Rotary Guests: Dwayne Black was the greeter for the day and presented our large list of guests who included the Past District Governor Marion Cheney, the assistant governor and district protection officer Gregg Dowty, the assistant governor Kathryn Flygare, Luke Newall (son of Zach Newall), and the Rotary Exchange Student who is staying with the Newell family, Antonio Soriano Lujan. Photo here is Zach and his wife Angelique picking up Antonio at Logan Airport. Thanks Amy Chipman for making the great sign!

 

Happy Dollars: President Patty kicked off the happy dollars thanking the Dover Rotary Club, for supporting the Global Grant with $5,000 toward the Rotary Hearing Center in the Dominican Republic! Dick Hall noted that this was his second meeting with Patty as President, and he thinks the meetings are getting better every week. Paul Gore is happy his leg injury is healing! Kathy Flygare loves coming to the Portland Rotary Club. Harry’s happy dollars went for the new club venue, the speaker, and a dollar for Patty Byers (who was feeling the love). Dave Small is happily celebrating 53 years of marriage!

 

No Queen: Mary Pat Donnellon led the raffle and the speaker picked Brian Nickerson as the lucky Rotarian. Brian tried to pull the queen of hearts from the deck for a shot at over $200. While Brian is a lucky man, he was not lucky enough to pull the queen and opted for 10 of hearts instead. 

 

Committee Work: The Board asked Ellen Niewoehner to be the club protection officer, and she said yes. The Protection Officer helps provide for safety at Rotary activities especially with respect to children, and those that might be more vulnerable. Greg Dowty is the District’s protection officer  attended the meeting to support Ellen.

 

Tim Donnellan is the new chair of new Mainer task force, and is inviting all Rotarians to attend an information meeting after the September 6th club meeting. He'll share how he and his wife Mary Pat Donnellan acted as volunteers to help a family from Angola.

 

Meanwhile, Mary Pat and Christine Force are co-chairing the environmental committee and are gearing for new events - stay tuned!

 

Salvation Army Awards Portland Rotary Meeting: Tom Ranello let us know that at the Friday September 13th meeting, the Rotary Club of Portland is being honored by the Salvation Army of Portland by receiving the "Others Award." This award is rarely given and dates back to the 1880s. Robert Trail and Mark Stimson will be honored for being past presidents of Portland Rotary and for being on The Salvation Army advisory board. Roger and Liz Fagan will also be recognized for their outstanding contributions to the international community for Hearts for Hearing, and for supporting the prosthetic hands and drinking water filter projects in the Dominican Republic. Mayor Mark Dion will be presenting the Fagans a certificate from the City of Portland. This should be a great event and the Salvation Army will appreciate the Club’s participation. The Friday meeting will be held at the Salvation Army’s Adult Rehabilitation Center on Prebble Street with Parking on Lancaster and Oxford Streets.  

 

Lobster Raffle: Zach Newell spoke to us about Lobster Raffle fundraiser and noted the sign-up sheets, sandwich boards, and banner were present for viewing during the meeting. Portland Rotary is teaming with Luke’s Lobster to raffle a lobster dinner for 10. In the coming months, Rotary volunteers will be selling raffle tickets on most mornings when the cruise ships unload at the Portland Pier, so check your calendars, and reach out to Zach with your availability. It is a credit, no cash event, since contact information for the winner and accounting are both more accurate using a QR code.

 

Zach Snackers Needed: Zach Newell also asked for volunteers to purchase individually wrapped snacks followed by delivery to the Veterans Clinic at 141 Commercial Street. Sue Young completed the first snack run, and said it was super, super easy. The club reimburses the purchasers of the snacks up to $150. Zach also said news will be coming soon about stuffing backpacks.

Dr. Durst discussed some of the work being done with suicide prevention. She started by saying that when we talk about suicide, we talk openly about it and say “They died by suicide.” The field has also transitioned to say, “They killed themselves.” The field no longer uses terms such as “committed.” It is important to speak frankly and plainly about suicide. Speaking frankly is part of the destigmatization of suicide.

 

Dr. Durst talked about the challenges professionally in shifting thinking about how to treat mental health issues. Dr. Durst related that varied stages of professional work in which mid-career and senior career practitioners sometimes get a little complacent, and don’t see, or don’t want to see, opportunities to tackle problems with a different lens. Dr. Durst said she used to think that some deaths by suicide were unavoidable. Dr. Durst did not want to recognize changes to treatment and the implementation of new frameworks for treating suicide. One such framework is the Zero Suicide Project.

 

Dr. Durst introduced the philosophy and message of Zero Suicide. Zero suicide is a methodology to eliminate suicide and a state of mind that one suicide is too many. Zero Suicide is also a priority of the National Action Alliance for Suicide Prevention. It provides a framework for systematic, clinical suicide prevention in behavioral health and health care systems that focuses on safety and error reduction in healthcare. Dr. Durst discussed Zero Suicide as a set of best practices and tools for health systems and providers where participants learned how to incorporate best and promising practices into their organizations and processes to improve care and safety for those at risk for suicide. Dr. Durst explained that the overarching Zero Suicide Philosophy provides that suicide is preventable and health care systems need to embrace and work towards the aspirational goal of preventing ALL suicide deaths for patients in their care. If we don’t consider zero suicide a possibility we won’t work towards zero.

 

There are 7 elements of Zero Suicide, which include: Lead, train, identify, engage, treat, transition, and improve. What is important in these 7 elements is the work of conveying the message of Zero Suicide by Shifting the culture, confronting the naysayers, and delivering Zero Suicide to a Health System and state. In simple terms, this means that we all need to talk about suicide, help people get help and embrace the idea that we can all help to make a difference.

 

Dr. Durst discussed the importance of breaking down barriers when talking about suicide and in helping others. Dr. Durst referenced the Kevin Hines story – the man who jumped off of the Golden Gate Bridge and survived. Kevin was crying on the bus and no one asked him what was wrong. When the bus stopped, the bus driver was annoyed and yelled at him to get off of the bus. When Kevin was getting ready to jump, only a German tourist asked him to take their picture. It was the only verbal interaction with the depressed and despondent man. Part of the Zero Suicide mandate, clinicians work on the advice that if you see something, say something. Be a human being, Dr. Durst pleads. The idea is that we can all make a difference by not being afraid to talk about suicide. The conversation with someone who might be feeling suicidal does not have to be contentious but one that recognizes someone’s sadness or despair and willing to confront thoughts of suicide.

 

Dr. Durst advises that all it takes is the ability to recognize what someone might be feeling, and even say something like “Are you thinking about hurting yourself?” Dr. Durst also advises all to get Mental Health First Aid. The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) offers mental health first aid training, face-to-face or online. Dr. Durst as part of the NAMI training talks about a Question, Persuade, Refer (QPR) model for how to encourage people to question and persuade others to get help. By talking about suicide, engaging with proper techniques for addressing suicide as a national problem, can we begin to get to zero. For more information, please visit Zero Suicide here: https://zerosuicide.edc.org   Photo, Patty Byers with Linda Durst.

September 6 - Bob Mackenzie, District Governor

September 13 -  Salvation Army "Others Award" - Meeting at Salvation                Army’s Adult Rehabilitation Center.

September 19 - Thursday Night Social Event

September 20 - No Meeting