Email Newsletter for July 2008
Greetings from the West Cascade Peace Corps Association!
In this edition of our electronic newsletter, you'll find:
August 7: Monthly board meeting. Location TBD. If you'd like to attend, drop a note to info@westcascadepca.org.
August 8-10: The Northwest Regional Campout will be held this year at the Lake Roosevelt National Recreation Area in Washington, hosted this year by the Inland NW RPCVs. More information is on the calendar on the website and below.
August 22-24: Peace Corps Reunion in Fort Collins, Colorado. More information.
August 23: Walk for the Gold is a benefit for Special Olympics that will be held on the morning of August 23rd in Alton Baker Park. More information.
September 12-14: Eugene Celebration - see below for more information.
September 13: Food for Lane County Empty Bowls Dinner Auction - arrive 8:30 PM for a free buffet dinner then begin cleaning up after the dinner auction. We need about 20-25 volunteers. Please contact Michael Kresko (mjkresko@hotmail.com) or Shannon Micheel at 510-6547 with questions and to sign up.
September 19: Bimonthly potluck at 6pm at Benj and Joann Epstein's home at 3950 Monroe Street.
West Cascade has a long tradition of funding projects around the world, from an orphanage in Ecuador to a music room in Mongolia. We get the money for these projects from memberships and from the sale of merchandise. If you were going to buy something from West Cascade, what would it be? Let us know in our most recent poll.
The full text of the minutes is available on the website.
We began with James telling the board that Brett Holt has left the U of O as a recruiter and gotten a job in Portland. Happily, Brett was at the potluck soon after, so we were able to say goodbye.
Rolly, our vice president, reported that we have put in our application for a spot in the Eugene Celebration parade. We'll have a booth too, so it should be a fun weekend! We will need help staffing the booth, so anyone who would like to help should contact info@westcascadepca.org. We have also paid for 200 calendars for next year. We hope to have them to sell at the Eugene Celebration and the next potluck.
Rolly also reported that the IRS has informed us that we need a new EIN (Employer Identification Number) because of the group's name change in 2004. The amount of work that has been done behind the scenes on getting true nonprofit status for our group is heroic. The main work has been done by Rolly and Evangelina, our treasurer, although others have helped as well.
Felicia, Communications Coordinator, brought up a request for sponsorship for a guy who is running to raise money for well projects in Ghana. We tentatively budgeted $100 for his project contingent on getting more information.
The online survey Felicia posted about how people would like to receive a newsletter got a good response. As a result, I will be attaching a PDF of the newsletter, which should make it easier to print out and nicer looking. For those who just want plain text email, that will be in the body of the message. Also, I will be posting other surveys in hopes of finding out what works best for our members.
Felicia has slightly changed the way that membership payments are recorded. If a payment is made before the membership expires, then the date of the payment is marked as the expiration date rather than as the date paid. This way no one is penalized for renewing early. She also found the sign-in sheets from the previous potlucks to be very helpful in fleshing out the membership database.
Jack Meacham of the Financial Planning committee has chosen 5 projects off the Peace Corps Partnership site and will make a presentation at the potluck. This way the membership can help choose what projects we support.
The Fundraising Committee hasn't had a meeting yet, but they are have a list of people who will help and would happily welcome more members. On the subject of fundraising, James reported about Cafe Press, a website that prints shirts, books and other things on demand. The basic shop is free, so he has signed up. Now we just need to get some images. We discussed Beryl's Memorial Fund and voted to add the $2000 from a Calvert Fund CD that is maturing to it. Other fundraising ideas were discussed, including having a booth at Saturday Market. James will look into that.
Upcoming community service projects:
- the Empty Bowl Auction at Food for Lane County on September 13th needs 20-25 volunteers to clean up after the auction. At 8:30, there will be a buffet for the volunteers.
- Walk for the Gold, a fundraiser to support Special Olympics athletes, will be happening on August 23rd in Alton Baker Park from 9:30 until noon. This local event is essential to funding athletes from Eugene.
Longtime WCPCA member, Joe Hindman, has been elected as the
Western Regional Representative on the board of the National Peace
Corps Association. Joe has a long history with the Peace Corps
having served as a volunteer and then as the PC country director in
several countries. Congratulations, Joe! We look forward to
hearing about your work with NPCA.
We decided not to publish information about monthly board meetings in the paper. So, if you want to join us, you'll have to check the calendar or read the newsletter. Speaking of that, the next board meeting will be on August 7th. The next potluck will be on September 19th at 6pm at Benj and Joann Epstein's home at 3950 Monroe Street.
The annual western region campout will be August 8-10 at the Gifford Group camp on Lake Roosevelt in Washington. Our hosts are members of the Inland Northwest Peace Corps Association. Details below.
The group campsite is reserved from 1:00 pm Friday, August 8th,
until noon on Sunday, August 10th. There are individual sites
nearby for those who wish to come early or stay after the group
campout. For non-campers there is a B and B at nearby Buck Canyon
Lodge, (509) 722-3949, and the town of Chewelah is about 30 miles
away with lots of motels.
Our host group will provide Saturday's dinner. The Boise group will
provide Sunday's breakfast. Other meals are on your own.
Please RSVP to Delores (Malaysia 72-74) at delschw@msn.com or call
(509) 489-2005. This will help with meal planning, etc.
Directions: The camp is in the Lake Roosevelt National Recreation
Area between the free ferry and the town of Gifford. The shortest
drive from Spokane is going north on #395 to the Addy turnoff. This
puts you on the Addy-Gifford Road to Gifford. Drive south from the
town of Gifford to the campground which is only 1-2 miles away.
Look for the entrance to the campground on the river side of the
road.
Another route is to drive west to Davenport on highway #2 and then
take highway #25 north past Two Rivers, through Hunters, and past
the free ferry which is about a mile before the campground. This
route is about 10 miles longer.
WCPCA will take part in the Eugene Celebration on September 12,
13, and 14. We count on the event to keep our presence known in the
Eugene area and to meet newly returned PCVs and encourage them to
join our organization. The board is looking for volunteers to help
with several tasks and to give us new ideas for activities. See our
ideas below and please let us hear from you.
We're always a welcomed presence in Saturday's parade. Join us in
the parade and consider wearing clothing from your service country
and carrying its flag.
At our booth we hope to meet new RPCVs in the area as well as those
who've been here for awhile. We answer many questions about the
Peace Corps from community members. The U of O Peace Corps
recruiter joins us and supplies ample literature to hand out. We
hope to raise funds to pass on to active PC projects through the
sale of merchandise including the new issue of the international
calendar published by the RPCV group in Madison, WI. Perhaps you
would like to take a turn at staffing the booth.
We're looking for local RPCVs to join us before the event to help
refurbish our hallmark cardboard lorry which we'll carry in the
parade. It's a great visual but could use a little sprucing up!
If you have ideas to add to the above or can join us for any of
these activities, please let us know by sending an email to
dorothysoper@comcast.net. More details will be in the next
newsletter.
See you there!!
