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2010-11 Qtr 4 (Apr-June)
April 6, 2011 –Today’s meeting was the first of two annual meetings where we recognize our area’s Top High School Students. At this meeting we recognized two students from three area high schools. Our honored students were from Acadiana High School, Carencro High School and Episcopal School of Acadiana (The Academy of the Sacred Heart was to join us but had a scheduling problem and will be with us in the next couple weeks) Rotarians Casey Rawlings and Jim Bealer worked to put together this program with Jim being our Master of Ceremonies. Jim introduced the respective schools’ counselor who then introduced their two top students. He also presented each student with a gift card and certificate of recognition. Each student was asked to say a few words on their accomplishments and their plans for the future. The students honored were:
Acadiana High School – Lauren Credeur & Milton “Trey” Junker, III
Carencro High School – Mariah Hukins and Lucas Daigle
Episcopal School of Acadiana – Chris Beyer & Elleny Gutierrez
(see pictures in Photo Gallery under “Awards”)
April 13, 2011 – Today’s meeting was a special meeting for the club to review the plan for the Rotary Club of Lafayette’s 6th Annual Golf Tournament. Tournament committee chairman John Guilbeau lead the meeting informing the club of what to expect at our golf tournament to be held April 25, 2011 (the day after Easter). For the third consecutive year our club has Special Olympics Louisiana join us as co-sponsors of the golf tournament. We will donate 60% of the proceeds from this tournament to Special Olympics Louisiana to help them with their excellent programs they put on for the Special Olympians. John reported the field of golfers was full and we were ready to play. Our major sponsors are Lofton Staffing Services, Abacus Restaurants and Superior Energy. A sign-up sheet was passed around for club members to volunteer for jobs needed around the golf tournament from early morning setup to the cleanup of the area after the closing ceremonies. The tournament will include, baggers to help unload golf bags, a check in table for the players to play, mulligan sales, free BBQ burgers, refreshment (beer) carts, an opening ceremony with the Special Olympic torch run and lighting, Lafayette Parish Sheriff Mike Neustrom playing with the Special Olympic Louisiana golf team, and the Sheriff making them honorary Sheriffs for the day, a color guard from Comeaux High School, with a student singing the national anthem, a prayer by a member of the Salvation Army and a noon shotgun start. The Rotary Wheel will be there and team pictures will be taken by Special Olympics Louisiana for each player to receive after the tournament. John also reported the goal for this year’s tournament of $40,000 should be reached.
April 20, 2011 – Today’s meeting started by recognizing the top two student’s of the year from the Academy of the Sacred Heart. They were unable to attend our meeting two weeks prior due to a scheduling conflict but were able to come this morning. ASH’s top two students honored today were Elzia Broussard and Katie Domas. They were introduced by ASH’s Upper School Head Sheila Kurtz (see picture in Photo Gallery under “Awards”).
Today’s guest speaker was Sandy Cambre, Registered Nurse and Certified Health Specialist with Nouriche Wellness and Aesthetics in River Ranch (see her picture in the Photo gallery under “2010-11 Meetings”). Sandy told us about Thermography… Thermal Imaging is a painless, non-invasive, state-of-the-art thermal scan which involves no exposure to radiation, no compression, no direct contact with the body and no harmful substances. Using an extremely sensitive infrared camera, a thermal scan shows patterns in skin temperature that are thermal ‘fingerprints’ indicating the presence of pain, injury or something wrong. It takes 5 minutes to complete. It can alert a doctor to changes that can indicated early stages of breast cancer and other diseases like tooth infections, gallstones, heart blockages, and more. This can be good for physical therapists and chiropractors too. You can go to www.nourichemedspa.com for more information.
April 27, 2011 – Today’s guest speaker was our own Rotarian Keith Patin, city-parish councilman from district 8. Keith spoke about the redistricting results. Every 10 years a census is done and the state and local governments must reform their governmental districts. Locally, areas around the communities of Youngsville and Milton have had a 47% increase, while some areas in Lafayette have lost. The population in Lafayette parish is around 221 thousand. This equates to a population of approximately 25 thousand per representative city/parish district with a mandated 2 minority districts. With the core of the city of Lafayette losing people, a lot of rearranging/shuffling had to be done. The results were that some communities were not happy…like Milton has half of it in district 8 and half in district 9. The town of Scott is split the same way. The plan is submitted to the Justice Department, then to the Secretary of State’s office for approval. They will look for things like…no split precincts, compact districts and continuity. In the past, the school board districts were the same as the city/parish, but that will not be the case this year.
May 4, 2011 – Today’s guest speaker was Donielle Watkins, co-founder of D.R.E.A.M.S. Foundation of Acadiana. D.R.E.A.M.S. stands for Disability Resources Education Activity Management Services. Donielle and her husband Brian are the proud parents of three children, one of which, Logan has spina bifida. They have been through many things, but the hardest is when you know your child wants to participate in normal child activities and they simply can’t because there is nothing available due to their disability. Some area camps were hesitant or were not wheelchair accessible. But Lafayette Little League came through allowing around 40 kids in wheelchairs to play baseball. The kids have a great time. “It’s not about the sports, it’s about being included” she said. After baseball, they want to play basketball. These kids have every right to play…they bowl, have art classes and now karate camp this summer. DREAMS is a place for these kids to come for activities, to make friends, to have fun and bring parents together. In the future, they would like to have a facility of their own with all of the activities.
Today, they were one of two teams picked out of 900 special teams to play a challenge game at the Little League World Series in Pennsylvania. They need donations for all (including parents) to go. They are raising money with BBQ’s, etc. because some families can not afford (with all their medical bills) to make the trip. You can go to www.dreamsfoundationaca.org for more information or to help. The Lafayette Little League is helping by having local restaurants come every Thursday night to serve $5 meals with all the proceeds going to DREAMS.
May 11, 2011 – Today’s guest speaker was Lafayette Parish Sheriff Mike Neustrom. The Sheriff spoke of the things they are doing at the Lafayette Parish Sheriff’s Office… like the accreditation of their jail, law enforcement and their healthcare system. They are working on their local police communication accreditation. In the technology area, they are the first to install an infield setting to allow mobile AFIS (Auto Fingerprint Identification System) to quickly ID people. In the future, they may get DNA the same way, but today the downside is the time lag. Today, the jail capacity is 954 and they average between 930 and 940 inmates. More inmates are releases with ankle bracelets as a way to monitor them without locking them up. This is done with the low level criminals. They do drug testing of them and day reporting where they go to classes on drug abuse, anger management etc. The work release program has about 100 inmates participating. In the future, they are working on a work release program centered on a 29 acre are off of West Willow Street that would have a warehouse for work crews to cut grass, work on community projects, etc.
May 18, 2011 – Today’s guest speaker was Charlie Buckels, Vice Chairman of the Republican Party of Louisiana. Charlie handed out a breakdown of Louisiana Voter Registration. It breaks it down to Democrats, Republicans and other. Independents are included in the “other” category. 50.2% of the voters state wide are democrats, with 26.7% registered as republicans and 23.2% listed as Other Party. “It’s interesting” he said, “that with one fourth of the total registered voters in Louisiana being Republicans, we have all (except one) statewide offices are held by Republicans. Both democrat and republican parties are constitutionally organized. 210 members are elected to one state central committee (one from every state representative district). Each parish has an executive committee. Representatives from the state central committee elects a state chairman, treasurer, secretary, etc. They meet every 3 months and vote on various issues like funding candidates, delegates plan for the national convention with about 43 attending the national convention. The Republican Leadership Conference will be held in New Orleans next month with approximately 5,000 people attending. There are registration forms for anyone to attend.
May 25, 2011 - This mornings meeting recognized and honored the Gold Medal ($5,000) and Silver Medal ($1,000) sponsors of the annual golf tournament. Each sponsor who was in attendance was presented with a plaque as a show of our appreciation.
The tournament was able to raise over $40,000 this year in great part to the sponsors who are;
$5,000 Gold Medal
- Superior Energy Services – Kenny Crockett
- Lofton Staffing Services – Brett Lofton
- Abacus Restaurants of Dallas, TX – Bill Hyde, award accepted by
Rotarian Brandon Hyde
$1,000 Silver Medal
- Evans Equipment & Environmental – Roy Smith
- WHC, Inc.
- Energy Drilling Fluids
- The Lemoine Company – Tori Mortenson and the Built to Serve
Committee
- Quality Transport-
- ManCo Rentals and Sales
- LandCoast Insulation, Inc. – Mick Martin, award accepted by Robin
Martin
The following $1,000 Silver Medal Donations were from Rotarians;
- Musson Patout – Mike Gregory
- River Ranch City Club – Robert Daigle
- Hoyt Law Firm – Ted Hoyt
- Camardelle State Farm – Gabe Camardelle
- Barry Air Conditioning – Barry Duplechin
- Landry Harris & Co. – Charles Trent
- Fortier State Farm – Gene Fortier
- Sandy Purgahn Family – Sandy Purgahn
- First National Bank – Rose Miller
In addition to the awards for the golf tournament the club awarded Gerald Hebert of UL Lafayette with the Vocational Service Community Recognition for his instrumental work with the Top 28 High School Basketball Tourney that has been held in Lafayette for the last 15 years. It’s easy to understand after listening to Gerald speak, that his passion for promoting the Lafayette community goes far beyond that of an everyday citizen.
June 1, 2011 - Our speaker today was Herb Schilling of Schilling Distributors, speaking on behalf of the Upper Lafayette Development Commission. They represent North Lafayette, Carencro and Scott to help make something positive happen in that area. They work with concerned citizens to help promote the area and make them aware of what they have to offer. It’s the front door to Lafayette parish. That area was not pretty, but they started to correct that starting with frontage roads on the interstate highways with easy on and easy off accesses. Jan Swift, their Executive Director has done an excellent job.
New jobs, a growing residential population, active business leaders, and an involved government are four reasons why Upper Lafayette is poised on the verge of an economic renaissance. The area is ripe for development, and will completely transform the economy of Lafayette Parish and Acadiana once these developments are realized.
Upper Lafayette Economic Development Foundation is an association of proactive individuals and business leaders joined together to be a catalyst for change. The Foundation's mission is to enhance and direct the positive, planned growth of Upper Lafayette, focusing on quality of life, while participating in the overall development of the Greater Lafayette Metropolitan Area. Their membership is growing and they are trying to make positive things happen for the good of Lafayette. They meet once a month and their funding is multi leveled dues based. For more information, go to www.upperlafayette.com
June 8, 2011 – Our club did not meet this morning because we will be installing our new officers at our Installation Banquet tomorrow evening at the KC Hall on Rena Drive.
June 15, 2011 – Today’s guest speaker was our very own Rotarian Tracy Richardson. Tracy told us of his father being over weight and died at a young age. At that time, Tracy was over weight himself with a son and a healthcare education. He began to study many different methods to lose weight. While at a healthcare convention, he spoke with a vendor who told him about losing 3 to 5 lbs. per week. He liked what he was hearing and after 9 weeks on the diet, he lost 35 lbs. his blood pressure was down and his cholesterol was down too. His wife also lost 75 lbs. in 4 months and had “zero” abnormal blood levels.
Tracy explained to us that our bodies need energy. It gets energy through carbs and sugar then breaks down fats and proteins. Breaking down fats can be good and bad, but breaking down proteins can be self destructive. Our insulin takes our food and converts it to energy or fat. Carbs and sugars must go while fortifying protein. Exercise is good for our health, but to do that to lose weight is pointless. Our healthcare system is symptom based, but there’s a better way. Metabolic syndrome is a group of conditions that put you at risk for heart disease and diabetes. These conditions are High blood pressure, High blood sugar levels, High levels of triglycerides (a type of fat, in your blood), Low levels of HDL(the good cholesterol, in your blood) and Too much fat around your waist. Not all doctors agree on the definition or cause of metabolic syndrome. The cause might be insulin resistance. Insulin is a hormone your body produces to help you turn sugar from food into energy for your body. If you are insulin resistant, too much sugar builds up in your blood, setting the stage for disease. The problem is our pancreas putting out too much insulin. Our bodies build up a resistance to insulin with all the sugar and carbs we eat. So it requires more insulin. Therefore, we get into a deadly spiral into diabetes. But it’s possible to correct the pancreas…when it wants more sugar, we have to say “no”. Metabolic syndrome is deadly. We need to re construct our pancreas and protect your protein. Our very own Rotarian Keith Patin followed Tracy’s plan and lost 50 lbs. and was taken off all his medications.
June 22, 2011 - Our guest speaker this morning was Coach Mark Hudspeth, recently hired head football coach for the ULL Ragin Cajuns (see his picture in the Photo Gallery under “2010-11 Meetings”). It may be hot and summer time but there is no reason why we can’t start getting excited about the upcoming college football season. Coach Hudspeth just finished his first football camp at ULL and they’re off to a good start. For the summer semester, his players will have the highest GPA ever. He instituted “Class Checkers” to check to make sure his players with a GPA of 2.8 or less are attending their classes. Players with a 2.8 to 3.4 GPA get random checks. He also checks their weight every day. “If you work hard, you win…if you don’t work hard, you don’t win” he said. The theme for his first year is “What’s My Name?” “If you’re not real good, you’re not respected” he said “and we’re not respected right now”. Coach told us the story of the fight Muhammad Ali against Ernie Terrell…
Terrell held the WBA heavyweight belt – which had been taken from Ali after his conversion – and was on a five-year, 15-fight unbeaten run. He was a tall fighter who Ali nicknamed Octopus. Unfortunately, Terrell decided to irk Ali in the same way Floyd Patterson had, refusing to refer to him by any name other than Cassius clay. Ali would be just as heartless once more.
Ali opened with a flurry of hooks, then showed his disdain for Terrell’s skills by alternately circling his opponent, hands down and daring him to land a shot, then slapping him one-handed. Terrell’s best work was done in clinches he gained by advancing behind a high guard and weathering Ali’s combinations. The fight became a brawl along the ropes when Terrell could force Ali there for whatever respite he could gain, and something of a nightmare for him when business was conducted from the center of the ring. Ali had fractured a bone under Terrell’s left eye early in the fight and also damaged his retina. By the middle rounds Terrell was finished, flinching every time Ali drew back his fist. Terrell suffered terribly as Ali carried him through all 15 rounds, taunting him the whole time: “what’s my name, Uncle Tom? What’s my name?”
At the end of the fight, Terrell whispered into Ali’s ear…”you’re Muhammad Ali”
ULL football will keep saying this. “Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard” Coach said.
June 29, 2011 – Our guest speakers for this morning was Cathy Webre from Downtown Lafayette Unlimited (DLU) and Brett Mellington from Lafayette Economic Development Authority (see their pictures in the Photo Gallery under “2010-11 Meetings”). DLU is a non-profit corporation whose mission is the physical, economic and cultural revitalization of the downtown district. Their presentation focused on the latest developments / activities happening downtown. Cathy gave us “The Downtown Story” which began in 1996. Downtown Lafayette has had over $140 Million has been invested by the government and through building permits. Its occupancy rate is now at over 92% and it includes the CBD and the adjoining old neighborhoods. It consists of over 700 employers with over 7000 employees, approximately 3300 residents (97 residential units on Jefferson) with 3 parcs on 4 acres. Their future objective is to continue their growth with the assistance of the Lafayette consolidated government. The downtown partnership includes the Downtown Development Authority and Downtown Lafayette Unlimited. Downtown Lafayette serves up an eclectic menu of special events, major festivals and cultural & community programs, as well as a wide assortment of shopping, restaurants and entertainment opportunities. You can go to www.DowntownLafayette.org to learn more.
Brett informed the club of the new Opportunity Machine(OM), a business accelerator designed for technology-focused startups looking to grow their businesses and become a part of Lafayette’s developing technology ecosystem. OM can help these businesses gain access to capital funding and acquire industry best practices and help expand their range of expertise while providing development resources including temporary office space at an OM EcoZone and the chance to network with peers, mentors, coaches and community leaders. You can go to www.opportunitymachine.org for more information. Today’s meeting was truly a very informative and interesting.
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