Prayer. Eternal God, whose dwelling place is not only above and beyond us, but within each of us, we are grateful that even in our secular pursuits we are not outside of your protecting presence. We are comforted and challenged by the fact that we are not alone in dealing with the complexities and concerns of life.
We ask for your blessings upon the food awaiting us that we may be physically strengthened for continued service. May all we do and say be productive and to your ultimate glory. Amen.
The following is from Matt Monsour, Club Director - Service Projects:
"Mark your calendars in a different way for Tuesday, April 16.
This is the date for our Club’s annual blood drive. On that date, the Mississippi Blood Services “BUS” will be parked in front of The Rickhouse to make it convenient for us to make a blood donation. The “Bus” will be there from 9 AM to 3 PM."We will not have a regular meeting or speaker that day. The Rickhouse will have box lunches available starting at 10 AM. Members who donate before lunch can take their box lunch with them or eat it at The Rickhouse.
Not having a normal meeting and program creates an opportunity to come at your normal Tuesday noon meeting time and have an expanded time of unstructured fellowship. A blood donation is encouraged if you can donate, but certainly not required.
Since the Blood Drive is a club service project every member who donates or attempts to donate will receive a makeup attendance credit in addition to being marked present for our Tuesday meeting on the 16th.
For those who can donate, starting Tuesday, April 2, there will be a signup sheet on the table so you can schedule a time to donate that best fits your schedule."
Birthdays And Anniversaries.
Birthdays:
Dick Dickerson April 18
Anniversaries
None
Membership Anniversaries
Tag Gamblin 13 years, April 18
Jeff Bonner 15 years, April 19
Marisa Davidson 6 years, April 22
This week's Rotary Foundation Thought is about Resources for Refugees
Since August 2017, nearly a million Rohingya Muslim refugees have crowded into the Cox’s Bazar region of Bangladesh, fleeing violence in Myanmar’s Rakhine state. Women and children face particularly difficult challenges in the massive refugee camps, including lack of adequate shelter, health care, and educational resources, and an increased risk of sexual violence.
Sakun Gajurel worked in Italy and in her native Nepal with United Nations agencies before studying international development policy at the Rotary Peace Center at Duke University and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. As a part of her Rotary Peace Fellowship, Gajurel spent the summer of 2018 working in Cox’s Bazar with an organization called UN Women that provides direct aid to women in the refugee camps.
Q: What are the greatest challenges in getting aid to Cox’s Bazar?
A: Close to 900,000 refugees crossed the borders in less than a year’s time. In monsoon season, things got worse. Tents built with a bamboo frame and tarpaulin cannot resist heavy rain or minor landslides. A few thousand shelters were destroyed every week in the aftermath of heavy rains.
For humanitarian agencies, reaching everyone is another challenge due to poor road conditions. The sheer number of refugees makes effective support problematic.
Q: What problems do women and girls in particular face?
A: Women and girls are more vulnerable to violence. In some crisis settings, more than 70 percent of women have experienced gender-based violence. Women often report challenges accessing sanitation and hygiene facilities at night or when they are menstruating. They face heightened risks as well as increased care-related tasks such as providing food and water for their families and caring for the sick.
Q: How do tradition and culture affect the ways assistance is provided?
A: Gender segregation is generally common among the Muslim Rohingya population. It is closely connected to the practice of purdah, or preventing women from being seen by men other than their husbands. Women and girls are expected to stay in the home and be close to their family, whereas men and boys are more present in the public sphere.
Through multipurpose women’s centers, UN Women engages and empowers women. Women and girls can come to a center like the one in Cox’s Bazar and get information about the services and opportunities in the camps. About 20 women serve in the center in Cox’s Bazar as outreach workers. These are Rohingya women who talk to other women and bring their issues and challenges to the center as well as to meetings with camp officials.
Q: What kind of assistance is most needed?
A: Education is one of the greatest needs. The education partners in Cox’s Bazar have set up learning centers that provide three shifts of two-hour lessons. However, it is not enough. Men and women often express a desire to learn new skills.
The UN has already announced that the Rohingya refugee crisis will be a protracted issue. History shows that once a refugee crisis becomes protracted, refugees often spend decades in the settlement camps. A long-term solution is necessary to ensure that a whole generation does not end up without education or opportunities to better their lives.
North Jackson Rotarian Rob Farr II received his third Paul Harris Fellow recognition at the April 9, 2019, meeting of the Rotary Club of North Jackson. This Paul Harris Fellowship award is in recognition of Rob’s third one thousand dollar donation to the Rotary Foundation. Club Foundation Director Suman Das (left) presented the award to Rob. Both of them are shown in the following photo with Club Secretary Lee Carney. We congratulate Rob on this recognition and thank him for his long term support of the Rotary Foundation.
Ashby Foote III, the Jackson City Council Representative for Ward 1 in Northeast Jackson, spoke to the Rotary Club of North Jackson at the Club’s April 9, 2019, meeting. Mr. Foote discussed the status and ongoing activity of the City Council and the results being obtained by the current City Administration, particularly in the use of the 1% additional sales tax approved by the Citizens.
Mr. Foote noted that he is the only Republican on the City Council reflecting the demographics of the Ward that he represents. He was very positive on the new Public Works Director, Robert Miller, and what he is accomplishing. We thank Mr. Foote for his comments to our Club and for his service to the citizens of Jackson. He (right) is shown in the following photo with Club Vice President Greg Campbell (left) and Past President Wyatt Emmerich who introduced him.
Murray Harber, Executive Director of the Mississippi Business Group on Health (MBGH) spoke to the Rotary Club of North Jackson at the Club’s April 2, 2019, meeting. The subject of Mr. Harber’s presentation was "Employer Health Management", i.e. workplace wellness and health. He cited data which conclude that 50% of a person’s lifetime health is determined by lifestyle. Family historyis a 20% determiner, and environment 10%. The balance is chemicals, substance abuse, etc. He discussed the wellness program implemented by Southern Farm Bureau Life Insurance which included factors such as a healthy cafeteria, a Farmers' Market, incentives to live a healthy lifestyle, including workstation ergonomics, an active lifestyle, healthy eating and reduced sedentary times. The result has been reduced health benefit costs from the trend on which the company was embarked.
We thank Mr. Harber for his presentation and for his work on behalf of Mississippi companies and their employees. He is shown in the following photo with Club Member Marisa Davidson who introduced him.
Christopher F. “Chris” Brantley was inducted into the Rotary Club of North Jackson at the Club’s March 26, 2019, meeting. Chris is the son of Club member Chris Brantley, who proposed him for membership. He is a Trust officer with Trustmark Bank and is Vice President/ President-Elect of the Estate Planning Council of Mississippi. He is a graduate of the University of Mississippi. He and his wife, Reynolds, have one son, George, and live in Northeast Jackson. Chris (center) is shown in the following photo with his father (right) and his sponsor, Past President Kevin Russell (left).
Christina Dent, founder of End it for Good, a non-profit dedicated to ending the "War on Drugs", spoke to the Rotary Club of North Jackson at the Club’s March 26, 2019, meeting. Ms. Dent is the daughter-in-law of Club member Tommy Dent and the wife of former Club member Thomas Dent who spoke to the Club earlier in March about Child Protective Services. She is also the mother of three children and is a self-professed Conservative Christian. She graduated from Belhaven University with a degree in Bible Studies.
The essence of her talk is that the “War on Drugs” being conducted by our country is a dismal failure like its predecessor action the passage of the Prohibition of Alcohol. She said that she came to this conclusion only after extensively studying the results of the "War on Drugs." She began that study as a strong proponent of the "War on Drugs", but her position was changed as a result of those studies.
Both prohibitions have only succeeded in lowering the quality of the products they have made illegal and made both consumers and vendors of the products criminals. She cited the experience of Portugal which eliminated the criminalization of drug use. The result was a significant reduction in deaths due to drug use and in the use of the drugs and in drug-related crimes. Both injection drug use and addiction decreased significantly. In addition, the decriminalization of drugs in Portugal resulted in 6 drug overdose deaths per million people compared to 185 drug overdose deaths per million in the US.
Additionally, Portugal has been able to reduce its enforcement effort to the point that 90% of the cost is now focused on treatment and prevention compared with the US where 90% of the cost is in enforcement and 10% is for treatment and prevention.
Ms. Dent presented a Vicious Circle that exists in the US now where drug use leads to incarceration, disconnection from family and society, and ultimately to lifelong employment difficulty and a traumatic life. She cited the figures that Mississippi now has 3807 nonviolent offenders imprisoned at an annual cost of $68 million annually. Her bottom line was that if she wanted to design a system to keep addiction going on a massive scale, she would design the present War on Drugs.
We thank Ms. Dent for her presentation and for her work on behalf of Mississippi. She is shown in the following photo with her father-in-law Club member Tommy Dent and Club President Anna Powers (right).
