The following information is intended to help you get to know our club and enable you to see quickly how you can contribute to its efforts and to the objects of the great organization of Rotary International to which we belong.

The Rotary Club of Toowoomba City was chartered on the 13th December 1991.We were special from the start as the then only mixed Rotary Club out of seven in Toowoomba. Initially, we had 14 men and 14 women under the leadership of co-founder and President Janet Abberton. The other co-founder was Past District Governor Nevell McPhee who was a member of the Rotary Club of Toowoomba - the club which sponsored our creation as a new club.

We meet each Friday (basically other than public holidays) at 12 noon for 12:30 pm for a two course lunch.

Since Charter, we have engaged in various activities, including:

• Sponsoring a room at Rotary Wesley Lodge, Brisbane - $7,500
• “Raising the Standard” by selling our national flags & poles
• Careers Night participation until its cessation
• Youth Exchange Programme
• Art Show with proceeds to Blue Nursing
• Youth & Kidz Expo 95, 96, 97.
• Donations totalling $5,365 to end of '03 to the Toowoomba Base Hospital Children's Ward
• Trivia Nights and raffle raising $10,455 (to end of 2003) for the Toowoomba Hospice - $6,555 of which was further matched by the Heritage Building Society
• “People to People” home-hosting of USA students since 1994
• Literacy packs sent to Aetape, PNG & Solomon Is. 99/00
• Sponsoring an Indonesian student since 1995
• Sponsoring a little boy at St Jude's School in Tanzania 02/03 onward
• Sponsoring bright young students to the National Youth Science Forum
• Movie Festival which sent disadvantaged kids to the movies and , through sponsorship, raised $10,000 for Drug Arm
• Donated $2,500 to the Sunrise Way drug rehabilitation project
• Participated in many doorknocks for the Salvation Army, the Cancer Fund, Guide Dogs for the Blind, Blue Nursing Service
• Planted young trees as part of the Olympic Land-care project, stencilled storm-water drains with environmental messages and for a number of years, gave plants as thank you gifts to guest speakers
• From 2001 we been a “New Model Club”, one of only a few hundred in the world, as part of programme investigating how and if Rotary should remodel itself for the future.
• Many other Contributions

The first object of Rotary is “The development of acquaintance as an opportunity for service.”

All we ask of you in your first weeks with us is:

• A willingness to participate in club activities
• A commitment to get to know club members
• A Commitment to get to know about Rotary itself
• A short job talk (5 - 10 mins) about your profession or business

Read the Member's Pack you receive at induction

• Ask! Ask! Ask!
• Read the monthly magazine “Rotary Down Under”
• Read our club's newsletters
• Attend members sessions when they are held by the Club
• Attend District Conferences (held annually) and District Assemblies
• Visit our club website or Rotary websites

• Wear your Rotary pin at work and meetings with pride
• Wear your name (or dinner) badge at our meetings and at make-ups
• Partner's badges can be purchased through the Club Secretary
• Enjoy the friendship and service opportunities Rotary is offering you.

• Joining fee (covers Rotary pin, dinner badge & kit): $45
• Annual Membership: $200
• For each meeting:
• Pig (for the Rotary Foundation): $2.00 - or you can pay ahead for the whole year and claim a tax deduction
• Sergeant's fines : 50c each fine, with a weekly limit of $2.00
• Meal (including raffle ticket for $2.00): $20.00 - out of which we pay the caterer, Rotary House levy (to pay for the real estate) and contribution to guest speaker expenses

Please do! Each member can bring 2 guests who might be prospective members at the Club's expense each year. Otherwise the meal cost for each guest is the same as for members.

• Apologise, if possible, in advance to the Secretary - preferably no later than Thursday
• Do a “Make-up” meeting. This means that you attend another Club's meeting if you are unable to attend your own. You may attend any Rotary Club in the world to do a make-up. You will be asked to introduce yourself - give your name, classification and Club name. To be recorded as a make-up, you must attend a meeting 14 days before or after the missed Club meeting and hand your make-up card to our Secretary.

A lot of fun is had at meetings collecting fines. This is a Rotary way of building fellowship and collecting money to defray the Club's expenses. The Sergeant at Arms has the job of fining members for “misdemeanours” such as birthdays, anniversaries and “newsworthy” events.

Please stand if you are addressed by the Sergeant. The usual fine is 50c. Any member can “buy the baton” used to collect the fines if he/she feels unjustly fined for a cost of $2.00 and thus fine the Sergeant.

The original china piggy bank sadly passed away and a new pig was inducted to collect money for the Rotary Foundation - Rotary's international charitable fund. We ask that each member commits $100.00 pa to this fund ($2.00/week) which is used for projects such as Polio Plus, the campaign which is eradicating Polio world-wide.

Each week we hold a raffle. The cost of the ticket, $2.00, is included in your meal price.

It's part of Rotary tradition, particularly in Toowoomba. The lyrics of our song were written by a founding member, Joy Brown, who now belongs to Ipswich City Club. In 2000, Club member Joan Mladenovic played the music and was recorded by other Club member Geoff Roberts on CD.

The Club is run by an annually elected executive, The Board, Consisting of the President, Secretary, Treasurer, President Elect, Past President, and Directors in the Avenues of Service of Club, Community, Vocational, International and New Generations. The Board meets monthly and you can expect to be asked to serve on it as you become more experienced in Rotary. In the mean time you will probably be asked to help on a sub-committee.