I want to express my heartfelt gratitude to the Rotarians of District 7040 for entrusting me with the honor of serving as your District Governor in 2023-24. It was a pleasure to see many of you at the District Changeover as we welcomed Teresa Whitmore from the Rotary Club of Orleans as the incoming Governor for 2024-25.
This event provided an opportunity for me to reflect on the achievements of the past Rotary year.
Rotarians in our District take seriously our Rotary motto, Service Above Self, to help address serious societal issues in our communities. Following from RI President Gordon McInally’s call for us to give attention to concerns about mental health, a number of Clubs, both individually and collectively, have established, or are in the process of establishing, programs for their Clubs and local communities relating to mental wellness. Others took on the issue of Human Trafficking, and are developing communication, education and outreach materials and programs to help raise awareness among people including youth.. And based on activities of Clubs in Montreal, Kingston, and Ottawa, Rotarians have started to develop a District-wide program to address Food Security and Food Rescue.
These activities are all in addition to the large numbers of local activities that Clubs undertake in their local communities, which impact so many people and help improve lives of those in need. While many of these local initiatives are funded by Clubs themselves, others have accessed funds available through District grants. If your Club has not looked at the financial support that could be available from District sources for local initiatives, I would encourage you to do so.
Our District’s international activities which help people in need in other parts of the world continues to flourish, and help build relationships with Rotary Clubs elsewhere, and with other organisations seeking to achieve similar objectives. Some of these international projects are funded by Clubs, either individually or in concert with other Rotary Clubs. Many of the projects are delivered as Global Grant projects, which access funds from Clubs, individuals, the District, and the Rotary Foundation to implement activities around the world in all of Rotary’s seven areas of focus. Collectively, D7040 Clubs are involved in projects in countries such as, but not limited to, Costa Rica, Colombia, Peru, India, Nepal, Uganda, Kenya, Dominica, El Salvador, and are having a significant impact in helping to bring hope to the world. And the District’s contribution to Rotary’s End Polio campaign has remained strong.
To move into the future, our membership needs to be vibrant and committed, with the ability to refresh itself. To this end, and with the assistance of the District Membership Committee, the District’s membership has one of the highest attraction records in Rotary Zones 28 & 32. In addition, Rotarians in our District are involved in connecting with a younger demographic, who may become Rotarians one day, through their involvement in the creation and on-going support to Interact and Earlyact Clubs in schools, and through the rebuilding of the Youth Exchange program and the Rotary Youth Leadership Awards (RYLA) program.
As an international organisation, we can connect with Rotarians around the world, not just to undertake humanitarian projects, but to foster personal relationships and friendships. To this end, the District has engaged in a District Friendship Exchange with Brazilian District 4510, and is organising exchanges with other District in a number of countries. We also took the opportunity to renew the relationships established during a District Friendship Exchange from 2019, by inviting our Russian friends from D2223 to join D7040 members at a District dinner during the Singapore International Convention.
On a personal note, my greatest joy this year was the ability to visit most of the Clubs within the District, and my apologies to those I was not able to visit; I hope you will invite me to join you at some future date. These Club visits allowed me to meet with so many Rotarians in urban and more rural communities within our District, in small Clubs and those significantly larger, and reminded me of the wealth of experience, expertise and interests that we have in our vibrant membership, all bound together by the common desire and passion to do good in the world and help those in need.
I look forward to the District continuing to flourish under the leadership of DG Teresa and her team in the 2024-25 Rotary Year.