Rotary Club of Parramatta City Newsletter 15 January 2012

1. Rotary Club of Parramatta City
COMMUNITY NETWORKER
ROTARY CLUB OF PARRAMATTA CITY
PRESIDENT MESSAGE ROTARY HOME
EXCHANGE
Welcome back everyone and it is with good news that two of our FELLOWSHIP
members are recovering well after some mishaps over the holiday
period. Our Director of wellbeing and health John Surian, was in a bike
race and at the finishing line, a blast of must win surged up and he
soon found out that the body is softer than road base and two don’t
match. Our other member Maurice Kriss underwent heart surgery and
proved that he is tough as teak and recovering well. Though this program is a listed
Recreational & Vocational Fellowship
This Australia Day we have again been invited back to Parramatta program it is open to every Rotarian
Park to feed the many who attend our nation’s national day. It is an wishing to avail him/herself of
its benefits. The fellowship program is
early start for the starting crew, and John Ching is asking for volunteer’s online at the website
www.RotaryHomeExchange.com.
to attend and put in a few hours to assist & promote our club. Applications for membership must be
Joy & Prashanth will be gathering numbers this week for our transfer completed on the internet where as
much descriptive information may be
meeting on Monday 23rd to Northcott headquarters to hear from our detailed as a person may think will
help arrange an exchange. This may
RYPEN & RYLA young people sponsored by our club. We need to have also include as many coloured
photographs of the home, the family
numbers for the catering at Northcott. For members who may not be
or the geographical area as are
aware our Club & many other Rotary Clubs donated funds towards desired. The application fee is
detailed thereon. Once contact is
Northcott’s new premises and this is an opportunity for everyone to made, it is up to the individual
Rotarians to organise the details.
inspect the complex and its multi-function purpose building. Houses, cars, boats and in some
Your will also notice in February two of our neighbouring Rotary places, servants are considered as
relevant aspects of the exchange. As
Clubs hosting functions and I encourage members to attend for what only Rotarians are eligible for the
program, there is an appreciated level
should be fun nights. If we want Clubs to attend our functions we must of trust between both parties as to the
do the right thing by attending theirs as several did for our Trivia night respect for each other's property.
The site is operated by a commercial
last year. home exchange organisation with
‘Firewalls’ in place to protect the
A reminder from Treasurer, Keith Henning of membership fees are Rotary operation. These ‘walls’ may
be breached should the member take
now due. advantage of a free offer to access
I emailed earlier this the great news concerning polio in India, it has the commercial pages and consider
an exchange therein. Potential
now been a full year without polio being contracted. We still have to members should be aware of this fact.
To register for the program and so be
go through for two years before being declared eradicated in India. So included in the current exchange
the campaign stills continues there for those next few years. We cannot booklet, prospective members should
complete the application form prior to
forget the other remaining countries, Pakistan, Afghanistan & Nigeria 31 October of each year. This
ensures all current entries being
and with war and conflict occurring their this makes the job harder still, available in the express delivered
booklet the following February.
so support the painting of the little finger. Countries currently available and in
demand are USA, Canada, UK, South
Africa and India, with potential to visit
any country within the Rotary family
should members establish the
contacts.This program has been
operating successfully since 1977 and
has a large archive of reports from
truly satisfied exchangees with the
benefits of free quality home

2. Rotary Club of Parramatta City
CALENDAR OF EVENTS
January
14-21 RYLA Camp-Blue Gum Lodge
16 First Meeting of the year- “what we did on our holiday”
23 Transfer meeting-Northcott- RYPEN & RYLA Students
30 Maria Padisetti- Mirco Loans & Aaron Cantor- Ambassadorial Scholar
February
6 Lord Mayor-Lorraine Wearne
11 Rotary Club of Parramatta –Valentine Party
13 Debra Carr- Parramatta Mission
17 Rotary Club of Holroyd-Trivia Night St Pats School-Guilford
23 Rotary Day (Transfer meeting)
March
2 ARH- Golf Day at Riverside
3 Multi-District PETS- Campbelltown
5 Pride of Workmanship Evening
19 Michael Crosslands- Ignite the fire within
23-25 District Conference- Penrith
April
2 John Watters
29 District Assembly
30 Police Officer of the Year
May
6-9 International Convention-Bangkok
14 Australian Rotary Health- PHD Scholars night

3. Rotary Club of Parramatta City
DAVID’S PEARLS
Being the Best
Desire is the key to motivation, but it's the determination and commitment to an unrelenting
pursuit of your goal, a commitment to excellence, that will enable you to attain the success
you seek.
- Mario Andretti
The spirit, the will to win, and the will to excel are the things that endure. These qualities are so
much more important than the events that occur.
- Vince Lombardi
If you are not too large for the place you occupy, you are too small for it.
- James A. Garfield
Make a strong and permanent commitment to invest your talents only in pursuits that deserve
your best efforts.
- Nido Qubein
CANADIAN VOCATIONAL PROJECT SEEKS EMPLOYMENT
OPPORTUNITIES FOR THE DISABLED
By Ryan Hyland
Rotary International News – 11 January 2012
Rotarian Mark Wafer (left) recognizes Tawnya Walsh as 2010 Employee
of the Year at one of his six Tim Hortons in Ontario, Canada. Walsh was
a beneficiary of the district's service project. Photo courtesy of Mark
Wafer
Several Rotary districts in Ontario, Canada, are helping to expand
employment opportunities for people with physical or
developmental disabilities by educating business leaders on the
benefits of hiring them.
Districts 6290, 6400, 7070 and 7090 partnered with Community
Living Ontario, a nonprofit association that advocates for people

4. Rotary Club of Parramatta City
with disabilities, to create a vocational service project that provides resources and training for business
owners interested in hiring people with disabilities.
By working with employment agencies, the project connects disabled individuals with job openings.
Since its launch in 2009, the program has helped more than 130 disabled people find employment.
Project manager Joe Dale, a member of the Rotary Club of Whitby, says about 16 percent of the
province’s population has some kind of mental or physical impairment; of those, 49 percent are
unemployed. It’s one of the largest minorities in the country and a significant labor pool for businesses
to tap into, he says.
“This project has helped a growing number of employers dispel the myths about the disabled by
connecting them to [potential] employees with disabilities,” says Dale, executive director at Ontario
Disability Employment Network. “We go around the province encouraging Rotarians and other
businesses to hire those with disabilities and inform them of the benefits that come with it.”
Studies conducted by Community Living Ontario and surveys of employers have shown that employees
who have a disability demonstrate average or above average work performance, are willing and able to
work many different types of jobs, and improve staff morale.
Whitby club member Mark Wafer, who helped launch the project, says hiring people with disabilities
gives him a competitive edge. An owner of six Tim Hortons, a Canadian-based coffee and baked goods
chain, Wafer has employed more than 80 people with disabilities over the last 16 years for positions
ranging from customer service to management.
Wafer says the benefit is “substantial." People with disabilities tend to stay with an employer longer, he
says, because it has taken them such a long time to find a job. That reduces the cost of having to
interview, hire, and train replacements. “Turnover is expensive.”
Wafer says his overall turnover rate remains low because all his employees "want to be a part of
something special, they feel good about the inclusive workplace. It changes the nature of the work
force.”
Expanding the project
Dale hopes to see Rotary clubs and districts across Canada take part in this vocational project.
Rotarians can use their influence in the community to demonstrate leadership when it comes to hiring
people who have a disability, he says. “If business owners hear that this hiring won’t be a deterrent to
profitability, then that’s a strong message.”
Participating clubs can use connections in their community to conduct informational sessions for
business groups, chambers of commerce, and trade and professions associations.
David Onley, Ontario's lieutenant governor, who contracted polio as a child and remains partially
paralyzed, says the project “reflects an important partnership between Community Living Ontario and
Rotarians to assist Ontarians with disabilities find appropriate employment by forging relationships with
businesses.”

5. Rotary Club of Parramatta City
The hiring of people with disabilities is one of the last frontiers of discrimination, says Wafer.
“Rotarians, as business owners and professionals are well positioned to break down this barrier and open
the doors to a more inclusive community.”
FACEBOOK
We have now available for the club a new facebook page the shortcut is
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Rotary-Club-of-Parramatta-City/108769975845097
Please visit, make comments, open discussions and for your initial visit please hit the “like button”. The
reason is the more members who like the page, we receive additional features. The Facebook page is not a
substitute for our website, but more of an additional way to reach our audience.