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Rotarians gathered at the Lansing Center on this perfect mid-70s August day. Our meeting was brought to order by President Lisa Smith a few minutes earlier than our normal 12:30 pm starting time. In unison we arose to receive the invocation from Kevin Schumacher, delivered in a white seersucker suit complete with white bucks. Following the invocation we sang My Country Tis of Thee accompanied by John Dale Smith.
Dave Trumpie moved around the room with the microphone to get our guests introduced. Carmen Turner gave the remembrance report and we all stood for a moment of silence in honor of Charlie Smith, who passed away unexpectedly Thursday night. Our clubs thoughts and prayers are with Charlie’s family.
Daniel Layman was brought forth to deliver his new member presentation. Daniel is the managing director of Ele’s Place in Lansing after many years working with Hospice in the Ann Arbor area. Daniel has a Michigan State University education, which that alone makes him a very likeable guy. When you meet Daniel, if you were unable to attend today’s meeting, be sure to have him tell you the story of how a pigeon and a pot hole changed his life.
Melissa Nay spoke to our club about being more social and join her at 11:15 am at the Lansing Center on August 28th or October 2nd, which is conveniently right before our regular meeting on those dates, to learn about Facebook and how to become a power user of Facebook to help yourself and the club get the word out on social media about the great things our club does for our community and worldwide.
Next up was Laurie Baumer to remind us that Loftus Day is September 11th, where each year we honor our Rotarians who have passed away with tributes to Rotarians who passed away with the last year, as well as visiting local cemeteries to place flowers on the graves of Rotarians from our long history. Cathy will be distributing lists to each of us shortly with our assignments to local cemeteries.
Jenn Dubey asked us for nominations for worthy recipients of a $20,000 grant to our club for international projects. She also asked for volunteers to walk, jog or run in our 100 mile event to celebrate our clubs centennial. She has 40 miles covered and needs our help covering the last 60 miles of this event.
Mark Alley delivered the August birthday update by asking our members born in this month “what was the most bizarre and interesting encounter you have had in your life.” The stories involved a trip to the British Open, encountering a Timber Rattlesnake, being the warm up act for Jerry Vale, working as a dock boy and meeting former Detroit Lions Head Coach Monte Clark in the men’s room and later in life speaking to him again about their first encounter and last but not least, visiting the Caribbean Island of Bonaire and finding out the planned resort was overbooked and being booked into another resort that ended up being a nude resort, which when a room opened up in the other resort, he and his wife decided to stay put for the rest of the vacation. My google search did turn up that it was voted the #2 on the best ten nudist resorts in the world, way to go Pat Hanes.
Chair of the day, Jack Davis introduced us to our day’s speaker Dr. David Kaufman, Chief of the Neurology Department at Michigan State University and the on-field neurologist for the MSU football team. His topic “Sports Concussion Update”, Dr. Kaufman mentioned that last night alone Washington Redskins quarterback Robert Griffin, III suffered a concussion in his preseason game against the Detroit Lions. All told it is estimated that each year there are between 1.8 million to 3.6 million concussions annual due to sports. 60,000 of these concussions are documented in the United State playing high school sports. Women are more susceptible to concussions than men and children are more at risk for concussions than adults. For high school boys, football is the number one sport for concussions and soccer is the leading sport for high school girls. For all sports and not too surprising hockey is the number one sport overall for concussions.
A concussion is a force being applied to the skull that is transmitted to the brain causing generally, temporary impairment of brain functions. A concussion actually changes the metabolism of your brain cells and can lead to many different symptoms such as headache or a feeling of pressure in the head, temporary loss of consciousness or vision, confusion, amnesia, dizziness, ringing in the ears, nausea, vomiting, slurred speech, delayed response to questions, appearing dazed or fatigue. These symptoms may not appear immediately after a concussion event and may not appear for a day or more after the event.
While there are no medications for treating a concussion, a concussion is treatable by rest and reduced activity with a gradual increase in activity both physically and intellectually. Symptoms can be treated with medication under a doctor’s supervision and return to normal activities should be monitored by a trained medical professional, until the athlete is cleared to return to full participation in those activities.
Dr. Kaufman ended his presentation by asking “should football continued to be played in the wake of our current awareness of the impact from concussions?” Dr. Kaufman’s opinion football is not going away, but the sport will continue to strive to make the game safer through changes in the rules, attitudes and equipment.
After question from the club members, President Smith thanked Dr. Kaufman for his very informative presentation.
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Amy Hunter is the Transgender Advocacy Coordinator for the Trans Advocacy Project at the ACLU of Michigan where she helps bring to the public a better understanding of who the transgender community are and the challenges they face. When not at her duties with the ACLU, she serves as President and Chair of Equality Michigan Pride PAC, a statewide political action committee which focuses on politics for Michigan's gay and transgender residents and their families. Amy also serves as Chair of the Kalamazoo Alliance for Equality PAC and holds a leadership position on the Board of Directors for the Victory Fund, a national political action committee which specializes in electing out LGBT officials at all levels of government. Amy has extensive experience helping communities organize around and bring about nondiscrimination protections for gay and transgender Michiganders, she held the post of Director of Operations for the One Kalamazoo campaign, successfully defending Kalamazoo's nondiscrimination ordinance from referendum. Amy is similarly engaged with communities and organizations across Michigan pushing for amendment of Michigan's Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act to include protections for sexual orientation and gender identity and expression. Amy is a past board member of Kalamazoo Gay and Lesbian Resource Center, Kalamazoo Community Foundation Equality Fund and past Vice President of Equality Michigan Action Fund. Amy and her spouse Cindy love sharing a home in the woods near Kalamazoo with their cats, Duncan, Thomas and, Annie.
Charlie passed away on Thursday, August 20th, 2015. He was born on July 16, 1944. Charlie joined Rotary in February of 2005, Chris Holman was his sponsor. Charlie is survived by his wife, Karen and sons Chris, of Texas, and Spencer, of Bad Axe, and daughter Abby Meyer of Lansing.
Loftus Day is a tradition unique to our Lansing Rotary Club. Every year at a September meeting, a Rotarian who has passed away during the year is honored. After an abbreviated meeting, if they so choose Rotarians visit and lay flowers at assigned grave sites of deceased Lansing Rotarians.