Rotary's Theme for 2015-16

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

President Brad Thorp noted that the park shelter was dedicated in June of 2008. The building project lasted more than a year. Brad said that next week we will be celebrating World Polio Week and also installing a new member. The upcoming Pancake Breakfast Day will also be on the agenda.

 

Brad said that he and Carol Kennard recorded a program regarding the Pancake Breakfast for Centerville Reports with Miami Valley Communications Council that will be broadcast this coming week.

 

 

Sgt.-at-Arms Erich Eggers collected Happy Bucks for the Reclaiming Futures program that Montgomery County Juvenile Court Judge Anthony Capizzi and several others associated with the program explained to us at recent meetings.

 

Mitch Biederman said his new house is now finished.

 

Pat Beckel mentioned that his son is on the PBS broadcast that airs in Cincinnati on Channel 12 that deals with childhood hunger in the United States. He said that 48 percent of all children born in Hamilton County are born into poverty, defined as $11,000 household income. It is second only to Detroit in the U.S., he said.

 

Kim Senft-Paras said this is her sixth year in Rotary, her 37th year of marriage, and that she has a grandbaby on the way. 

 

Brad said he is off to Annapolis for a visit, and Ron Hollenbeck said the coats are already being distributed to the area children and that the dictionaries and thesauri are in the hands of children in our local schools.

 

 

 

Kristen said the Park District is expanding its evening and weekend hours and programs in the fitness, nature, and arts and crafts. The dog park is also being expanded. She said the district has been partnering with local businesses, such as Raise Your Brush, Farm to You, the library, etc. They held a successful Teddy Bear Picnic and worked with the Historical Society on completion of the Smith House at Bill Yeck Park. It is open for programs for the community and had a ribbon cutting Sept. 26, she said. A museum room has furniture and artifacts to represent the 1860's, she said. It seeks to tell the story of the property. 

There will be a luminary walk with dulcimers and hot chocolate, with luminaries on the trail at the property. There are also restrooms with access from outside the house there now, she said.

 

Kristen said this year's Haunted Trail at Grant Park will take place Wednesday, October 21 and Thursday, October 22 from 7:30 to 9 p.m. (last group is sent through at 9 p.m.

You will be guided through the dark and spooky forest by a trail guide. The Haunted Trail is appropriate for ages 8+ (ages 7 and under will not be admitted).

The event is free, but attendees are encouraged to bring canned goods/nonperishable food items to be donated to local food banks.

The Haunted Trail is co-sponsored by the Centerville Noon Optimist Club; the University of Dayton Optimists; the Centerville High School Octagon Club; and the Junior Optimists Clubs at Incarnation School and Magsig, Tower Heights and Watts Middle Schools. On the 24th, the first backpacking trip in Bill Yeck Park will be held, she said. 

 

The Park District is also doing outreach in the schools with a naturalist and volunteers going to the schools three to five days a week. The volunteers have spent 60 hours in the schools through November, she said.  They help supplement the schools' science programs. 

 

The Winter newsletter will soon be sent out with registration beginning in November, she said.

 

Ken Carter gave a quick overview of the operations part of his job, noting the area has 50 parks. Oak Grove Park is one of a few parks that has a dedicated staff at it, he said. Operations provides programming assistance and is responsible for maintaining the parks and such things as mowing, trail maintenance, and facility maintenance and repair. The dog park at Oak Grove Park is being expanded. It is the most popular facility and visited more on a daily basis than all the other parks, he said. The spray ground is the next-most visited, he said.

  

At the dog park another acre will be fenced in to add to the two acres already fenced, Ken said. This will allow one area to be fenced off at a time to cut down on the wear and tear of the turf, rotating the acres so new turf can grow, which will help with the maintenance. He said a batting cage was recently added to Oak Grove Park and that on Social Row Road they will add an 8th community park, the Robert F. Mays Park, with multiple use trails, a shelter house, public restrooms, a playground and athletic fields to allow for more youth lacrosse. 

 

They also plan to create the Holes Creek Trail, a one-mile trail running from Lyons Road south to Yankee Trace. It will have grant funding from the state of Ohio, he said. 

 

Also, the Oak Creek South Skate Park is to be expanded to allow for the large number of people who want to use their skateboards there.

 

The Little Woods Park north on Ohio 48, north of Rahn Road, donated by the William and Dorothy Yeck Family Foundation to the Park District, is under development as a small neighborhood nature park, he said. 

 

The Donnybrook Park is being restored to make a natural fen, as the soils existing there support habitat for unique species of plants and birds. According to the dictionary, a fen is land covered wholly or partly with water that usually has peaty alkaline soil and characteristic flora such as sedges and reeds. Wikipedia describes a fen as: one of the main types of wetland, the others being grassy marshes, forested swamps, and peaty bogs. Along with bogs, fens are a kind of mire. Fens are usually fed by mineral-rich surface water or groundwater, it states. 

 

To reduce maintenance and create sustainable management in some of the parks, some turf grass areas have become native prairie and grassland area, Ken said. Acreage in unused areas of the parks will be turned into grassland and native prairie. The program was actually started in 2012, Ken said, and 20 acres are now in grassland. He handed out purple cone seed packets to any who wished to plant them at their homes. They are native to our area and native to Ohio, he said. They bloom from mid summer to fall and develop deep roots.

 

Aside from the lower temperatures and slight wind that had Rotary members vying for the benches in the sunny areas, the day was a perfect October park day, complete with box lunches from Dorothy Lane Market and sweet tea and/or water to drink.