We had a great evening on Wednesday when we welcomed in the new team for the coming year. It was great to host Carolyn Nelson for Inner Wheel and Liecester Wilson from the Ashburton Club and we were especially honoured to host District Governer Nick Courtney and Past District Governor Liz Courtney. 

Bob thanked and congratulated Steve and his team for a successful year.
The past year has been very challenging on the back of covid.
We were unable to have a Changeover as we normally would and Zoom meetings were still the norm. It was through Steve’s guidance that got us back to normal. And it was through his initiative that we changed our meeting schedule and became more flexible. He also guided us through changing venues and through that we find ourselves now meeting here at the Hotel Ashburton.

Steve on behalf of all our members, congratulations and thank you.

Steve and Bob after Steve presented Bob with the chain of office

Bob then introduced the Rotary Theme for 2021-2022 Serve to Change Lives

Our Rotary International President Shekhar Mehta in his speech to the international convention a couple of weeks ago, mentioned his life’s guiding philosophy

“Service is the rent I pay for the space I occupy on this earth,
and I want to be a good tenant of this earth”.

It is through Rotary that we have an opportunity to serve. It is through Rotary that we have provided eyesight to the blind, food to the hungry, homes to the homeless.

Rotarians see a need and they serve.

Why else have Rotarians spent billions of dollars and volunteer hours over the last 35 years to eradicate polio and serve mankind?

Through Rotary we have set up thousands of schools, hundreds of hospitals, provided water in parched villages, brought dignity to people by providing the simple necessities of life, and locally we have used our fund raising effects to support many causes within our own community.

Rotarians serve to change lives.

Today the need to serve has become even more necessary and apparent.

We completed the evening with the induction of our new member Jaimee Blythe. Congratulations Jaimee.