Ville Platte Rotary Club welcomes St. Landry-Evangeline United Way representatives

November 18, Meeting
During the November 17, meeting of the Ville Platte Rotary Club, Rotarian Mark Suellentrop welcomed Ginger LeCompte and Susan Fisher with St. Landry-Evangeline United Way. They discussed the various programs and services offered to groups in Evangeline and St. Landry parishes. LeCompte stated the St. Landry-Evangeline United Way was founded in 1957 and currently has only three people in the office. She said the organization recruits community citizens to help review the mission and minutes of agencies to research them before helping them out in order to be accountable to the United Way donors. The United Way funds many educational programs for the youth of the communities it serves, focusing on the at-risk middle school age children to keep them in school and discourage them from dropping out. Fisher announced that the Harlem Ambassadors basketball team (a ministry that plays Harlem Globetrotters style basketball) will visit Ville Platte for an assembly with fourth, fifth and sixth grade students on February 11, 2015, and will be playing against a team being put together by Mayor Jennifer Vidrine. Fisher said the group cares about the future of children and is a powerful ministry that uses basketball to get their message through to the at-risk youth of a community.
President David Mayeux made several announcements, noting the annual Rotary Club Christmas social will be held Tuesday, December 9, at Nick’s on Main and that no meetings would be held December 23, and December 30, for the holidays. He stated that Steve Williams with Union Tank and attorneys Nick Monier and Chris Ludeau have applied for membership in the Ville Platte Rotary. Mayeux said that donation boxes created by the Sacred Heart Interact Club were created and asked the business owners in the organization to place them at their businesses in order to collect donations for the Rotary Foundation’s program to help eradicate polio. He told members the club’s Facebook page is up and running and would be maintained by members Mable Foreman and Nicole Winger. He said that due to other upcoming projects, The Ville Platte Rotary Club would not be able to sponsor the local Boy Scout troop at this time. Mayeux also noted that nominations were now being accepted for the new slate of officers for the coming club year.