Rotary Roundup

Meets Noon Mondays at the Hilton
www.hbgrotary.org
Executive Director: Linda Freedenberg Email: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Telephone: 717-234-1208
Fax: 717-234-3234

Speaker: David Unkovic, Receiver for the City of Harrisburg
Topic: "THE NEW GUY IN CITY HALL: The Receiver, David Unkovic, Will Share His Job Description and It's Challenge"!

Greeter:  Bill Spahr
Invocation:  Dave Warren
Mini-Classification Talk:  James Good
Club Singing:  Karen Paris
Publications:  Steve Baloga

Corporate Member

BIRTHDAYS
Chris Markley  MAR 19
Anne Aufiero  MAR 20
Mark Totaro  MAR 22
Paul Mahoney  MAR 22
Lou Grammes  MAR 23

UPCOMING PROGRAMS
at the Hilton   
3/26  Speaker: Timothy Potts Co-founder

DEMOCRACY RISING PA
BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND!

Your Program Chair took  the opportunity to invite Tim Potts, a past well received Rotary speaker, to share an early, up front result of the 2012 INTEGRITY POLL released a few weeks ago!

"By hugh margins, the citizens of Pennsylvania have a far different vision for Pennsylvania government than their elected officials".

Tim Potts
The poll was conducted in December by Terry Madonna Opinion
Research, Franklin & Marshall College, funded by citizen donations.
Program Title:
“WHAT DO WE HAVE TO SAY ABOUT OUR PA GOVERNMENT"?

 For complete programming go to our website: www.hbgrotary.org
and click on calendar.
For meeting cancelations:
Check your e-mail or call the
Rotary office at 234-1208.

PROGRAM:
On December 2, 2011, David Unkovic was appointed as the receiver of Harrisburg. Unkovic is now tasked with developing and submitting a fiscal recovery plan to the Commonwealth Court, DCED Secretary, city council and the mayor and pending approval will implement the plan.

Prior to being appointed Receiver—Mr. Unkovic was appointed Chief Counsel for the Department of Community and Economic Development in January 2011. Prior to public service Mr. Unkovic enjoyed a successful career in private practice most recently with Cozen O'Connor's Public and Project Finance Group in the Business Law Department since 2008. Prior to joining the firm, David was a managing director and chief compliance officer of PFM Asset Management LLC in Harrisburg, Pa., and prior to that served as a public finance partner at Saul Ewing law firm in Philadelphia.

David has more than 30 years of experience in public finance, primarily as bond counsel on tax-exempt financings for local governments, authorities, school districts and nonprofit corporations. These financings have provided funds for a wide variety of capital projects, including roads and bridges, parks and recreational facilities, water and sewer systems, transportation facilities, public and private schools, universities, hospitals, and assisted living facilities. He also has experience representing clients in investment and derivative matters, including investment pools, repurchase agreements, collateralized certificates of deposit, and interest rate swaps.

David is a fellow of the American College of Bond Counsel and a member of the National Association of Bond Lawyers. He has served as the president of the boards of directors of various nonprofit organizations, including the Pennsylvania Association of Bond Lawyers, Pennsylvania Legal Services, the Lawyer Trust Account Board, the Philadelphia Bar Foundation, and the Philadelphia Volunteers for the Indigent Program. In those capacities he has taken a leadership role in professional initiatives and in fundraising for charitable causes. David currently serves as co-chair of the Tax Exempt Finance Committee of the Philadelphia Bar Association and as treasurer of the Pennsylvania Association of Bond Lawyers. David is also currently chairing the 30th Anniversary Host Committee of the Philadelphia Volunteers for the Indigent Program.

David has received various awards in recognition of his work for organizations that provide free legal representation for the indigent, including the Pennsylvania Bar Association's Louis J. Goffman Award, the Pennsylvania Legal Aid Network's Outstanding Leadership in Support of Legal Services Award, and the Philadelphia Bar Association's Fidelity Award.

David earned his law degree from Harvard Law School and his undergraduate degree in political science, summa cum laude, from the University of Pennsylvania. He has been named a Pennsylvania "Super Lawyer by Law & Politics in the area of Bonds/Government Finance.

NEWS AND NOTES: 
• Rotary/Red Cross Blood Drive:2nd Blood Drive will be on April 2 at the Hilton.  We will have our regular Rotary meeting that day in the banquet room with a speaker from the Red Cross.  Please sign up for time slots 10 AM - 2 PM (blood drive in another room) and you can still attend our meeting.  You will also receive future attendance credit for your blood donation.  

Below are the Links to sign up sheet for Blood Drive April 2 and the Red Cross Donor info site:  http://www.timetosignup.com/ipackman/signupsheet/7485   ---- use this link to sign up to donate blood

http://www.redcrossblood.org/donating-blood/eligibility-requirements  ---use this link to read the donor requirements

• FREE IMAX show:  Whoa, hold on to your hat!  That's right, we are face to face with a tornado on the horizon my Rotary friends!  Thursday, April 19th at 7 PM sharp you and your guest are invited to a complimentary showing of the IMAX thriller Tornado Alley!  Please RSVP to Linda as soon as you can. There will not be tickets provided, just show up at the Whitaker Center IMAX for open seating when doors open at 6:40.  The IMAX seating is limited to 200 and we hope to have a full house of family and friends join us for a windy, good time. Oh, yeah, plan to bring a few dollars so you can grab a tub of popcorn!  ALSO – you get attendance credit!

• Congratulations to Susan Anthony and Maddie Young – Honorees for YWCA Tribute to Women of Excellence.  Awards dinner will be Wednesday March 21.

•  84% have paid the $100 HRF contribution.  42% have paid the Support for the Troops contribution. Please send in your payments today!  41% have paid the RIF contribution.

DISTRICT NEWS:  
• District 7390 Conference to be held at Williamsburg, VA on Friday, March 30 through Sunday, April 1, 2012 at the Williamsburg Lodge.  Come experience all that the Colonial Williamsburg has to offer Rotarians and their guests.  Dinner at Shields Tavern is included in the total package plan.  Register online at www.rotary7390.org for the conference and contact the Williamsburg Lodge at 1-800-261-9530 (Group #15318) for overnight hotel accommodations.   

• The February Governors Newsletter is available at:
http://www.rotary7390.org/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=Ok1pspPQ9Sk%3d&tabid=113

LAST ROTARY MEETING:  3/12/12
Minutes by Carrie W. Thomas:
ROTARY MEETING MINUTES – MONDAY, MARCH 12, 2012

PRESIDENT BOB SALINE called the meeting to order at 12:15 PM, introducing Dick Stewart to give the Invocation. John Hickey led the group in the singing of the National Anthem, without the usual accompaniment of Norma Swain at piano. After the Pledge of Allegiance, Rotarians greeted each other warmly and resumed eating their lunches, until at 12:25 PM President Bob began the business portion of the meeting. Since Norma Swain was absent due to a family emergency, he thanked John Hickey for a splendid job in leading the singing acappella.
ROBIN SCAER announced only one guest was in attendance, namely, former Rotarian Chuck Schulz, who was with Peggy Grove. She told the Club that Chuck is now teaching personal fitness and doing deejay work for events.

DAVID VOLKMAN gave a most entertaining Mini-Classification Talk, explaining that after growing up in Bucks County, he’d gone on to college at Penn State, majoring in Political Science with the ambition that he may attain the status of a modern-day Cardinal Richelieu, as the power-behind-the-throne. Since the several political campaigns he’d worked on led to defeats for his candidates, he decided to change course, and went into education. After attending Shippensburg, Lehigh, and Penn State Universities and receiving his all his teaching certifications, he worked at Susquehanna Township schools for over 40 years, starting off as a teacher and ending as Superintendent of the District. After retiring, David was tapped by Carolyn Dumaresq to work for her in the PA Department of Education, where he now is employed, with “the longest job title” known to man!

STEVE FEINOUR encouraged additional Rotarians, especially women, to volunteer to serve as chaperons for the upcoming Youth Exchange Weekend.

IRA PACKMAN requested additional volunteers to sign up for the upcoming blood drive.

ANDY REBUCK announced that the Fellowship Committee is hosting an evening at Whitaker’s IMAX Theatre for a showing of “Tornado Alley” on April 19.

PRESIDENT BOB said that the Homeless Committee is diverting donated items to be sent to our sister city of Harrisburg in the Midwest, which had been hard-hit by a tornado in recent weeks.

BOB HOSTETTER, Program-Chair-Extraordinaire, at 12:35 PM introduced the day’s speaker, Donald Gilliland, an enterprise reporter at the Harrisburg Patriot News. He said that Mr. Gilliland had been highly recommended by President Bob, because of his focus on ethics in covering issues such as Marcellus Shale drilling, legalized gambling, and the accounting fraud at Adelphia. Although Mr. Gilliland has been at the Patriot News for two years, prior to that he had been editor of The Potter Leader-Entrprise in Potter County for over a decade. Gilliland’s topic for his talk was “Ethnics, pursuing an ethical compass.”

Gilliland began his talk by stating that “Journalistic ethics is NOT a contradiction in terms.” He said that he’d attended Cornell University and Cambridge, where he’d studied Medieval Literature and Archaeology, not journalism. He explained that understanding how to do effective research and to conduct productive conversations stand one in better stead than majoring in journalism in college. After graduating from college, Gilliland began working for the Potter Leader-Enterprise, attracted to the paper because of his admiration for a nineteenth-century editor there who had stood up to railway barons and conflict of interest issues, despite the bombing and firing of his offices. That editor had published a line on his paper’s front page stating  “Not afraid to tell the truth about the public’s business.” Gilliland went on to say that this sentiment and creed fits perfectly with Rotary’s Four-Way Test.

“Is it the truth?” is a newspaperman’s creed.
“Is it fair to all concerned?” is the touchstone of a newspaperman’s craft, and giving the subjects of news stories an opportunity to explain their side of the stories is standard practice. Ethical journalists stop and put themselves into the position of a story’s “villain’s lawyer.” They ask themselves, “What other narratives may exist?” Fair coverage is  not always “pleasant coverage,” he admitted. Exposing a person with public coverage exposes the writer to criticism many times.
“Will it benefit all concerned?” For a journalist, this idiom could be re-phrased as “What good will come from publishing this?”Will the coverage of the issue “add to the public good,” or will it merely do more “piling on?”
“Will it build goodwill and better friendships?” This phrase doesn’t really apply to the newspaper industry, historically. However, he pointed out that with the Internet and social media sites, the question is being asked in newsrooms. Gilliland said that  his talk was the Rotary’s Four-Way Test as seen through the prism of news reporting.

PEGGY GROVE asked what Gilliland felt about the Marcellus Shale commission,  as regards conflicts of interest, since the businessmen on the commission all had been major contributors to the Governor’s campaign. The speaker replied that although the commission requires people with knowledge of the drilling industry, he felt that more environmentalists and citizens groups should have been represented.

JOHN HICKEY inquired how reporters keep “personal biases” out of their reporting? The speaker expounded on his feelings about the anonymous comments posted as diatribes on Penn-Live, calling many of them “Civics Porn.” He said these comments are often by people who try to twist news stories into skewed fabrications. The speaker went on to say that the key for journalists is to be aware of one’s biases and to try to be aware of the other side. However, he said that when covering any story involving white supremacist groups, he refuses to consider their side of the story.

Gilliland continued to say that a lot of the polarization in today’s TV news coverage is propaganda, both from the fringe Left and the Right.This does no one any good. Returning to the issue of the anonymous Penn-Live posts, he said that “people love to watch a train wreck.” Newspapers often make a business decision to let people rant that way in order to increase viewers’ interest. As news consumers, people should make choices as to what news to patronize or not.

TOM JOHNSTON commented that discussion of the Governor’s proposed budget leads the have-nots and the agencies who serve them to crying “unfair.” Gilliland said that covering budgets can be a “minefield” for journalists. Budgets tend to be boring reading until a crisis of some kind develops. Someone always feels they have been treated unfairly.

PEGGY GROVE thanked our speaker for his excellent, thought-provoking presentation and for his integrity.

PRESIDENT BOB closed the meeting  at 1:15 PM by asking that the Club members all operate under the Four-Way Test as they “go forth and serve.”

Respectfully submitted,
Carrie Nicholas-Wissler-Thomas

OFFICERS:

DIRECTORS:

Robert S. Saline              
Una Martone
Karen F. Snider
John P. Judson, M.D.
Carolyn Dumaresq, Ed.D.
William B. Boles
Richard Utley                

President
President-Elect
Vice President
Immediate Past President
Secretary
Treasurer
Sergeant-at-Arms

Sandra Beck
Caryn J. Carr
David E. Freet
Kent E. Frese
Lisa Lewis
Thomas A. Peluso
Andrew R. Rebuck
Robin Scaer