Jimmy Galvin, Sonoma Strong @ Nascar

While we all try to adjust to the realities of this pandemic – social isolation, caring for relatives and friends, home schooling children – our club is committed to helping folks who are hungry, desperate, and frightened. And now more than ever we need your help!

Due to the coronavirus, the Club had to cancel our March 21 Crab Feed – our annual fundraiser that you may have attended in the past. This put a big hole in our budget going forward. But Rotarians always find a way! We are pleased to announce that several members of The Rotary Club of Glen Ellen-Kenwood have gotten together to provide a $10,000 matching grant, allowing us to double the amount we raise up to $20,000 to go to two areas where the need is most dire food and rent.

There’s simply no way for us to generate funds in the traditional ways of the past, so we are appealing to you directly. We know that like us, you want to help folks who are hungry and scared. We are eager to support the following nonprofit organizations here in the Valley of the Moon, which are providing essentials to a disadvantaged segment of our community. And with your help, we’ll continue working with them and others as long as the need exists.

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• FISH (Friends in Sonoma Helping). Founded in 1971, FISH is an all-volunteer organization that has been helping with food assistance, transportation to medical appointments, medical equipment and more. They are currently helping people with rent and utilities. Clients are screened and payments are made directly to the utility or landlord.

• SOS (Sonoma Overnight Support). SOS was formed in 2003 to provide overnight shelter to individuals and families. In 2007, SOS purchased “The Haven,” a four-bedroom home, to meet housing and other basic needs. SOS’s Brown Baggers provide 8,000 hot meals each year. Our club has worked with SOS for the past five years, and we recently bought them a commercial dishwasher to meet sanitation requirements. SOS has seen a huge increase in people needing help since this pandemic began. At this time they are serving around 100 meals a day. Some of the food is prepared at SOS, and some is purchased from struggling local restaurants.

• Redwood Empire Food Bank. The Food Bank is the most efficient food acquisition and distribution center in the county. Our club members volunteer at food distribution sites in Glen Ellen (Jack London Village parking lot), and Kenwood (St. Patrick’s Church parking lot.) We will continue our efforts distributing food, as well as providing financial support, as the Food Bank is able to purchase $4 worth of food for every dollar donated.

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Please join us in these important efforts by donating today! Any amount will be greatly appreciated, and remember, with the matching grant you will be doubling your money. We can’t do this without you!

All donations to the Glen Ellen Kenwood Rotary Foundation are tax deductible. Please send a check, made out to Glen Ellen Kenwood Rotary Foundation, to P.O. Box 91, Kenwood, CA 95452, or go to our website, www.glenellenkenwoodrotary.com and click on the “Donate Now” button. We thank you in advance, and are sincerely grateful for your donation!

Warm Regards,

Kyle Fisher
President-Elect Rotary Club of Glen Ellen-Kenwood Glen Ellen Kenwood Rotary Foundation

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PO BOX 91, KENWOOD, CA 95452 Rotary.glenellenkenwood@gmail.com • www.glenellenkenwoodrotary.com Glen Ellen Kenwood Rotary Club Foundation Tax ID # 82-3241767

 

 

Christina Boston

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Christina has served as the Wilderness and Wild and Scenic Rivers Program Leader for the US Forest Service, Pacific Southwest Region since May 2010. She began working for the USFS in 2001 and prior to her current position served as a Wilderness Program Manager for the Superior National Forest’s Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness for five years, as the Public Services Program Area Leader on the Stanislaus National Forest’s Groveland Ranger District for two years, and three years as a Wilderness and Wild and Scenic Rivers Specialist in the national headquarters office of the U.S. Forest Service in Washington, DC.

 

Christina began working in parks and recreation at age 16 assisting with municipal summer playground programs throughout her high school and college summers. Following college, she worked in several park ranger positions including: seven wonderful years in Yosemite National Park with the Visitor Services and Wilderness programs; with the Visitor Services program at Grand Canyon National Park; patrolling open space parks and implementing restoration projects and visitor interpretive programs for the Livermore Area Recreation and Parks District; and doing environmental education with students for the Bureau of Land Management in Anchorage, Alaska. 

Christina was born in Urbana, Illinois in 1967, but grew up in Livermore, California after her family moved there in 1972. Her parents, both educators, and her younger brother, Mark, spent school vacations adventuring around California and road-tripping all around the US and Europe. Her passions are travel, outdoor adventures, live music, gardening, soccer, photography and more recently qigong. She has been to every US state except Louisiana and has traveled to 15 other countries. She also loves spending time with her family near and far including her niece and two nephews, Julia, Jake and Justin, and her goddaughter, Kristhyn Angelina, who lives in Costa Rica. She is also an activist for environmental protection and social justice causes.

After graduating from Granada H.S. in 1985, Christina earned a B.A. in Geography with a minor in International Relations and one class shy of a second minor in Journalism from Humboldt State University in 1989 and has completed two years at Colorado State University in the National Resources Recreation and Tourism M.S. program with an emphasis in Wilderness and Protected Areas management.

 

 

Rotary Club of Glen Ellen Kenwood Projects

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GEK/Food Bank Valley Food Assistance

This is a program post Valley wildfires to nourish the underserved in our community,

and continue what we have been doing for four years with the backpack

program at Dunbar.

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SOS Haven Friday Neighborhood Dinners

Rotary Club of Glen Ellen Kenwood and friends, do you have a few hours to spare on Friday?  SOS Homeless Haven is in need of volunteers during Free Food Friday at La Luz Center (17560 Gregor St., Boyes Hot Springs) from 3-5:30 pm. We need Food prep,dishwashers,meal servers and general good cheer. Can you help feed our hungry an evening meal in Sonoma and Sonoma Valley? 

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Glen Ellen Forum

Thanks to generous donations from the United Way Wine Country Sonoma County Wildfire Recovery & Resilience Neighborhood Grant, The Glen Ellen-Kenwood Rotary, Beltane Winery's Wine Club Members, a Rise UP grant from Rebuild Northbay, and support and help from discounts by Home Depot and a deep discount from Friedman's Home Improvement,  The Glen Ellen Forum has provided 33 sheds to fire survivors.   The shed lottery is now closed, but stay tuned for our next lottery which will award gift cards to fire survivors to purchase trees and landscaping for their properties as they rebuild.

 

Mayan Families

Financial assistance to Mayan Families, a non-profit providing health and educaiton services to the indigenous people living in rural areas of Guatemala. 

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Operation Bicycle-Teen Center

Funding and hands-on assistance for a vocational program to train teens in repairing bicyles. The club assists in providing needed tools and hardware

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Sonoma Overnight Support

SOS provides shelter and food to the homeless in Sonoma Valley. The ciub has provided funds for warm clothes and sleeping bags for clients during the winter months

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The Sonoma Ecology Center

We have partnered extensively on SEC's various projects for creek evaluations and remediation as wheel as providing substantial assistance post October wildfires to prevent toxic runoff into the creeks and general forest and trail restoration to help prevent future wildfire vulnerabilities.

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Children's Medical Aid Foundation

The club has given financial assistance to the Children's Medical Aid Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to improving the lives of impoverished children and families in Nepal. One focus of the foundation is a corrective surgery program for children born with birth defects.

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LEAP program in South Africa

Along with other Rotary clubs in the area, the Rotary Club of Glen Ellen/Kenwood has given financial assistance to LEAP Math and Science Schools in South Africa, a unique high school program for marginalized youth.
 

Where There is No Doctor

The club helps support Where There is No Doctor, a non-profit medical social organization helping the poor in hill-tribe communities in Northern Thailand. Among other activities, the organization gives free medical treatment, and builds toilets and claean water supply faciities.

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Bell Ringing for FISH

Each holiday season, members volunteer to collect money for Friends in Sonoma Helping by ringing bells outside the Glen Ellen Village Market, encouraging patrons to donate money into a collection box.

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Shaw Park Renewal Project

Funding and working on a project to renovate Shaw Park in Kenwood, including improving paths, planting trees, and installing a fence around a heritage oak tree.

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Agua del Pueblo

We provided our assistance as part of a larger Rotary Global Grant to create widespread potable water and sanitation programs to all residents of the Lake Atitlan watershed in and around the towns of Nuevo Progreso and Chocol, Guatemala.

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Jack London Park

We are providing assistance for vegetation management to reduce fuel loads in the historic Eucalyptus grove. This donation will be used for a pilot project to illustrate the larger needs for fuel reduction in the park.

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Bouverie Audubon Canyon Ranch

The club assisted in upplying tools and equipment post October Wildfires and we have applied for a $50,000 Fire Relief Grant from District 5130 to help restore fire damaged land.

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Dunbar Elementary School

The Dunbar elementary school experienced major losses to the playground, their outdoor theatre/stage and the children's garden all of which we have been actively working to restore through raising funds and volunteering.

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Zidisha

Funds to help projects on Zidisha, a microlending website connecting lenders and emerging entrepeneurs in Africa.

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July 4 Event at Kenwood Plaza Park

Each year, the club holds a communty-wide event on July 4, featuring food, music, games, and spreading the word of Rotary!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CONTACT US

PO Box 91 Kenwood, CA 95452
Rotary.glenellenkenwood@gmail.com

 

FACEBOOK

https://www.facebook.com/gekrotary/

 

INSTAGRAM

https://www.instagram.com/gekrotary/

 

 

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