As a global network that strives to build a world where people unite and take action to create lasting change, Rotary values diversity and celebrates the contributions of people of all backgrounds, regardless of their age, ethnicity, race, color, abilities, religion, socioeconomic status, culture, sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity.
We Invite You To Join Our Club
We are your neighbors, your friends, your colleagues. We are committed to "Service Above Self".
It is ALL about WHAT WE DO
The Rotary Club of Half Moon Bay is in District 5150 - for more information about District 5105, open the link in the menu bar above.
My name is Liz Schuck, and I am the proud 2nd time President of the BEST Rotary Club in the world.
I joined Rotary because of my brother. He was a vice president at a bank and shared with me some of the work of his club. One project stuck in my mind, the goal to end polio. I was very taken by a club that not only supported its local community but was working to end a worldwide disease.
I decided then and there to join such an organization and I did just that in 1995 when I was principal of a large elementary school in Anaheim, California. I felt the connection between the business world and the education world was critical to the success of both! The club I joined was a very small club of 14 members, and I was one of only two women in the club. Our club’s only focus was showing up for the weekly meetings.
In 1999 when I began working for our local school district, Cabrillo Unified, I became a member of the Rotary Club of Half Moon Bay. My friend and dentist Eric Shapira was my sponsor. This is where I learned what Rotary is all about! Very soon after being inducted, I joined a team of club members on an international trip to Mexico to provide wheelchairs for people in need. I guess you would say this was my first “Rotary moment”, or what drove me to want to do more for our community and the world.
Another “Rotary moment” came in 2018 when I joined a team of over 50 people from the Bay Area on an international trip to India to participate in the annual polio immunization program. Which brings me back to my brother and why I joined Rotary. With all of the work of Rotary International and local clubs around the world, we have almost eliminated polio. Going to India was a life changing experience!
And that’s one of the examples of the impact of Rotary worldwide!
Currently one of our many projects locally is building, installing and maintaining little libraries throughout the Coastside. The Rotary Club of Half Moon Bay has been serving the Coastside for more than 50 years. We are actively involved in a number of ongoing community projects as well as planning another trip to Mexico in 2024.
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Come visit us and see what we’re up to! (To see more about our current projects, just scroll down this page.}
Club Information
Welcome to our Club! We meet in person at the HMB Library (or join us on Zoom.) But check below in case there is a special venue.
Service Above Self
We meet In Person
Thursdays at 12:00 PM
HMB Library
620 Correas St
Half Moon Bay, CA 94019 United States of America
Any guest who wishes to join us for our meetings at the Library or on Zoom is very welcome! Please contact President Liz Schuck at elizabeth.anne.schuck@gmail.com for the link to the Zoom meeting or more information about the in-person meeting.
Monthly Contribution to Coastside Hope Families Project
October Update
Thank you to Mary and the Coastside Hope monthly supplies packing team: Joe, Heather, Rosi and Hal and all else who helped this past Wednesday!! Your commitment to the neediest members of our community is quite admirable.
May
Mary, Ginger, Heather in Mary's driveway getting the supplies packed and then Doug delivering them to Coastside Hope's Caitlen Vreeburg, Development and Operations Director.
Club Members Doing Work In Our Coastside and International Communities - Update
We presented the check from our Magic of the Coastside Lobster Fest fundraiser toCADHC. Seeing the joy and gratitude on the faces of the recipients was truly inspiring!
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A huge thank you to the Coastside Hope Monthly Suppliesteam for packing 8 bags this week--Joe, Stacy, Mary, Heather, and Doug,(Liz and Pat arrived too late to help this fast crew).
Another huge thank you to members and friends from both our club and the Woodside/Portola Valley club for participating in the Annual Coastal Clean up on Saturday--Susan, Dennis, Warren, Stacy, Teri, Anita, yours truly, Emily Prah, plus Haydi Danielson, Sandi Pugh, Sue and her grandson Marshall.
Rotary Crew Working Hard at the Annual Coastside Senior Yard Rehab Project
Dennis and Susan, Liz and Teri , Rose, plus Chris and Ann at the home of Mickey Williamson.
PUMPKIN FESTIVAL 2023 - ROTARY CLUB CLAM CHOWDER BOOTH
Congratulations to Joe Brennan of the Rotary Club of Half Moon Bay for being selected as Rotary District 5150's Rotarian of the Month for September 2023! Joe has been a Rotarian since 2000. He began his Rotary journey with the Rotary Club of San Francisco and then joined the Rotary Club of Half Moon Bay in 2013. Joe has served as Club President and is the consummate Rotarian. He attends every weekly meeting and participates in almost all of our Club's community service activities.
Dedication to his Community: Joe leads our Breakfast for the Needy Program for the Abundant Grace Coastside Worker Agency. Monthly, he organizes our Club members into two early morning teams to prepare a warm meal for our unhoused community members.
For the past three years Joe has been part of a small team to assemble supplies for needy families served by Coastside Hope, an organization that our Club supports with District-Designated funds. Each month, Joe works with one or two other Club members to purchase and pack approximately $80 worth of household necessities for eight identified families.
Since 2021, Joe has been our Little Library guru. Our Club co-sponsored, built, and installed seven Little Libraries across the community. Joe maintains those Little Libraries, checking on them monthly and replacing parts and books as needed.
Joe is a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows in Half Moon Bay. For the past five years, he has arranged for our Club and the Odd Fellows to socialize together each holiday season. This has built a strong relationship between the two clubs.
International Service: In 2022 when COVID prevented our Club's team from helping a medical clinic in Mexico, Joe purchased medical supplies with money from his own pocket and took the supplies to the clinic in La Paz, Mexico.
In 2023 Joe returned to La Paz, Mexico with a team of seven Club members to provide support to a medical clinic. Again, he purchased medical supplies with his own funds and donated the supplies to the clinic.
Joe has also served on medical missions with Alliance for Smiles, an organization that provides free surgical repairs for cleft lip and cleft palatein the continents of Asia and Africa.
Joe truly exemplifies the Rotary motto of Service Above Self in everything he does. We at the Rotary Club of Half Moon Bay are honored to have Joe as our valued member. Joe Brennan is most deserving to be recognized as District 5150’s Rotarian of the Month for September 2023!
Club Members Helping in Mexico
Joe reported that they were back and had a successful and fun trip. The group of seven (Kevin O’Brien, Bill Johnston and wife, Austin Stowell, EJ Dieterle and wife, Rose Mortilla, Jim Holley* and myself) achieved our goals of helping at Dr. Nancy Harris’s Freed Clinic, and also having some fun things around La Paz and crossing over to the Pacific coast to see many Gray Whale cows and calves in the lagoon there. They will give a more detailed presentation to the Club when photos (and alibis) organized.
They did take $700 worth of Children’s multi vitamins and prenatal vitamins to be distributed. They also bought $700 worth of supplies for our work day at the clinic.
They attended the meetings of two of La Paz’s five Rotary Clubs which was good social grace for them and great networking for Nancy and her staff, Francoise and Adriana.
* Jim Holley is a wonderful man Joe knows from his large role in Red Cross and from Odd Fellows. Jim was an international executive in HR and is proficient in Spanish. He is not a Rotarian but fit and pitched right in.
Cooking Breakfast Monthly in Support of Abundant Grace's Community Outreach
We are once again able to help out with Abundant Grace in this essential program for those who are underserved in our community. The crew for the month of May below: (Susan Kealey and Dennis Fisher, Heather Bodman, Rose Serdy, Paul Wrubel, Warren Barmore. and Joe Brennan (not in the picture). Thanks to Joe for getting our crews organized.
Our October 26 meeting was all fun and no business. We took over the tent at Farmer John's and carved pumpkins. Liz has circulated pictures of the winners and all of the entries were great. Liz brought her signature cupcakes with a Hallowe'en theme. There were Rotary pooches uknderfoot and nosing around. A great time was had by all.
Liz introduced the day’s guest speaker, Kyle Haugen, Past District Governor from the Rotary Club of Prior Lake, Minn. Talking to us via Zoom, he told us about himself: From 2017 to 2018 he served as District Governor of Rotary District 5960; currently he is serving as a District Rotary Foundation Team Leader 2019-2021 and will serve as Region 36 Rotary Public Image Coordinator, 2021-2024. Liz met him when they served together on a polio immunization trip to India. The son of Rotarian parents and brother of a Rotarian, he had worked in insurance and coached T-Ball. A Rotarian himself since 2003, he had also visited Uganda, India, Haity and Rwanda; visiting Kenya on Rotary water projects, and was the youngest Governor of his district at the time. He and his wife are both Major Donors and members of the Bequest Society.
Throughout his talk, Kyle stressed the importance of story and, for all of us, the importance of telling our individual Rotary stories. He held the Half Moon Bay Rotarians enthralled, speaking encouragingly about membership and the Rotary Foundation, telling of his polio immunization trip to India and visit with a village leader, and his role as Rotary Public Image Coordinator, Zones 25B and 29.
He spoke about public image, “the delivery system” to members and to the public. We need to create an emotional response that makes people want to be involved -- everyone enjoys being part of a solution. Think about why you joined Rotary – Because you enjoyed being part of a group? Is there an emotional connection? What’s a good way to forge that – telling your story, helping listeners to create a picture of themselves in that situation? Could you picture yourself there? Does that make you proud to be a Rotarian? Without an emotional connection, there is no story.
The Sept. 7 meeting of the Rotary Club of Half Moon Bay was short but typical of the club: active and abuzz with discussions around upcoming events and plans.
President Liz Schuck was unable to attend, and so President Elect Irwin Cohen stepped up to lead the meeting.
For the Inspirational Thought, Stacy Trevenon offered her thoughts on last weekend’s 60th annual Kings Mountain Art Fair, an event she annually attends and at which she volunteers as a “booth sitter,” sitting in at booths when the artists need a break. She likened the art fair and the many volunteers that produce it, to our Rotary Club, given the boundless creativity, energy and resources it draws upon to do the work it does.
It was a quiet meeting, with no guests and no visiting Rotarians. When happy/crappy news was called for, Ralph Ely gave some sobering updates on Mike and Rose Serdy, both of whom were hurt recently due to falls.
Susan Kealey gave the latest on the Coastal Cleanup Day scheduled from 10 a.m. to noon on Saturday, Sept. 23 at Dunes Beach. For this event we will be joined by members of the Rotary Clubs of Woodside and Palo Alto. Susan had brought posters about the cleanup day, to distribute to members to display from office or home windows.
Color set the tone as it filled the June 29, 2003 meeting of the Rotary Club of Half Moon Bay. Bright pastel plastic tablecloths, gold centerpieces and a handful of little stars graced every table, and several colorful tutus decorated the chairs. President Krystlyn Giedt, herself a star since “Star” is her middle name and her year’s theme and this was her debunking, brightened the room with her smiles. She herself wore a sparkling star tiara and a yellow tutu. And cheery multi-colored tutus sparkled on the chairs. Incoming Club President Liz Schuck, who had chaired and planned the debunking event and luncheon, introduced Dianne Bobko, who in turn introduced Chef Ellie Angelini of "A Teaspoon of Love"who catered our delicious Luncheon. As Dianne treminded us, Chef Ellie has supported our Club's Magic of the Coastside Auction over the years each time donating a full gourmet dinner she prepared and cooked in the winner's home for 6 guests. Dianne mentioned that she was the lucky winner twice, and they were amazing dinners. Chef Ellie hails from the Cordon Bleu.
Liz asked members to introduce their guests who included Rosi Fontana’s partner Hal Novotny, Bo Bobko, Larkin Evans, Kathy, Wilson, and new member Wendy Smittle, who is due to be inducted in July.
Liz then invited Joe to offer a few words as the key part of Krystlyn's debunking. Joe Brennan, calling this “a good year,” obliged with the following limerick. “First with apologies to Frank Sinatra, he then read,"
“The year twenty twenty two / Was a very good year / It was a very good year for a small town girl / On first Thursday nights / She played under lights / On Main Street / In twenty twenty two … “As twenty twenty two closed / It was a very good year / It was a very good year for Chamber girl / Who wrapped up the year / With a meeting at Odd Fellows / And it was some fun / Goodbye twenty twenty two … “Now it is twenty twenty three / Which is a very good year / It is a very good year for warm-blooded girl / Of the Chamber’s dreams / Who’d work long hours / Burning the candle at both ends / Twenty twenty three is a very good year … “Now in mid twenty twenty three / It is a very good year / Her term is winding down / She’s holding together / The whole damn town / And passing on the Rotary crown / Twenty twenty-three is a very good year … “Krystlyn fortunately never suffers the blues, / Because in her closet she has all those tutus. / If she starts to feel blue, / She can take the cue / Slipping on a tutu and high, high top tennis shoes! “Tracking the Goonies at Columbia River’s end, / Taking a well deserved vacation with a friend. / They visited the Astoria Jail, / But didn’t have to post no bail. / Visiting all the Goonies locations as penned … “Krystlyn answered the Chamber’s call / It takes half of every 24 hours, that’s all / Then came the Rotary call / She took it without stall / But her office support evaporated by Fall! “She found it difficult to be in two places at once / The frustration gets one’s knickers in a bunch. / But she balanced her events / Whether in offices or tents / And survived the year with only a few lumps ... “It became a year of almost endless Zooms / Allowing her to be in two if not three rooms! / It was hectic to be sure / But also a stop gap cure / Allowing her distance from numerous sure glooms ... “Committee meetings had to be the worst, / You’re on the agenda but you’re never first / If you bide your time right / You’ll be in the spotlight. / Miss your cue and you’ll be exposed … and cursed! “This year saw the town’s first Pride parade, / Many came out into the sun from the shade / It was colorful to be sure, / Seeing the rainbow’s allure / Celebrating what progress we all have made!” Joe than called Krystlyn up front and presented her with her own Starr award and, in recognition, a crystal statue of a star and her Past President pin that “you’ve worked all year to achieve.”
Amid applause, Liz gave Krystlyn heartfelt thanks. Krystlyn then acknowledged that it was a group effort. She said she took on the presidency with good intentions that ended up flying right out the window. Thanking Liz for being her unofficial “sounding board” all year, and helping her keep the Club going, Krystlyn turned it over to Liz who presented her with a beautiful engraved piece with a star on the top from the Club.
As her “last official act” as President, Krystlyn rang the bell. “Thank you to everyone,” she said to the club. “It was a group effort. Love you all!”
NOTE: Click "Read More" to read about the Club Meeting and Announcements that followed and see lots of fun pictures in the PHOTO GALLERY.
Our speaker today was introduced by Susan Kealey. Karen Wang is a Montara resident and mom of 2 kids. She is also the Communications Officer for the County of San Mateo Office of Sustainability where she oversees communications to promote sustainability education and initiatives within the County and the community. She was formerly, the Director of the nonprofit, Collaborative on Health and the Environment (CHE) and the founder and Director of Because Health, an environmental health education campaign. Karen completed her PhD in Strategic Management at the Foster School of Business at the University of Washington. Karen also holds a MS in Environmental Science and a BA in Economics from Stanford University.
The following are the key points covered by Karen in her presentation.
First the History of the Office of Sustainability - it was formed in 2014, part of the county manager's office, helps the community become more sustainable. Now own county department, joined recently, solving for today and our long term future
Karen asked our members, "What do ou think about when you hear sustainability? " The responses were:
Food, environment, climate change, running out of resources, agriculture, housing,
Rotary has two beach clean ups coming up
Karen Then presented the Mission statement: Building a sustainable community that fulfills the needs of the present and future.
The OOS includes 20 partnered cities. Her following slides listed:
Four areas of programs:
Climate protection
Climate resilience- adapting to effects of climate change we are seeing
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Half Moon Bay, CA 94019
United States of America