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 Special event: 35 club members had dinner with Rotary International President Ravi Ravindran in San Jose. His talk was inspirational, and the bus ride there and back was a great opportunity for fellowship.
Welcome to our newest members! George Saxton (Non Profit Management; San Francisco Ho Chi Minh Sister City Committee) is interested in getting involved in our International Committee; his sponsor, Otis Paul (Surgery - Opthalmology Pacific Children's Eye Care), has known George for 10 years. Peter de Castro (Wealth Management; UBS) is also interested in our International Committee. Peter’s hobbies include skiing, sailing, gardening and travel. Peter is married to Michelle and has two children, Phoebe and Philip.
 Sunshine Report: Tim Hornbecker (Human Resources; The Arc of Alameda) asks us to keep his daughter, Megan, in our thoughts as she starts chemotherapy. Proud father Kevin Waldeck (Financial Services; Morgan Stanley Investment Management) announced the arrival of Audrey Claire Waldeck, who was born on January 16.
Recognitions: Dan Joraanstad (Retail Brokerage-Wells Fargo Advisors) donated $100 to celebrate the upcoming "Night of Compassion" event he and Bob are hosting at their home; they have already raised $10,000 for Larkin Street Youth Center. John Mathers announced his daughter's upcoming marriage with a $100 donation and the excitement over their engagement party in India. Stephanie Schmautz (Retirement Living; The Carlisle) donated $100 after she mistakenly announced that The Super Bowl Party she and Eric are hosting starts at 6:30.
Rotarian of the Month: Cheers and applause erupted when President Stephanie named Carrie Condran LaBriola (Non Profit Management; Retired) as January's Rotarian of the Month. Carrie coordinates a team of weekly helpers, arrives at meetings early, stays past 2:00PM closing the books and putting everything away at the front desk and then on weekly basis she deposits all of the checks. All this, and Carrie also writes a monthly member profile in Grindings! Carrie has been a Rotarian since 1987 when women were first allowed into Rotary. Congratulations to Carrie, and thanks for all of your hard work for our club.
Vocational speakers: Casey Blair (Finance; Feis Options) relived his glory days at The Chicago Stock Exchange when he toiled through long days sporting his lucky tie on the trading floor. Hot, sweaty, loud days on the floor are now a thing of the past now that he spends his days in front of multiple computer screens working from home.
 Congrats on these Paul Harris milestones: A Paul Harris Fellowship was awarded to Wai-Ling Eng (Franchise Restaurant Management; McDonalds). A Paul Harris "+1” pin was awarded to Rhonda Poppen (Grant Writing; GRANTdog), PH+2 to Peter LoganJohn Dracup (Civil & Environmental Engineering; University of California). Thank you all for your contributions to Rotary International!
Member Graduation: James Chen (Heilongjiang University of Chinese Medicine Japan College), John Mathers (Management Consultant; eVo Consultancy), Jennifer Ji (Business Consultant) and JT Forbus(Tax Manager; Bogdan & Frasco) for graduating to the coveted white badge. Thanks to Jennifer for making succulent plants as gifts for the graduates!
 Dictionary Season: Ten of us camped out to get hundreds of dictionaries ready for delivery. As always, many hands made light work: we were done and off to dinner in an hour. Big thanks to Harold Hoogasian Florist Hoogasian Flowers) for providing space for our work.
Great programs and speakers: Allan Herzog (Stocks and Bonds; Wells Fargo Advisors) led this year’s panel of prognosticators. Allan, Brent Cunningham (Wealth Management; Merrill Lynch), Kevin Waldeck, and Dan Joraanstad provided us with some possibly sage advice including:
- Invest in stocks rather than bonds.
- Stick to high quality stocks and investment grade bonds.
- Get prepared for rising rates and volatility.
- “Stay the Course” Continue to hold high quality investments for the long run.
- Know what division between stocks and bonds is relevant to your asset base, timeframe, and objectives. Put a cash flow plan in place, and from that plan emerges a useful asset allocation that can be tweaked and adjusted based on current events.
JT Warring told us about working with Myanmar’s then-harsh military dictatorship to secure required official government permission for Rotary to establish fully-functioning clubs in that country. JT and his local allies launched the Rotary Club of Yangon in 2013. JT’s Rotary Project Team has since constructed 42 Rotary-proprietary water management systems, with six more scheduled for 2016.
Dr. Scott Arai, Director of the Friendship Line at The Institute on Aging, spoke to us about depression and suicide in the elderly and how to recognize what the alarming signs are. The toll-free 24-hour Friendship Line - the only one of its kind in the USA - is both a crisis intervention hotline and a warmline for non-urgent calls. The Line handles 100,000 calls a year, delivering round-the-clock crisis support services, active suicide intervention, elder abuse counseling, grief support, assistance, reassurance, and information and referrals for isolated older adults, and adults with disabilities, throughout the United States.
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Posted by Carrie Condran LaBriola
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 President-Elect David Dye says he’s been president of many organizations in the past and, “It’s taught me that the best thing you can do is learn what has gone before and what works, continue that and nurture those to come after.”
He wants to build on the momentum our club is currently enjoying with a special focus on membership, getting existing members involved and “attracting new members by the vibrancy of what we have going for us.”
David, a native of Missouri, holds undergraduate, graduate and law degrees from the University of Missouri - Kansas City. He practiced law for several years and taught in undergraduate legal studies programs for 20 years.
Looking for a change after a divorce, David moved to San Francisco in 1996, married his wife, Dora, and managed the pediatrics department at UCSF for a while. He had been involved with the Boy Scouts in Missouri with his older son, Choski (an Incan name meaning messenger), now 31 and a musician living in Missouri.
David wanted to reconnect with the Boy Scouts, so in 1999, he asked for a volunteer position and ended up with a paid job managing Learning for Life, an in-school character-education program. He moved on to managing traditional Scouting programs on the Peninsula, where he first joined the Rotary Club of Redwood City, then the Rotary Club of Los Altos.
David had joined the Boy Scouts in 1999, at the same time as new Club member Frank Yoke, then both began working for the San Francisco Bay Area Council in 2005. David joined the Rotary Club of San Francisco soon after. Frank recently joined our club, too. David served a two-year term as our Club’s Vice President for PR and Communications and will be President in 2016-17.
David’s involvement in Boy Scouting extends back to his childhood and is “a defining part of my life and who I am today.” As an 11-year-old, his goal was to become an Eagle Scout, but he crushed two vertebrae in his back falling down cement stairs and landing on a step. He had to wear a full back brace, so couldn’t participate in sports. He was able to go camping, but unable to fulfill three requirements for Eagle Scout in such things as lifesaving and physical fitness. His Scoutmaster repeatedly petitioned the national office to allow the substitution of three other merit badges, and finally at age 17, he was successful. “It was a little bit more meaningful to me because there was not much hope of achieving it,” he says. “It taught me to persevere and overcome adversity.” His younger son, David Jr., 18, followed his father as an Eagle Scout, participated in RYLA and just started college at Skyline.
David’s experience as a teacher and manager of youth programs made involvement in Rotary’s youth work a natural fit, first with vocational service for the Rotary Club of Los Altos, then with the Interact Club at Lowell High School and as co-chair of Interact for District 5150 and chair of RYLA, a job he has now passed on as he prepares for his year as President.
He says he gets “personal satisfaction from watching kids get transformed by Rotary, taking advantage of the opportunities given them.” David says a shy kid with no self-confidence can grow and develop leadership skills, citing a student from an immigrant family that didn’t speak English who first joined Interact at Galileo, then participated in RYLA, then was staff at RYLA, then went to Germany on a Youth Exchange, and “finally could stand up in front of Rotarians to tell her story” at the District 5150 Conference in Anaheim. “That’s the kind of development I’ve seen.”
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Posted by David Dye
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 One’s first impression of Michael Strohl is of a gregarious, friendly, and impeccably dressed member of the club. When you get to know Michael a little better, you soon learned that he is first and foremost a husband and father. For him, family comes first. With his wife, Allyson, he has two children, his daughter, Caroline, is three years old and his son, Lucas, is eight months old. Allyson is a wealth manager at Bessemer Trust.
Michael, who grew up in Baltimore, is the son of Thomas and Bradley Strohl. After a career in the insurance industry, Thomas and Bradley retired to Florida. Michael describes his youth as rather uneventful. He was not active in clubs and his only interest was baseball. After high school, he attended Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
After college, Michael moved to San Francisco and took a job with Lincoln Financial Advisors. He’s been with the company for 18 years. Michael maintains a financial consulting practice in addition to serving as the managing principal of the Northern California Regional Planning Office of Lincoln Financial Advisors/Sagemark Consulting. Michael is a certified financial planner (CFP) and chartered financial consultant (ChFC).
Professionally, Michael has been involved in the Financial Planning Association, the Estate Planning Council, and the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors, NAIFA, where he served on the Board of Directors and chair of the membership committee.
Michael identifies two factors that brought him into Rotary. First his wife, Allyson, was actively involved in the Junior League and she urged him to get involved in something. Second, he knew Rotarian Michael Ford. Michael occasionally mentioned that he was going to a Rotary meeting. After accompanying him to some of our club’s meetings he eventually joined in 2011, primarily for the business networking opportunities. Because of his devotion to his family, he regards himself as a daytime Rotarian and reserves his weekends and evenings for his family.
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 In his talk, Behind the Bark: What sea lions have to tell us about the state of our coastal waters, Dr. Jeff Boehm, a veterinarian, and the Executive Director of The Marine Mammal Center, will explore what can sea lions teach us about the state of coastal California fisheries ... and about cancer.
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All club members are welcome to attend meetings of the International Service Committee. Please join the meeting to see what projects are coming up and how you can help, and/or to propose your own ideas for new projects. If you would like to find out how to submit a grant for a project, criteria for grants or completing a final report, this is the meeting for you.
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 Rotarians, friends and family are invited to watch the Super Bowl at the Schmautz House. Fun, food, and real-time announcements of the winners of Paul Harris Fellowships at the end of each quarter!
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 Renay Conlin, Development Director at San Francisco's Museum of Craft and Design, will give us a brief history of the craft and design movement and introduce us to the ways in which the museum explores how this movement impacts our dynamically changing global culture. MCD, which features exhibitions that explore a vibrant and exciting part of the international art scene, was named 2015’s “boutique museum of the year” by San Francisco Magazine.
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The board of the San Francisco Rotary Foundation meets monthly to discuss the needs of the foundation and to approve funding for Rotary Service projects. Meetings of the Foundation Board are primarily for Foundation Board Members, but club members are often welcome to attend.
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 All long-term, new, and prospective members are welcome to attend this evening social event. It's a great opportunity to get to know your club while networking with our newest members.
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 Jeff Adachi has served as elected Public Defender of the City and County of San Francisco since March 2002 and has worked as a deputy public defender in San Francisco for 15 years. As the only elected Public Defender in the state of California, Mr. Adachi oversees an office of 93 lawyers and 60 support staff. The office, which has a $30 million budget, represents more than 23,000 people each year who are charged with misdemeanor and felony offenses.
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Please attend this 1 hour training on how to successfully complete a grant to request funding for a Local Service or International Service Project. Rotarians leading a project or anyone who would like to introduce a new project must attend. Even if you have written previous requests, come learn what the SF Foundation requires in order for a grant to be approved. This training will be focused on projects between now and June 2017.
Open to club members only. Click here to register.
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All club members are welcome to attend meetings of the Local Community Service Committee. Please join the meeting to see what projects are coming up and how you can help, and/or to propose your own ideas for new projects. If you would like to find out how to submit a grant for a project, criteria for grants or completing a final report, this is the meeting for you.
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 Let's volunteer so others can eat. Come help pack food for distribution to the many needy people in San Francisco who depend on the Food Bank. Click below on "more information" for details about what to wear and where to park. Optional informal dinner in a neighborhood restaurant will follow.
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The monthly joint meeting of the boards of the Rotary Club of San Francisco, the governing body responsible for club operations, and Rotary Service, which oversees all of our club’s service projects. Members are welcome to attend, but please contact the Club Secretary to confirm time and location before attending.
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 This is the day when we honor outstanding representatives of the public safety departments we depend on every day: Police, Fire, Sheriff, and Coast Guard. Meet the honorees and their loved ones, and hear their amazing stories of heroism and dedication told by the top brass of each department. Since this is one of the most popular meeting of the year, it is especially important to RSVP.
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 Come and celebrate Chinese New Year with your fellow Rotarians at this dinner to be hosted by Lilian Tsi-Stielstra in her San Francisco Home. We'll enjoy a buffet of Singaporean style food as we welcome the Year of the Monkey.
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 World Wide Rotary Day honors the San Francisco Consular Corps as the special guests of the Rotary Club of San Francisco. One of the most popular programs on our club's annual calendar, WWRD was founded in 1997 to recognize our club's international service activities and the support of the Rotary Foundation of Rotary International.
Our featured speaker this year is Past Rotary International President Cliff Dochterman, widely recognized as one of the best speakers in the Rotary World. Cliff's talk is sure to be interesting and inspiring. As always, many members of the Consular Corps of San Francisco will attend as our guests. Please RSVP as early as possible so we can be sure to have enough seats for all who want to attend.
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 Enjoy a private evening at the Museum of Craft and Design, including wine, snacks, and private tours of the exhibitions on view, Art and Other Tactics: Contemporary Craft by Artist Veterans and Without Camouflage: Dafna Kaffeman, Silvia Levenson. Afterward, some of us will share an informal dinner in the neighborhood. Friends and family welcome. Pre-registration required.
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