Present for today's Zoom were: Sandra Westaway, Roland, Helen Campbell from Railway City Club; Catharine, Barbara, Ron, Connie, Malcolm, Gerry, Trish and Stewart.

 

21Oct20 Zoom meeting with Catherine Hind, End Polio Chair, Stratford Club (pictured bellow)

 

The Interactors were at Wild Flowers market last Friday and earned over one hundred dollars.

 

Sandra reported that 21 people attending at Inn Out of the Cold were placed in housing.

 

Helen Campbell spoke about Rotary International Scholarships. She is available to answer questions.

 

Rotary flag raising at St. Thomas City Hall will not be conducted on World Polio Day, as October 24th is a Saturday.  When confirmed, the date and time will be sent out via email and anyone wishing to join is asked to wear a mask and keep their social distance. We hope to keep the time at 11:15 a.m. but it will not occur on Wednesday due to needing to be home on Zoom for our meeting at 12:00 p.m.

 

Heartland Ontario Habitat for Humanity(HH) https://habitat4home.ca/ catchment area is London-Middlesex, Elgin, Oxford and Perth counties. 

HH is an official partner with Rotary since 2017. HH has had an international appeal; volunteers have gone to places like Cambodia to build. Concern for worldwide safe housing has brought Rotary and HH together. Malcolm's granddaughter, Emily (now helping HH with digital social networking) went to New Orleans on a build.

 

There are Restore stores selling reusable items in London(3), St Thomas, Stratford, Listowel, and Woodstock all operating under the operations center Wonderland Rd, London. If you are in this "catchment area" and you have large items to donate, contact HH for possible pickup. Since Covid, HH is not able to go to sites to extract items like cupboards; but contractors are cooperating by removing this kind of item without damage so they can be picked up. 364730 pounds of materials have been recycled. Wood not covered by paint, varnish etc are mulched.

 

Volunteers working with HH build homes for people who qualify for the program. The new owners must contribute 500 hours of work toward the building of the home. Students at Fanshawe College build prefabricated walls for each build. Professionals plan each unit using flexible modular designs. New owners are trained to manage a new home and budget the costs. They learn that homeownership should be no more than 30% of the family budget. Each build costs from 33000 to 64000 dollars. Often, new owners come from social housing, which reduces the burden on those seeking low-income housing. 

 

Builds have been completed on Muncie First Nation. A new build is planned for London next year. Currently, St Thomas is the host for a build on Hiawatha St. This home will be 25% more energy-efficient than code. Construction waste will be reduced by 22%. The cycle of building construction is sustainable because income/expenses are not tied to operational costs of HH; each build pays its own way.

 

$500 from our budget has been approved to go to HH.

 

The Railway City will be invited to join us next week for Zoom.