global Grant for a vocational training program in Senegal has been approved! Much appreciation to Barbara Kiernan (Catalina Club), the District 5500 Global Grants coordinator, to Jim Lubinski who will be heading this project and to Elijah Ndoye, who is playing a critical role in implementation. And to the team of Rotarians who just went to Senegal to get the project started: Elijah Ndoye, Hugh Thompson, Darrell Stewart, Brittany Battle, Adja Ndoye, Allyn Thompson, Erica Cantua, Joe Puett (From the Sierra Vista Club) and me. You’ll hear more about this amazing trip on Wednesday.
Kudos and congratulations to our program committee, headed by Pat Zumbusch and Cami Evans, for an excellent slate of programs, which included: Alison Flynn Gaffney (CEO, Banner University Medical Center), Dave White for Car Show prep, Michael Guymon led a Housing panel, #1 UA Men’s Basketball Coach Tommy Lloyd, UA President Suresh Garimella, Michelle Conklin (CEO, Tucson Botanical Gardens) and the Honorable Danelle Liwski, Presiding Judge of Pima County Superior Court. We had a record breaking 72 guests join us for the Tommy Lloyd meeting and 27 for Suresh Garimella!
Community:
CAR SHOW 2025. Our Nifty 19th car show was one of the best ever! Our Friday night dinner was a sold-out celebration of our car show exhibitors and volunteers, sponsored by Faye Morse and Eric Smith. Huge thanks to Dave White, the Executive and theTLT teams - as well as all of our fellow Rotarians and friends who contributed so much. New member Daniel Allen won the Corvette! Join us for the Jan 21st meeting for distribution of funds (the BIG checks!)
Car Show recipient charities for 2026 are: Youth On Their Own, Interfaith Community Services and the Amphi Foundation.
Our many and varied service projects benefit Southern Arizona in myriad ways: Community Food Bank, Tucson Clean and Beautiful (We've adopted Oracle Road, between River and Wetmore - be sure to look out for our sign when you drive by!), Triangle Y, Camp Lawton, Salvation Army, Youth Services (Interact, Rotaract, Youth Exchange, RYLA), Reading Coaches at Robison, The Haven, Boys & Girls Club, TRAK, AZ Trail maintenance.
El Tour/ RTEP was held November 22: John Hewko again joined us and spoke at the Friday night pre-ride dinner.
Rotary Club of Tucson Ride to End Polio Teams 2025:
El Tour Team: Matt Blair; Luis Hernandez; Gary Hirsch; Kandy Hirsch; Dan Kalm; Bob Morken; Lee Olitzky; Alan Rogers; and Jonathan Walkup
Indoor Team: Dana Cole; Jo DeChatelet; Rich Flynn; Nancy Gutt; Charlotte Harris; Gary Hirsch-leader; Jennifer Hoffman; Sean Hoffman; Dot Kret; Ann Lancero; Bobby Larson; David Lex; David Lovitt; Jim Lubinski; Ernie Montagne; Steve Pickering; Darrell Stewart; Hugh Thompson; and Bruce Tunze
We have contributed to the UA and Pima scholarship funds as well as TRVFA (The Rotary Vocational Fund of Arizona). We hosted the Dove Mountain Rotary Club, who sold their beautiful color-changing mugs. Thanks to funds from the Rotary Club of Tucson, Wright Flight hosted another successful flight day, giving a proud group of students the chance to take to the sky and celebrate their hard work.
On December 13, a large group of 75 Rotary ‘Ding-A-Lings’ rang the bells for the Salvation Army, organized by Tom Strasburg and Dan Kalm. We raised more than $8,500!
Thank you to Tom Moulton (the Morning Voice), Mitch Pisik, Brittany Battle and Mark Irvin for the excellent news, radio and print coverage for our various activities. With your help, the Tucson community is learning about Rotary and how we Unite for Good!
Compassion:
Sadly, we said farewell to Sandy Dahl, lovely wife of Rotarian Frank Dahl and our member Steve Ochoa.
Report card: Thanks to you all. We did so well with all of our Cs and for that I give us an A!
What's next?
A lot! More kudos to our program committee, as upcoming speakers include:
1/21 Dave White and Alan Rogers: Car Show Charity Presentations and Car Reveal; 1/28 Mike Ortega (RTA), 2/18 Rob Draper, O'Reilly Chevrolet; 3/4 Tucson Youth Music program, 3/18 Steele Children’s Research, 4/1 Cliff Bowman, RCOT Foundation with more exciting speakers to come.
Thank you to everyone for such a successful start to this Rotary year; I am honored to be a part of this remarkable club!
YIR,
Dot Kret, President 2025-26
