If you enjoy the fellowship of your friends and neighbors who are dedicated to helping their community, join us Tuesday mornings, at our Kensington-Berlin Sunrise Rotary Club, 7:30-8:30, at the Community Center, 240 Kensington Road, Berlin, Connecticut.

Although we are a small Club, we are energetic innovators in community service! During the five (5) years since being chartered, we have led the way in implementing the Amber Alert Child I.D. program in our district. This voluntary program for all children under the age of sixteen (16) provides the parents/guardians with a wallet size, laminated card with a picture of the child, a unique Amber I.D. Number and minimal, yet essential, information needed to help find a child in the event of an abduction. The information is stored in a secure database activated only by the Connecticut State Police. We have purchased the necessary computer and photographic equipment for this program. To date, we have conducted 35 I.D. sessions in all of the Berlin elementary schools and provided free child I.D. cards to 2,000 parents/guardians. We have also trained members of other Rotary Clubs and loaned them our equipment so that they, too, may implement this important program in their community. We will continue our annual update of the I.D. cards.

Our Club has helped provide bus transportation to the residents of the Friendship Service Center in New Britain by our purchase of bus tokens. We regularly help re-stock Berlin's Food Bank. As part of Rotary International's literacy program, we have purchased a high quality dictionary for every third grade student in Berlin. We will distribute them in the Fall. We are also annual financial supporters of the Rotary International Foundation.

We have conducted a "Rotary Night" at the Rock Cats baseball game and are planning a Fall sale of Rotary bird food in cooperation with the A.S. Labieniec Grain & Food Store.

Our weekly meetings include time for fellowship, coffee, and Club business and usually a speaker/discussion about some topic of interest, an hour well spent!

During the Rotary year 2009-2010, we hope to increase our membership by five (5) members. We will continue to promote good fellowship and fun in our community involvement, thereby enhancing Rotary's image. Whenever possible, we will work with other Rotary Clubs to create joint projects.

We welcome you. Come and give us a look, being a small Club, the efforts of each member are valued.

Sincerely. Scott Skates, President