President Kelly's Final Presentation to the Club

President Kelly presented a recap of his year as President of the Rotary Club of Belleville during his final meeting as Club President.  

 

Kelly started his presentation by thanking Lola Reid Allin for creating the slide show of our Rotary year that ran during lunch and Kelly's presentation.

 

Kelly warned that is always risky to start naming individuals when you are thanking people, for fear of missing people but did not see any other way around it.

 

Kelly started by thanking his wife Debbie for her patience and guidance. Kelly also as an aside thanked Sam Brady for advising Debbie that we were not meeting at the Travelodge and were in fact at the Banquet Centre, a fact that Kelly forgot to provide to Debbie.  Kelly advised that we really as a club got 2 presidents for the price of one, as he used Debbie as a sounding board for many of the ideas for his year as President, and if there were initiatives that did not meet our members' fancy,  Debbie was probably against it and Kelly went ahead and did it anyway.

 

Kelly then thanked his Rotary wife Jennifer Tretina-Nelson for all her work as program chair, but also for the President's Night Dinner which was great, a night when he should have publicly thanked Jennifer for her amazing job that night, but as well for her work week in and week out coordinating speakers and organizing details.

 

Kelly thanked Andrew Bandler for his work as treasurer following in great examples set by previous treasurers Ray McCoy and Shannon Neely.

 

To Bill MacKay Jr., Kelly thanked him for his incredible guidance on all things Rotary. Bill knew what needed to be done relating to board procedures and was always able to provide relevant club history. Though Bill is stepping down from the Board, Bill will be taking on the role of leading Mentorship which is great for the club.

 

Kelly thanked his board members for all their hard work and dedication to the Club during the past year. He praised each of them for their individual contributions, Judy McKnight who has recently stepped down from the Board, Birgit for her work with First Nations and Kids Against Hunger, Chris Finkle who is retiring from the board after this year, who made Hitz of the Blitz a reality through his persistence, Nadine  Langlois for her leadership in editing and leading the Bulletin Committee (pictured here, Paige Summers, Jeanette Minaker, Alan Kelly, Mark Bishop, Darrell Smith, Judy McKnight, Nadine Langlois and Maggie Smith) , and the other members of his board Brenda Snider, John Sherratt, Doug Peterson and Len Kennedy as Past President providing support and guidance. To each for  their contribution to the success of the Rotary Club of Belleville during the past year, Kelly expressed his thanks.

Kelly acknowledged the tremendous work of Shannon Neely as his number 2 man and now moves into the President's role in the upcoming Rotary Year and Tracy Bray who will take on that role in the following year and has volunteered countless hours to all things Rotary both locally and at a district level.

 

Kelly thanked our new incoming directors who stepped up to make a difference in Rotary, Nick Foley, Adam Zegouras, Eric Thompson, and Drew Brown who stepped in when Judy McKnight had to step down.

 

To follow Kelly's guidance will try to acknowledge all those Kelly acknowledged during his speech without repeating his speech verbatim and so will hopefully not miss people.

 

Kelly thanked the following for their various  contributions to the club

 

Kerry Paul for his AV work each week

 

Richard Tie for music each week

 

Elizabeth Grew and Sharon McConnell for getting the global grant after all these years and  Michael Maloney for initial work on the Literacy program with RCB

 

Lola Reid Allin for all the pictures of all that was Rotary in the past year, by attending all our meetings and events to provide a pictorial history for future reference and for the slide show today.

 

Committee chairs:  Colin Leaver, Dr. Ruth, Darrell Smith, Harold Brennan, Karen Baker, Vince Lynch and Kristin Crowe for another successful Merrywood, Hugh Campbell, Birgit for First Nations,  Len for Foundation, Amy Doyle, Sharon McConnell for Literacy and Spelling Bee, Dave Allen for all his work on membership this year and stepping into new role with Satelllite Club along with Adam Zegouras and Ryan Hilmi for helping to get it off the ground, Tara Lyons for Vocational Service and moving into Program for the 16/17 Rotary year and Jeanette Minaker for leading beverage service for Waterfront and while typically a next year event already been doing all kinds of work now.

 

John Chisholm for keeping Ken Wormald's Rotary Music Festival alive,  Rudy Heijdens, Drew Brown for PR, Pat Feasy, Dave Stewart and Mike Stiff for reception, Greg Knudsen (also of the Travelodge location today)  and Sam Brady for raising large amounts of funds via RLK,  Bernie Ouellet for raising a whack of money each year through RLK sponsors, Vince Lynch for the Roster, John Smale for a very successful Rotary Aids Walk, Dianne Spencer for RYLA which Kelly attended and wants to be part of next year and Dave Allen for his work as Sergeant at Arms Duties. Bill King was recognized  for his sage counsel on all things by-law, Tracy Bray for Special Needs Children Christmas Party, and Sam Brady for his work on the Rotary Youth Exchange and his friendship. Though Kelly didn't want to cry like a Brady, did want to publicly thank Sam for his contribution to the President's Night and would thank him once so as to avoid shedding tears.

 

Kelly talked about the Club 50 Group as one of the greatest things accomplished this year, and acknowledged Bill MacKay Sr., Bob Ord,  Bob Graham, Ken Wormald, Mac Smith and Bob Michaud Sr. for their 50+years of service above  self.''

 

To the past presidents Kelly thanked them for their support and without naming names, thanked those who had spoken up when they didn't like  things.   Kelly appreciated their honesty and desire to state their beliefs, and it is healthy to have differences of opinions and those opinions put forward.   It is what makes Rotary work, the healthy exchange of ideas, the same with family,  in fact Kelly believes it makes everything work when we share our opinions and provide feedback and encouraged us as members to continue to put forth those ideas, opinions as we enter Shannon's year.

 

Kelly was greeted by a standing ovation at the completion of his presentation to his year as President, a fitting tribute to a done very well done. Congratulations Kelly on a great year as President.