OKC Rotarians visit Poland

Members of the Rotary Club of Oklahoma City Mary Jane Calvey, Dr. Ron Sutor and Larry Stone earlier this month attended a trilateral meeting hosted by the Warsaw City Rotary Club in Bialowieza, Poland.

This year celebrated the 20th anniversary of the consortium of Rotary Warsaw City, Berlin Luftbrucke and Italy's Milano Nord to work on international grants. The clubs are the major international grant contributors in the Rotary world in Europe.

The Oklahoma City club was invited for a second time to attend the trilateral meeting because of its reputation for participating in important projects and to explore how the club could do even more work together with the European clubs. The meeting allowed the Oklahoma City club to have a larger reach and build more and stronger relationships, the real purpose for these efforts, said Larry Stone, foundation chair for the Rotary Club of Oklahoma City.

Also known as Club 29, the Oklahoma City Rotary club is well-known as the largest supporter of international projects in the Rotary world. The club has worked on several projects with the Warsaw club, and this year also invested in a water project with the Milan club.

Milano Nord will host next year’s meeting, and Oklahoma City has been invited to participate again.

Bialowieza is the last primordial forest in Europe, home to the European forest bison. Extensive efforts by the Polish people have preserved and nurtured the bison population, and today more than 700 of these animals live wild in the forest.