Opening Routine and Business
- We did a hybrid meeting. Your note taker was online, so apologies for things I missed!
- Thank KJ for greeting; Will will do the honors next week.
- Stephen Dotson is a guest (in person) this week and is a prospective member. (See below for more info about him!)
- Next week’s scribe is Lisa, but Marcy is going to fill in. Sept. 8, Josh is filling in for Mona so Jim Maxwell will scribe. Diane is on the 15th.
- KJ will host the speaker next week and Jason will be speaker the next 2 weeks.
- “In every day there are 1440 minutes. That means we have 1440 daily opportunities to make a positive impact.” Les Brown
No Rotary Anniversaries
Birthdays
- Katja was on Monday and Josh was last week. We celebrated them both with song.
Rotary Announcements
- Disc Golf: The tournament is coming along for Oct. 1. It is now a whole weekend event! WOOHOO! Friday afternoon is Team Scramble Chuck for Charity where sponsors and their teams compete. Saturday and Sunday is a professional tournament. This year is a B Tier, which means we will probably have 150 people from all over New England. There will be a staggered start and it will be COVID friendly. They are still working on the volunteer opportunities because they are working with a professional tournament operator to run the tournament. We have an opportunity to show our brand and a fundraising opportunity via a pop-up “café.” Please reserve the weekend if you can be available to help. https://brattleborodiscgolf.com/
- District grant deadline was moved to September 15. There is $33K available, so send ideas to Mona.
- Moving Wall: You can sign up here. https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10c0d4eaba728a3f58-moving There are lots of slots still available. The Noon Club is also signing up to help. We are serving volunteers, not the public.
- Board meeting Sept. 2 at Legion.
Brags
- Sandy S.: Another brag for Jim Maxwell’s retirement. Please come to the Retirement Party Monday, August 30, 4-6 PM at the Country Club. RSVP if you can to Sandy or just show up!
- Josh G.: Anniversary on Sunday with Amy.
- Good to see Jeff and see him walking around!
- Turner: Friday this week Kay and Turner celebrate 1-56. Wow!!! Congratulations!
- Mona: Celebrating 4 years with her spouse.
- Jon S.: Lithuanian Ambassador crashed at the Secrest home for a night. They gave some awards to some Lithuanians in VT. She organized some meetings with Legislators and others to talk about rural communities in a modern economy.
Alina is settled in Gambier, OH at Kenyon College. She is very happy and it was a fun drop-off. There was a nice convocation event. She likes her roommate. Alexa is now stuck with both her parents with no support. - Katja: Paid her $5 birthday fine (yes, birthday fines are now $5). They went on college visits with Richard’s daughter, Isabella, in NY and ME. They all got sick, unfortunately (confirmed not COVID). Even sick, Isabella decorated the house and they celebrated Katja’s birthday.
- Kevin: Fines for everyone not wearing pins. He bragged for the nurses and staff at BMH. He was there for surgery and after a long delay, it was successful.
Cards
- Stephen (guest) chose 2 of Diamonds. No one appeared to be the winner.
BioChar with Tristam Johnson and Stephen Dotson
- They started with a video. We shared it at the meeting and on Zoom. We are so modern. Thank you to everyone who helped make that happen!
- Information and the video: https://regenerationinternational.org/2018/05/16/what-is-biochar/
- Stephen talked about some of the challenges we have in VT waters with contamination and pollution. Biochar can absorb some of the heavy metals and things out of the water be used to make other products like top soil. https://www.vsjf.org/2019/06/10/forests-filtration-and-farms-vermont-company-bets-on-biochar-to-clean-up-lake-champlain/
The one downside of biochar is that it is missing MPK, but the urine recycling group has lots of it! There is a partnership to be made there! - What is the process for not burning this wood? It is an oxygen-limited environment. It is a 2-barrel system that is slow-burning. There was a more in-depth explanation of this than I was able to capture (apologies from the note taker).
- What you burn does matter in terms of the yield and the quality of the product.
- There might be ways to use the heat coming off the barrels for other purposes (cooking, heating, powering bug zappers, etc.). At an industrial scale, the two-barrel system does look different, and so that might be an even greater possibility.
- It is an ancient technology and it is not really patent-able. It is not a big industry at this time that we know of. There is a lot of interest from environmentalists.
- More about Stephen Dotson: he has lived here about 8 years and started working for Brattleboro just before the pandemic. He works on sustainability issues for the town of Brattleboro broadly including COVID migration, agriculture and climate issues. He came to town to help start Hermit Thrush and worked with Jim V. at Windham Grows and has lots of amazing connections.
Closing
This has been one of the biggest meetings we have had! Thank you to everyone who attended in person and online. Bring a friend to the meeting!
Ended with the 4-Way Test: Is it the truth? Is it fair to all concerned? Will it build goodwill and better friendships? Is it beneficial to all concerned?