Peaceful connection

I was delighted to read the article in the August issue underscoring Rotary’s special connection to the Peace Corps. As I have noted in talks with the Rotary Club of Washington, D.C., there are numerous examples of Peace Corps volunteers cooperating with local Rotary clubs, and it was a pleasure to read some fine examples of that in this article. On behalf of the Peace Corps staff and its volunteers, we are proud to be working with Rotary on numerous invaluable projects around the world, and we look forward to continuing this productive relationship for many years to come.

Ron Tschetter
Director, Peace Corps
Washington, D.C., USA

Post-Katrina views

My experience of New Orleans during a one-week stay in June was a little different from Dave Hoekstra’s [Travel, August]. I found that Hurricane Katrina dominates the mindset and the lives of most residents. I did a Rotary make-up at the East New Orleans Rotary Club. Prior to Katrina, they had 26 members; after, they had 6. The restaurant where they met was destroyed, as were the houses of four of the six who remained. All club records were destroyed. Every suitable place to meet in their area was gone. We drove through the lower part of the Ninth Ward, where we saw modular homes, homes that had been refurbished, and many untouched boarded-up homes spray-painted with the labels that condemned them. Some areas had been completely torn down and were now open fields. Another block was a demolished brick building, rubble covering the whole block. Even considering the devastation and slow rebuilding process, the most significant factor seems to be the downsizing of the city. A huge number of citizens have left, and most will probably never return.

John Hummel 
Williamsburg, Va., USA

The tentative schedule of upcoming RI conventions showing New Orleans for 2011 and the travel column about New Orleans caught my eye. I have visited New Orleans more than a dozen times, including almost six times in the past year. It is a wonderful destination – even in the summer – and the article correctly points out that the French Quarter and business district around the convention center suffered very little damage. I served on the executive board of the American Library Association, which held its 2006 annual conference in New Orleans and was the first large conference to be held there post-Katrina. With a modest 18,000 attendees, the city accommodated us well and welcomed us with open arms. Since then, one of my close friends has moved to the city, and I have seen much more of what is going on outside the normal tourist areas. However, the economy of New Orleans is partly built on tourism, and because of that, I would encourage Rotarians to visit before and after the RI Convention to enjoy the hospitality the city offers.

Michael Golrick
Eau Claire, Wis., USA

Monthly meetings? 

Our 15-member Rotary club (including an octogenarian, four women, and a family who brings their young children to meetings) became a participant in the Meeting Frequency pilot project [Letters, August]. We opted to meet once monthly and participate in a project each month, adding extra meetings according to the demands of each project. Last year, we exceeded our goal of 12 projects. We awarded a full-tuition, two-year scholarship to our local community college and five US$500 scholarships to graduating seniors. Other projects included dictionaries to third graders, thesauruses to fifth graders, thanksgiving baskets to the needy, a hot picnic lunch for seniors, and collaboration with other Rotary clubs in an international water project. In lieu of fines, we collect $20 in monthly dues. Five dollars goes to The Rotary Foundation, totaling $60 per Rotarian each year and giving 100% participation.

We are proud members of a small but very active club able to live by the motto of Service Above Self. 

Selma Josell
Dalton, Mass., USA

Bridge builders

The cover of the August issue took me back.. Bridge the Gaps was the theme of the 1970-71 Rotary year when William (Bill) Walk was president, and during which I served as district governor of District 403 (now 7000). Kudos to Rotarian Ken Frantz for literally bridging geographical gaps in Ethiopia, Bolivia, El Salvador, Peru, and Zambia, and thus living the Rotary ideal of international cooperation.

May Rotary also continue to build Bill Walk’s bridges over generational, economic, cultural, and educational gaps in today’s world.

E. Ivan Soler
Mayaguez, Puerto Rico

US$100 challenge

While the proposal to have each of Rotary’s 33,000 clubs donate US$1,000 per year for three years toward Rotary’s US$100 Million Challenge [Let the match begin, April] would be simple enough for large clubs with hundreds of members, a smaller club would obviously be more challenged. The 14 active members of the Rotary Club of Skiatook, Okla., USA, have committed to a goal of $100 per member and hope the ripple effect will result in all 1.2 million Rotarians participating. As a “little” club, we are proud to have completed our goal. Now we respectfully and with waiting amusement challenge the “big” clubs.

Chester Reyckert
Skiatook, Okla., USA

Global warming debate heats up 

The diverse opinions in just four letters in your August issue demonstrate the futility of satisfying everyone. The most recent article in APS Physics, “Climate sensitivity reconsidered,” points out that the global temperatures have not risen in a decade and have been falling since 2001. It’s well to consider that when my Viking ancestors settled in Greenland, it was in fact green. All the ice had melted. Yet, all that melted ice from Greenland did not raise the ocean levels and flood London. So – let’s preserve the letters section for Rotary topics, and not use the space for such a contentious matter.

John Tengdin 
San Clemente, Calif., USA

Your undertaking a discussion of the global warming issue is certainly appropriate and appreciated. Global warming is indeed a fact. But man’s contribution to it is still being studied and debated – it is currently only theory and built mostly upon projections from computer models.

A creative and unusual approach to this issue is by Bjorn Lomborg in his book Cool It: The Skeptical Environmentalist’s Guide to Global Warming. He points out the many excellent ways to improve life for people here on our planet, for instance, water purification and immunization projects that can save millions of lives every year. Rotary has already made a huge difference in these areas. But, much more can be done with more bang for the buck than any of the Kyoto Protocol schemes.

Bill Bacon
St. Augustine, Fla., USA

There is a real and total censorship against the thousands of scientists and climatologists, like John Coleman, founder of the Weather Channel and now meteorologist for KUSI-TV in San Diego, who do not believe in “greenhouse warming.”

I have never before experienced a situation where citizens, educators, politicians, and media refuse to investigate the truth of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report. Worse, they will not listen to or publicize those who have investigated it. There is a parallel in fables: I am that small boy, saying, “The Emperor has no clothes.” When can this small boy be heard?

Guy Winton Jr.
San Diego, Calif., USA