July 15, 2003

NEXT MEETING, JULY 21… our speaker will be Dr. Bryant Boswell, who’ll tell us about the Lewis & Clark Re-enactment.

AND WE’LL MEET IN OUR NEWLOCATION… Sparkman Auditorium at the Mississippi Ag Museum! Here’s a map? showing how to get there. Our meeting will be at the same time, and the agenda will be the same. Only the location (and the food!) will be different.

LAST MEETING, JULY 14… Frank Melton, Executive Director of the Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics, gave us a unique look at what he described as Mississippi’s number one problem – the use of illegal drugs. Frank told us that 97% of the kids in our state are good and decent, but dealing with the remaining 3% is tough. He reminded us that the chances are 100% that our children will be exposed to illegal drugs at some point. And we have to make sure they have enough information to make the right choice when that happens. Frank praised his undercover agents, those 23-24 year-olds who put their lives on the line every day. And he reminded us that he will continue to work with other agencies (he particularly named the Highway Patrol) to help our state cope with this problem. Frank’s enthusiasm is contagious, and his talk was extremely well received. Thanks to Don Clark for arranging this program, and to Danny Williams for introducing it.

WELCOME TO NEW MEMBER… number one of this Rotary year. Introduced to the club at the July 14 meeting was…
• Chris Klotz, Partner, Coxwell & Associates, PLLC. Chris was introduced by his proposer, Janet Scott.

PRESIDENT’S CORNER… Sometimes you get a clue that you’re doing something really right. We received a thank-you note from one of our scholars who just graduated. He told us how much the scholarship had meant to him, and how the rest of his life would be different because our club cared enough to have such a program. This kind of note is one of the reminders we sometimes get that we’re doing some good in this world, and is an indication of just what Rotary means. – Haden