Kathy has been the Rotary Club of Traverse City's Club Administrator for almost 6 years. She has previously worked for the Traverse City Area Chamber of Commerce, Traverse Bay Economic Development Corporation, National Cherry Festival, and was a stay at home mom who assisted in raising three amazing daughters. She is an active volunteer in her community, giving time to addiction recovery support, Rotary events, Traverse City Film Festival, and the National Cherry Festival.
Above and beyond her normal job duties, Kathy had done some research into the Rotary Disaster Relief Grants and was the person that contacted PDG Al Bonney, indicating that she thought that our district may qualify to apply for the DRG. Al contacted District Foundation Chair, Gernot Runschke and after some discussion and phone calls with RI, he received information that this is a one-time grant and that our district would qualify to use the money for Food and other Covid-19 related expenses in our district.
With this information, the Foundation Committee and Grants Committee decided that we should write and apply for this grant.
The committee agreed that the funding, if the grant was approved, should be used for Feed America, West Michigan; Feed America East Michigan and the United Way, Feed Algoma. This way all of our clubs in Michigan and Ontario will receive benefits from this grant.
The grant application was submitted at the beginning of May, but due to the lack of funding the grant approval was put on hold. Rotary just recently received new funding, our grant got approved and with this we are able to notify the recipients of the forthcoming money to insure a continuing supply of nourishing food that can be purchased for people in west/east Michigan and parts of Ontario.
The foundation Committee will make the decision on Thursday at our regular meeting, how the $25,000 will be split between the three entities.