Archive: Around Town

This week the Ithaca-Cayuga Rotary Club announced it is changing its name to the Lansing-Ithaca Rotary.  The club, which was founded in 1971, has been considering the change since 2005 to better reflect its focus on activities in the Lansing community.

"What we are at this point is small and scrappy," says AnnMarie Hautaniemi who currently shares the President's seat with Ed Siemon.  "We're trying to broaden our profile in Lansing so we can get more Lansing members.  We've sponsored exchange students for Lansing.  More recently we've sent kids from Lansing to Rotary Youth Leadership Awards (RYLA).  All of our efforts have been geared toward Lansing.  Our focus is Lansing, and that's where we want to grow, and grow our membership from."

The name change corresponds with a renewal of that focus on Lansing and new efforts to grow the club's numbers.  Membership had dwindled to 13 with about eight of those active.  Most members were retired, and the club had become tired.

"This is the first time in over 30 years that we have not had an exchange student come to Lansing," Hautaniemi says.  "The outbound students don't really costs the club much.  But inbound students get a stipend every month, and we pay for them to go on trips and things like that.  This year we looked at it and didn't have the money."

Rotary has 34,000 clubs worldwide, with 1.2 million members.  Five are in Tompkins County.  The first and largest in Tompkins County is the Ithaca Rotary Club.  In 1991 the Ithaca Cayuga Rotary Club spun off.  The Ithaca Sunrise club was the next to form.  Groton, Trumansburg, and Dryden also have Rotarys now, and Hautaniemi say officially changing her club's focus to Lansing brings it in line with the others.

(Left to right) Co-presidents Ed Siemon and AnnMarie Hautaniemi, Art Muka, Vickey Beaver, and Jase Baese
"A year ago we were getting smaller and smaller as a club," she says.  "If we had a guest and they brought three friends they outnumbered us.  Our energy level was seriously flagging, because when you have a small club two or three members take care of everything.  Then Chuck Brodhead got sick, and he was one of our movers and shakers."

Jase Baese and Vickey Beaver are the newest young members.  Baese works at Cornell, and with his wife owns The House At the Corner, a historic vacation rental in Lansing.  Beaver is a freelance writer.

It's not easy to recruit.  Two years ago Beaver participated in a Rotary sponsored group study exchange for young professionals aged 25 to 40.  Part of her responsibility after returning was to speak at local clubs to talk about the experience.  When she spoke to the Lansing Club Hautaniemi suggested she join.  At that time she wasn't ready, and she was still visiting and considering other local Rktary clubs.  After she was invited back to the Ithaca Cayuga club to talk about her writing career she helped with recruitment planning, and finally made her decision.

"We've realized that in order to recruit people we have to have something they will benefit from," Beaver says.  "The first thing we worked on was to get two, three, or four presentations lined up ahead for our meetings.  Since May we've managed to have a presentation scheduled every week.  The other thing was to look at efforts we need to make to increase membership and the activity of people who are already members."

The first step was to ask the members what they want the club to be active in going forward.  Most who responded said they want the club to survive and to have outreach in Lansing, including more visibility and a stronger relationship with the Lansing schools.  They then formed workgroups to take the lead to make those things happen.

"I love the energy that Vickey and Jase have brought to the club," Hautaniemi says.  "Before we even inducted her she had redone our brochure, a great way to learn about the history of the club."

Beaver (left) and Hautaniemi unload a carload of donations for flood victims.
The club recently placed donation boxes in Lansing businesses to collect clothing and supplies for New York State flood victims in Delaware and surrounding counties.  Hautaniemi, Baese, and Beaver placed boxes at All Saints Church, Lansing united Methodist Church, Rogues Harbor Inn, Crossroads bar & Grill, Lansing Town Hall, and the Lansing Community Library. Tuesday Hautaniemi and Beaver dropped off a truckload of things they had collected to the Hobart, New York Rotary Club.

Later this year a 'Liberty Tree will be planted in Myers Park.  The club has raised funds to plant the tree, which was obtained through a grant by the Parks and Recreation Department.

This Saturday (September 10) the club will present a check to the Lansing Community Library to purchase a laptop computer.  The machine will be used by an instructor who will lead local computer literacy classes for Lansing seniors, using the Fingerlakes library System's bank of computers that member libraries get to use.  It will be used for class and materials planning.  The matching grant comes from a regional Rotary district, which the local club applied for in behalf of the library.

"This is the first one we've applied for and we were able to do it successfully," Hautaniemi says. "So it was really exciting."

They also plan informal gatherings at various locations in Lansing to interest younger Lansing business people in joining.  Part of the effort to give the club a younger face is a Facebook page Beaver and Baese are maintaining for the club.

"Its very hard to take an hour and a half in the middle of a Tuesday for lunch," Hautaniemi says.  "We recognize that is an issue.  We've tried to keep the meetings from 12:15 to 1:15, and if people have to leave at one we get that.  And some people join as a networking club, but we're not there yet."

Hautaniemi says that joining now will give new members a unique opportunity to have a voice in what they want the club to do and how it will serve the community in the future.

The club hopes that a sharper focus on growing its membership, fundraising, reestablishing the youth exchange, and getting more Lansing business people involved will make their club more effective in serving the primary Rotary mission of providing service to others.

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