April 5, 2021

President Mindy Sehon opened the meeting at noon via Zoom with 24 people in attendance.

Annalise gave an informative presentation about our newest Paul Harris Fellow of a charter member of the Rotary Club of Eureka – Louis F. Perske. Perske came to Eureka in 1919 as the owner operator Eureka garage, located where the McCrea Nissan service center is today.  The Construction of the building was completed by Mercer Fraser.  In 1924 a newspaper article said that Perske had the word service embedded on his forehead. He was very active in the community and was a member of the Rotary Club of Eureka, Shriners, Elks, Chamber. Perske was in charge of an 8-day event in Eureka that was like a huge citywide circus.  Tickets were 50 cents. On September 25, 1936 Perske’s life came to an early end when he was murdered by an ex-employee who came into Eureka Garage with a rifle and shot him through the heart.  He was survived by his wife. It was noted that Perske had a lot of pride in Eureka and was a pillar of our community, taken too soon.

President Mindy noted that the Rotary Club of Eureka recently made a Small Grant to the Boys and Girls Club for $1,075 for their garden project.

Arny King has been keeping us informed about the NCAA double AA Auction and pool.  We’re getting close to having our final winners announced.

Recognitions

  • Birthdays: Charlie Bussman4/6, Mike Cunningham 4/9 and Patrick Cleary 4/10.
  • Anniversary: Blaine O’Shaughnessy 4/5
  • Kate Witthaus went skydiving for her Boyfriend’s birthday
  • Jay Reed’s daughter went back to in-person learning today
  • Phil Nicklas- had a great Easter with a lot of easter egg hunts
  • Klark Swan- took his son to his first movie this weekend at the Minor Theatre.
  • Keith Crossley’s daughter received her driver’s license
  • Kris Marquez’s daughter turned 20.

Speaker Cliff VonCott is with the McKinleyville Community Emergency Response Team CERT.

CERT is a FEMA program that trains volunteers to prepare for community disasters.  They provide consistent, nationwide standards. It’s a 3 day class that covers basic disaster response skills – fire safety, light search and rescue, team organization and disaster medical operations.  The goal is to support professional first responders, not replace them.  There are over 600,000 trained CERT volunteers nationwide.

Humboldt County potentially has 17 isolated areas in an emergency as well as a high percentage of seniors, and a history of disasters – floods, tsunamis, earthquakes.

CERT was introduced to Humboldt County in 2003.  The primary focus initially was to train instructors so they could go out and train others.  They do a lot of outreach to find grants, recruitment, training, etc.  There are 10 CERT teams in Humboldt County at this time.  Each team has sponsors. Grants and donation pay for supplies, training, equipment, resources, etc. CERT training puts focus on family and neighbors first then others.

Examples of places where they’ve helped to date…  During the pandemic they sorted and delivered food for Food for People during the Pandemic.  They provided communications for the Trucker’s parade.They organized and led a tsunami drill in Fields Landing.

For more information or to sign up for training go to: humboldtcert.com.