CLARK COUNTY, Wash. – More than 100 hospitals have been damaged or destroyed in Ukraine, severely limiting medical treatment for civilian population in many of the cities, towns and villages in the war zone areas. Clark County’s own Rotary Club of Three Creeks is doing something about it.
“Rotarians are ‘People of Action’, and while we can’t necessarily help out on the ground in Ukraine, we’re doing something to help those who need it,” said Rotary Club of Three Creeks President Kinsey Dhoot. “I’m so proud of how we’re putting funds raised locally to work, combined with investments from other area clubs and Rotary International to provide critical medical care to those living under some really scary circumstances in Ukraine.” The Rotary Club of Three Creeks is one of 18 clubs in District 5100 – along the Columbia River from the Oregon Coast to the Idaho border, with its northern-most clubs in Battle Ground and southern-most clubs in Stayton – that participate in an international grant to help pay for portable medical facilities in Ukraine. The 18 clubs contributed a total of $26,300, while District 5100 supported with $20,000 and The Rotary Foundation granted $16,000. The total $62,300 was enough money to support one medical unit and in partnership from another district fund a second unit as well. “The Rotary Club of Three Creeks has the honor of being the international club to coordinate the US clubs and districts in fundraising and honoring commitments,” said Three Creeks Rotary International Chair Brian Heimbigner, who has carried most of the load completing the work on these medical units. Each unit has trained doctors and nurses able to treat most simple to medium civilian medical needs including child birth. For more complicated ailments and surgery, they can stabilize patients before air or ambulance evacuation. Each unit has medical and dental equipment installed so that two patience can be treated at the same time. They are air conditioned and heated and have an emergency generator as well as a water purification system. They are also hardened to withstand nearby lesser explosions and small gunfire. They are towable using just an SUV or pickup, eliminating the need for heavy duty equipment and can be rapidly relocated when the military directs. The medical unit supplied by the Rotary Club of Three Creeks and its District 5100 partners has been deployed to Mykolaiv, on the front line. More than 100 hospitals have been damaged or destroyed in Ukraine through the war, which obviously limits access to medical treatment for civilians in many cities, towns and villages within the war zone. The idea for these portable medical units started with two Danish businessmen – members of the Rotary Club of Lviv International (Ukraine). They developed the project, obtained support from Rotary International, designed the units and located a fabricator in western Ukraine out of harm’s way. They then coordinated the partnerships between clubs and districts in Ukraine, the United States and Canada. The large majority of the funds to build and equip the units is spent inside Ukraine, with the exception of some medical equipment that’s sourced from other European countries. Donna Warnes has submitted her application to join the quickly growing Rotary Club of Three Creeks.
Warnes has history with Rotary, having been an Interact support person at Union High School where she helped the students participate in community clean up projects, and Earth Day. Other projects they worked on include Shop with a Cop, gathering blankets and distributing them to homeless, and wrapping Christmas presents. She recently retired after 28 years working for the Evergreen School District as a paraeducator. She worked in special education and assisting in learning support. She worked hard to encourage students to complete their online classes needed to graduate and to pass their general education classes as well. Donna has worked as a licensed real estate agent and has worked for Boeing. She loves spending time with family, friends and helping people. She also enjoys music, reading and "hanging out with my book club ladies", comedy shows, boating and gardening. Donna is married ans has two children and two small grandchildren. After coming to visit our club while her grand daughter Melanie presented to our club during the last meeting of 2023, Patti Wiseman decided we're pretty cool and has applied to join the Rotary Club of Three Creeks.
Wiseman has a very interesting background including family, career, travel, culture and volunteerism. She's been married for 40 years and raised three daughters. She's now grandmother to five grandchildren. She spent 45 years working as a registered nurse making a true difference in many lives. After retiring five years ago, she found great satisfaction in volunteer activities and now is ready to make a stronger commitment to "giving back" by joining Rotary. Travel, especially when combined with volunteerism is one of her passions. The year she turned 50, she participated in a medical mission trip to Guatemala. She also recently spent 31 one days on the island of Sicily for a "true cultural immersion". The outdoors is Patti's happy place, walking her dogs, taking grandchildren to the beach, exploring new locales and going "anywhere my feet can go and doing anything my hands can do: I'm there," she says. Patti said she also enjoys reading a good book, sipping a little whine and eating something delicious as favorite ways to spend an evening. If it involves a book club meeting with friends, then even better. She cherishes her time with family and feels blessed to be able to have them all so near so that she can be active in their lives on a daily basis. Patti's sponsor into the club is Laura Miller. Veteran Rotarian George Middleton, CFA, CPA has applied for membership in the Rotary Club of Three Creeks.
In addition to his many years in Rotary -- as a member of the Rotary Club of Vancouver and a charter member of the Rotary Club of Vancouver Metro Sunset -- George packs a ton of life experience. George is an avid tennis player, a seasoned cruise passenger and a wonderful English language partner to a young Vietnamese boy on the street. He also love to share about having worked as an intern at NASA, doing computer programming, and working as a controller and a home builder. George is also a principal at Middleton & Company a financial planning firm in Vancouver. President Kinsey is expected to conduct George's first reading is at our January 4 club meeting, and his second reading at the club's January 18 meeting, followed by a membership vote by the club's board of directors. The Rotary Club of Three Creeks and its Foundation hit the ground running during the 2023-24 Rotary Year with its second-ever international service project.
Through the work of our club's Rotary Foundation Chair Brian Heimbigner and club member/Foundation board member Wendy Bukoski, Three Creeks was able to partner with the Rotary Club of Playa del Carmen Seaside. The two Rotary clubs participated in the Keep Kids In School Program to provide 250 children in Playa del Carmen with school supplies and USB drives in time for school to get started. Our club's foundation contributed $1,000, with the help of a District 5100 matching grant, each contributing $500. Wendy Bukoski, her daughter and a friend, delivered supplies purchased in Vancouver during a hot, humid August trip to Mexico. Teaming with Gayle Collins, a member of the Rotary Club of Playa del Carmen Seaside, Wendy and her daughter sorted the school supplies and assembled bags for each student. The same supplies purchased in Vancouver would have cost 50-75 percent more in Mexico. The mission of Keeping Kids in School -- also known as the KKIS Project -- is to provide school for children from the poor areas of the region to enhance their learning abilities in order to be a successful adult. The students have classroom and social experiences at school, then use the USB drives to do homework at internet cafes. It's extremely rare for students to have computers at home. Playa del Carmen is on the Yucatan Peninsula, directly across from Cozumel, on Mexico's east coast. Rotary Club of Three Creeks members Wendy Wright (center) and Sue Simon (center right) deliver $5,000 worth of toys donated by our club to Santa's Posse. Clark County Sheriff John Horch (center left) and Santa's Posse volunteers accept the donation from the club at the Clark County Event Center on Tuesday, Dec. 12, 2023. The Rotary Club of Three Creeks and Santa's Posse have enjoyed a seven-year partnership that's included toy collections, financial donations, volunteerism to wrap gifts, pack bags and deliver gifts across Clark County over the years.
This year, the club stepped up its efforts even more. By virtue of a matching grant from Rotary District 5100, and $2,500 of the Rotary Club of Three Creeks Foundation, the club delivered a total of $5,000 worth of toys to Santa's Posse on Tuesday, Dec. 12. Three Creekers Sue Simon and Wendy Wright spearheaded the delivery of gifts to Clark County Sheriff John Horch at the Clark County Events Center. "Many thanks go out to Sue, Wendy and to Brian Heimbigner - who wrote the grant," said Club President Kinsey Dhoot. "It makes me and the other fabulous members of our club to be a part of helping make sure kids across Clark County get toys at Christmas. "Our club has a long history of support for Santa's Posse, and this year we were able to do just a little bit more." Dhoot also thanked Three Creeks member Nancy Docekal who chairs the grants committee for Rotary District 5100 and helped approve the club's grant proposal to maximize giving to Santa's Posse. Andy Lawrence has applied for membership in the Rotary Club of Three Creeks.
Andy is VP of Technical Security Operations at Darktrace, where he leads vulnerability management, pen-testing, security engineering, and vendor risk assessment programs. He excels in cross-organizational communication and collaboration, relationship building, crisis communications, and B2B SaaS pre & post-sales technical consulting. In his prior role, Andy led a 30+ member SOC team through multiple globally significant cyber security events that affected thousands of customers, such as Log4J, Hafnium, and SolarWinds. Additionally, he supported hundreds of ransomware, business email compromise, and data loss investigations that affected the global client base. Andy is a US Air Force veteran with 18 years of experience in cyber threat analysis, incident response, network engineering, project management, and leadership. He holds a Graduate Certificate in Incident Response from the SANS Technology Institute and possesses several SANS/GIAC certifications. He holds a bachelor's degree in international studies from Ramapo College of New Jersey, and a master's degree in international relations from the University of Oklahoma. Andy's hobbies include golf and guitar. President Kinsey is expected to conduct Andy's first reading is at our December 21 club meeting, and his second reading at the club's January 4 meeting, followed by a membership vote by the club's board of directors. The Rotary Club of Three Creeks is thrilled with the applications for membership from Lyle and Diana Smith.
The Smiths were long-time members of the Rotary Club of Vancouver Metro Sunset before the club disbanded after the 2021-22 Rotary year. They've visited our club several times and have decided to re-join Rotary as members of the Three Creeks club. While in the Sunset club, Diana served as club president twice, and as sergeant at arms another year. She also had been a member of the Rotary Club of Vancouver prior to the charter of the Sunrise club. Diana has a bachelor's degree in business, and an MBA. She has owned and operated an accounting and tax business for 15 years. Her hobbies include hiking, watercolor painting and knitting. Lyle, Diana's husband, also was a member of the Rotary Club of Vancouver Metro Sunset. He's the key person behind an AIDS fundraiser called "Lyle's Myles", a 5K fundraiser that's been held for 26 years. He's a 1999 retiree from AT&T-Lucent. His hobbies include golf and sailing. Lyle holds bachelor's and master's degrees in mathematics and a PhD in computer science. President Kinsey is expected to do first reading of the Smiths' proposed memberships at our November 16 meeting, and their second reading will be at the club's December 7 meeting, followed by a membership vote by the club's board of directors. President Elect Ryan Hart has completed a slate of proposed board of directors for the 2024-25 Rotary year. In accordance with the club's bylaws, PE Ryan has already conducted the first reading of this proposed slate of board directors, and will conduct the second reading and vote of the membership at our November 16 club meeting.
Other nominations from the floor, should there be any, will be accepted during the November 16 meeting prior to the vote. Those who have agreed to stand for election on the slate, and represent the membership, in the coming Rotary year - effective July 1, 2024 - are: President: Ryan Hart President Elect: Kristi Straight President Elect Nominee: Chuck Green Immediate Past President: Kinsey Dhoot Secretary: Susanne Holmberg Treasurer: Jesse Braman Sergeant at Arms: John Sandstrom Service Projects Director: Sue Simon Membership Director: Carol Mackey Club Administration Director: Charla Burke Public Image Director: Nelson Holmberg The Rotary Foundation Director: Brian Heimbigner |
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