Our Speaker: Bob Wallace is the District 7070 Rotary Foundation Chair and a member of the Board of Directors of the Rotary Foundation-Canada.
Ted Morrison introduced his dear friend. Bob is a frequent speaker at conferences and contributes to Rotary leadership training, such as President-Elect Learning Seminars (PELS) and the Rotary Leadership Institute (RLI). Bob, and his wife Kathy, travelled to India and administered the polio vaccine to children there. They are Rotarians through and through.
Bob Wallace provided an interesting tutorial that built upon Ted’s Rotary Moment. He shared information about the Foundation’s worldwide impact, Canadian regulations, how the district gets involved, and ended with an update of our club’s contributions.
Worldwide Impact
Pooling our money and expertise accomplished great things in the world. As of the 2024-25 calendar year, the Foundation issued grants totalling 569 Million $ (US). These included 424 global grants, 468 district grants, and 74 disaster response grants. As of September the endowment is over 2 billion USD. Charity Navigator awarded RI Foundation a 4-Star rating for 17 years in a row.
Canadian Connections
In his role with Foundation-Canada Bob evaluates grants requests. The main role of this group though is to comply with CRA regulations All the money raised in Canada, stays in Canada. Polio funds are calculated differently. He told us about how one project in Uganda went from building a medical centre to receiving a global grant to develop commercial mandarin orange groves that keep the centre going and making improvements. (that we contribute to ).
Rotary Club of Oshawa-Parkwood
We should be very proud of our club’s continued commitment to the Foundation. We exceeded our pledges to Polio (already this Rotary year)and(we are on the way to getting our goal for obtaining) the Annual programs Fund of the Rotary Foundation. (I did not write down the exact numbers, but the report is available on the Foundation’s website.) Bob ended the talk with a call for folks to attend the Grant workshop District 7070 on Saturday, November 15, 2025, at the Oshawa District Shrine Hall, 1626 Simcoe St N, Oshawa, 8.30 am to 2 pm. REGISTER HERE.
Only one question, from Dave A. and that was about EREY. Bob joked that Rotary loves these acronyms. EREY means EVERY ROTARIAN EVERY YEAR. This represents a commitment to donate some amount yearly from every individual Rotarians in the club, every year.
Bob being thanked by Larry. |
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Meeting adjourned by President Dave M. at 7:57 pm
IF YOU CAN’T MAKE IT, YOU CAN MAKE UP: Go online at www.rotary.org go to the club locator and find a club or clubs near your destination. Or you can add the free App Rotary Club Locator to your phone for instant look up of any club in the world. Please mail or fax your make-ups to Executive Secretary Dave Andrews or give your make-up card to the attendance/registration officer at the next club meeting.