Rotary 2019-05-21 (May 21, 2019)

Meeting: May 21st, 2019

Guests:

Susan Shaw, Rob Azizullo, Carly Jeffery. All three are checking the club out as possible members.

Foundation:

Colin spoke about the polio plus program that has been underway since 1988. There are currently only two countries that are still not polio free – Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Visiting Rotarians:

None

Announcements:

A thank you card from the school district for the bursaries and awards we give out.
A thank you from the Big Brothers and Sisters for our donation.
A thank you from Salvation Army for our work with the breakfasts.
Doug presented the club with $500 from the Daybreak to support a mental health facility in Kathmandu.

Paul spoke about the district conference held recently in Victoria. There were a number of training sessions for all. The exchange students worked at a couple of non profits including one that collects soap from hotels for distribution both locally and internationally.
Gill is looking for responses for the Dragon boat weekend. Please let her know as soon as possible.
Installation is on June 18th so put that night on your calendar. Spouses are welcome of course.
Barney talked to us about a possible new fund raiser. For $25 (or so) you would buy an app that would allow you to go to various breweries where each of them would have some sort of special or deal. We would target businesses from Duncan to Campbell River. More updates to come.
Derek’s painting of the exchange students hands and passports was used in the creation of the thank-you gifts for the conference speakers. It's gorgeous

Birthdays:

Rod enjoyed our choir’s rendition of happy birthday.

Anniversaries:

None

Today’s advice:

Accept the fact that some days you're the pigeon, and some days you're the statue!

Program:

This evening we had Chuck Keeling update us on Casino Nanaimo and it’s community activity. He has been with Great Canadian Gaming since 2005. GCG is the parent company of Casino Nanaimo.

Things to note

2/3 of revenue is retained by the province to support programs like health care education and social services.
The City of Nanaimo receives about 3M (from the Provincial gov’t) and local organizations (like us) receive gaming funds as well.
They employee about 150 people and 86% of them reside in the local community.
1.3 M goods and services are sourced in Nanaimo.
There have been 20M in capital investments since inception.
They paid 189K in property tax in 2018.
High risk problem gamblers are about 3.3% of adult British Columbians and 10.6 M per year are spent on programs for these people.
About 2/3 of patrons come from outside a 25km radius.
The customers are about 60% females to 40% males and the average stay is about 1.5 hours.