November Business Meeting

Today's meeting was our monthly business meeting. We started with our Know Your Exchangite, which was Virginius 'Jinks' Dabney, Attorney at Law. One interesting thing about Jinks is he learned to snow ski at age 42 and has been in love with it since (all these many years now). Click here for more information about Jinks.

Today's Guests: Danny Wittwer, Abby Inn (club sponser: Tom Bayles)

Business Meeting Items:

Induction of new club members - Patricia Sheffield, Children's Justice Center. Welcome to the club Patricia

SUPAF - click here for the upcoming schedule
We need all club members to be active in seeking donations for this years festival. We are asking each club member to raise at least $200. This can been done by the club member business and/or by seeking out businesses and individuals who would like to be a donor. An official letter and donation form will be sent out in the coming weeks.

New Member Drive - All club members have been asked to seek out and invite a prospective club member. Club growth is critical for successful and ongoing service. The next two meetings would be ideal for inviting someone to come to our breakfast meeting. Also, see the schedule at the top of the blog for upcoming meetings.

Give Me Liberty - More information is needed about a started kit for schools. Kathy will try contacting Jeremy Larkin. If anyone knows where to order a started kit please let Kathy know.

Tree Planting - As far as anyone knows we are on track for Arbor Day tree planting (Apr 30, 2010). I believe we had our tree planting activity on Saturday following Arbor Day. Wayne or Tim will be getting with Kent Perkins at the city to find out more.

Mayor's Walk - What did and didn't work for this years Mayor's Walk?
Did: the new pavilion, Staheli Catering, honey butter.
Didn't: sprinklers (technically they did work, but they didn't work for the Mayor's Walk), powder sugar, butter, honey, everyone eating half of the scones we made.
Feel free to add to this list by posting your observations of what did or didn't work.

See you next week for our speaker Mary Sanders, Beehive Cottages and KYE: Bill Hudson

23rd Annual Mayor's Walk Another Successful Event

"Great solar rays . . . what a day for a walk!" said this year's Mayor's Walk t-shirts designed by Duane Derfler at YESCO Signs. The colorful Solar Man shirts, distributed to hundreds of walkers honored Bart Anderson, southern Utah's beloved historian and hike leader; and Stephen Nelson, a well-respected member of St. George Exchange Club, both who passed away this year. In the cold darkness of Saturday morning, October 3, more than a dozen hearty members of St. George Exchange Club were on hand to kick off the 23rd Annual St. George Mayor’s Walk, as part of the activities of the St. George Marathon. Though the crowd - including business people, school mates, friends, families and lots of dogs - was much smaller than usual, they were no less enthusiastic as St. George City Mayor Dan McArthur sounded the horn at 7 a.m. at Bluff Street Park and led approximately 800 walkers of every age to the finish line at Vernon Worthen Park - only slightly ahead of the winning wheelchair racer.

By the end of the walk, SGE-ites Ralph Flanagan (in his first year as chair of the Mayor's Walk event), Ed Sappington, Neal Smith, Jinx Dabney, Dale Larkin, Mark Loosli, Tim Floyd, Wayne Everett, Tom Bayles, Jeff Buchnell, Floyd Holm, Kathy Martin, Vasu Mudliar and Ryan Robison, SGE's immediate past president picked up their gear and relocated to Vernon Worthen Park to set up for the onslaught of hungry walkers seeking their anticipated prize of a hot scone with honey butter after a 2.12 mile walk with the Singing Mayor!

Over the years, the Mayor's Walk has become a popular tradition in St. George City for walkers of all ages . . . and a lucrative annual fundraiser for St. George Exchange Club for support of numerous community projects throughout the year.

Thanks to everyone who helped make this another successful event!

Give a Kid a Flag to Wave

Our annual Give a Kid a Flag to Wave event was on Friday September 18th during the Children's Parade for the Dixie Round Up Rodeo. Last year we wore a bright yellow t-shirt to the parade in hopes of bringing better recognition to the club. But, this year we stepped it up to a whole new level by actually being in the parade and teaming up with BACA. The parade announcers at each block corner announced the club and BACA's presence in the parade was to bring awareness to Child Abuse. And it sounded like the crowds responded well. We had our banners for the club and for the Mayors Walk. We had some club members wearing our ever lovely yellow t-shirts and others wearing the new Mayors Walk t-shirts and handed out over 1,200 flags. Due to lack of participation from club members, those handing out flags couldn't keep up with the banners and fell behind a few parade entries. I think we can do better next year with more members participating and possibly create a new banner that states: Give a Kid a Flag to Wave! the Exchange Club and BACA teaming up against Child Abuse! or something like that. Your feed back and input at our next business meeting would be very helpful.

Mayors Walk and Give a Kid a Flag

Today's meeting was spent discussing upcoming events and meetings.

Mayors Walk - Ralph gave us an update. The Bluff Street Pavilion is near completion. The hats and shirts are ready to be picked up. A sign up sheet was passed out and has now been emailed out to make sure we are covered for Friday and Saturday.


Give a Kid a Flag to Wave - Kevin has ordered over 1,400 flags that we will give out on September 18th at 5pm during the Children's Parade. We are arranging to be in the parade this year and be combined with BACA, to bring better awareness to Child Abuse Prevention. We will need a good turn out with some wearing the Exchange Club Yellow t-shirts and others wearing the Mayors Walk t-shirts.

Upcoming events, speakers, and Know Your Exchangite have been updated at the top of the blog. Please be aware of those dates in Orange. They are not part of our weekly meetings.

Business Meeting

Today's meeting was a business meeting.
Wayne Everett, today's Know Your Exchangite, shared a historic BYU UofU game that he felt Jinks needed to know about.

Fund-raising Committee recommended a number of possibilities for fund-raising, with the goal of having it simple, once a year, and have a good chance of raising $15,000 or more. Some suggestions were:
1) Photo Shoot with Iron Man (5/2010), and an additional Mayors Walk with Iron Man
2) A Cruise
3) Raffle off an exotic car
4) Annual Radiothon
5) Encourage trust/will donations to Club Foundation
6) Annual New Year's Exotic German Hof Brau Luncheon
7) Bowling Tournament

Membership Committee is looking for photos from all club members that can be used in a promotional DVD that will be presented to City Council, Chamber of Commerce, and used as a recruiting tool. Also, an email will be coming soon asking for everyone's response to thought provoking questions the will help identify what it is that brought you into the exchange club and what drives you to remain a member of the club. These responses will be valuable to help others connect with us and join the club. Members will be asked to recruit one member by a yet to be determined deadline (ie December 31). More details will be in an upcoming email.

Mayor's Walk: Corporate Sponsors this year are The Yellow Book and State Bank of Southern Utah. Scones will be provided by Staheli Catering, they will also provide canopy covering if needed, inspired by last years rain. The new Bluff Street Gazebo should be completed in time. Volunteers will be needed for our booth at the Dixie Center and then the morning of the St. George Marathon at both the Bluff Street Park and the Vernon Worthen Park.

Rocky Mountain District Convention

The Rocky Mountain District Convention was held in St George this year, June 4th - 6th. Here are some of the highlights:

Patricia Sheifield spoke about the Children's Justice Center and Child Abuse Prevention
Lee Warren gave a presentation on the Proudly We Hail
Awards were presented to the Student of the Year
Your Club President, Ryan Robison, was awarded President of the Year
Flyod Holm was elected as Regional VP
Ground breaking ceremony for the Bluff Street Park Pavilion (in honor of Stephen Nelson and Bart Anderson)
Donation to the City of St George presented to Mayor Dan McArthur

More photos to come as they get emailed in.

Mayor's Walk Origin

As told by Kent Perkins - Director, St George City Leisure Services Department

Just to keep history accurate, I attended the Honolulu marathon in 1987 and was excited to see their Mayor's Walk begin just after their marathon start. Upon returning I asked Mayor Karl Brooks if he would like to support us in starting a Mayor's Walk of our own. Mayor Brooks agreed to support and participate in a Mayor's Walk, and invited Bart and his entourage to join him and the public for the first walk. Bart was invited each year thereafter and we printed in our publicity, "come walk with Mayor Brooks/ McArthur and Ranger Bart Anderson"...

Now you know the rest of the story.

Exchange Celebrates Arbor Day 2009

Nine members of St. George Exchange Club gave up a portion of their Saturday, April 25 - a total of 15 man (and woman) hours - to plant trees along the walking trail on Riverside Drive. The event was a little late for Earth Day (Wednesday, April 22), but perfectly timed to kick off National Volunteer Week (April 27 - May 3) and to celebrate Arbor Day, a day set aside since 1872 for planting and caring for trees! Mother Nature cooperated, delivering a cooler-than-usual late April day for the hard work of digging holes and positioning 25 6 ft. tall (mostly) pine trees in 50 gallon tubs.

St. George Mayor’s Walk

Each October, members of the Club organize and participate in the annual St. George Marathon by sponsoring the St. George Mayor’s Walk for family and friends who wish to be a part of this great community event. Participants walk to the marathon finish line with the Mayor and other civic leaders. The walk begins at Bluff Street Park at 7:00 a.m. and ends at Worthen Park, which is the finish line for the marathon runners. Participants receive Mayor’s Walk T-shirts, walker numbers, a light post-walk breakfast and prize drawings. Funds raised during the Marathon and Mayor’s Walk by the Club are used to build facilities and improve recreation opportunities throughout the community.