By Shelley Widhalm

The Surveyor

Nearby cities to Berthoud all have Rotary Clubs, so Berthoud couple Ken and Jan Grack figured the town should have one too.

The Gracks, who belong to the Greeley After Hours Rotary Club, began holding informational meetings earlier this month to drum up interest in a Berthoud-based Rotary Club. The next informational meeting will be Sept. 26 at City Star Brewing, 321 Mountain Ave.

“Berthoud is in need of a club, and Berthoud is growing,” Jan said. “Once we get a core group of people interested, then we can have more informational meetings and meetings to form the club.”

The first two informational meetings were Sept. 6 and 10, and so far 10 people have expressed an interest in starting the Berthoud club. To form a club there needs to be at least 20 members who want to attend meetings and provide community service through an organization with the motto of Service Above Self.

The committee for the Berthoud club, consisting of the Gracks and four members of the Rotary Club of Loveland, plans to hold additional informational meetings until the club has enough members. They hope to have a club in place by mid-October.

“We try to inform people about what the power of Rotary Club can do for the community,” Ken said, adding that at the meetings the committee explains what Rotary does and the need for a club in Berthoud. “Rotary does a lot for the community as far as socializing within the membership and doing service in the community.”

The Gracks joined the club because they wanted to engage in service-oriented projects at the local level.

“We have a passion to give back to the community and to serve the community,” Ken said. “When we became Rotarians, we found the organization gave us the ability to serve that passion. Rotary is an organization that basically changes people’s lives and helps develop community projects and organizes people to work together on community projects.”

A committee from the Rotary Club of Loveland, chaired by Bob Eatnam, is helping the Gracks organize the Berthoud club at the direction of Rotary District Governor Chuck Rutenberg. Before a new club can get started it needs another club to sponsor it, and the Gracks approached Rotary Club of Loveland because of its presence in Berthoud. The club puts on the Governor’s Art Show in Loveland and is involved in services projects like the Paint Our Town home painting project and the Kids Pak weekend food program, as well as dictionaries for third graders at Loveland and Berthoud schools.

The Rotary Club of Loveland will help the Berthoud club with its membership, bylaws and election of officers, as well as submit the necessary paperwork at the district and international levels. The club will become part of district 5440, which consists of 53 Rotary clubs in Northern Colorado, Wyoming and parts of Nebraska and Idaho, and Rotary International with more than 35,000 clubs and 1.2 million members worldwide.

“They will be the guiding force for the technical items that need to be done,” Jan said.

The members of the club will be able to decide what they want to call the club and when, where, and how often they will meet, plus the format of the meetings. They also will be expected to pay district and international dues, but their membership fees will be dictated, in part, on where they meet and if they include meals.

The club will be able to choose from six avenues of service that include supporting education, providing maternal care, supporting economic development, promoting peace, fighting disease, and providing clean water, sanitation and hygiene.

Small clubs generally focus on one of the avenues, while larger clubs often select two or more. Clubs have access to resources on how to do a variety of service projects and can get district support for their questions.

“What Jan and I would like to do for Berthoud is let the new club choose the avenue of service they believe fits in the community,” Ken said. “There’s a tremendous opportunity for people in Berthoud to use the power of Rotary and focus on an avenue of service. So we would like to give the Berthoud residents the opportunity to use the power of Rotary to change the lives of our students, our people that may be in need, and to promote good will within the community.”

The informational meeting will be at 6 p.m. on Sept. 26. Food and drinks will be provided, including sub sandwiches from Brick Oven Pizza. The Gracks will buy a drink for everyone who attends.

“It’s the friendship. We meet friends from all over the world,” Jan said. “You have the love of helping local people. It’s all these local projects you get involved in. It makes you feel good when you do it.”