
Welcome to the final month of our 2013-2014 Rotary Year, June is Rotary Fellowship Month.
What better way to celebrate fellowship than at a Rotary International Convention. I am writing
this from Sydney, Australia, site of this year’s Convention and sitting with about 22,000 of my
new closest Rotary friends. The sight of the flags of over 200 Rotary counties parading in to the
Opening Plenary session will set your heart pounding and make you proud to be in Rotary.
The House of Friendship is three huge Convention halls linked together and has Rotary booths,
Rotary Vendors, places to exchange banners, restaurants and just a great place to meet folks
and learn more about where they’re from and what type of Club they belong to. Pins and cards
get exchanged, new ideas gleaned about service projects and fellowship, and just a wonderful
and relaxing way to meet folks.
There are Plenary sessions with the latest information on all aspects of Rotary, changing of the
guard as new Directors and Trustees are introduced and Breakout sessions on everything you
would ever want to know about Rotary. Rotaractors from around the world have their own
mini-Convention for the three days prior to the official start of the RI Convention. Great to see
so many young folks proud to be involved with Rotary.
Our District’s own Director and RI Vice President Anne L. Matthews sponsored the annual Southland
event and held a reception on Saturday. The Southland Reception was held Saturday May 31,
2014, 5:30 – 7:30PM at the Powerhouse Museum in downtown Sydney, amidst the main hotels and
restaurants. A great time was had by all as old friendships flourished and new friends made.
As we move into the final month of the Rotary Year, have you reflected on all the good Rotary does in
your community and in the world? Have you Engaged Rotary this year and helped to Change Lives?
Think about the little things that you can do as an individual Rotarian and then consider multiplying that
by 1. 2 million to consider what we can accomplish as an organization. Have you volunteered to help
with Club Service Projects this year? It’s not too late, get involved and find others to pitch in as well.
Have you reached out to potential members and invited them to join you at a meeting? It’s not hard, it’s
just being a friend to get others involved.
Get Connected and Engaged – If you want to enjoy seeing all that Rotary does in the world
and in our communities, then the Rotarian magazine is a great source of information. There
are wonderful stories, photos and a calendar of events that keep you plugged into what’s
coming up in the Rotary world. Did you know that the Rotarian is now online at http://
therotarianmagazine.com/. Don’t wait any longer to check it out. What better way to share
what the magazine is all about than to share it out on social media and include in your Club
pages as well.
Public Relations – This is a great time to think about how we can spread the good word and
works of Rotary in our communities. Public Relations and providing stories and photos of our
service projects and fellowship events to local media is a great way to do that and to promote
membership opportunities as well. Use Social Media in addition to Print Media to showcase
This is something that all Rotarians should take pride in, sharing our Rotary opportunities with
others. Have you looked around you at family, friends and neighbors; these are people that you
know the best and they are wonderful candidates to join Rotary. Updated membership shows
the District at a “plus” 89 through May 29th
would be 2 per Club on average.
It has been an honor and a pleasure to serve as your Governor this year.
Let’s all continue having a great year as we “Engage Rotary and Change Lives”.
Regards Lou Mello DG 2013-14
. Let’s finish strong and get to that plus 158 which