April 14, 2023

Welcome to the Sunrise Spirit –
the Weekly Newsletter of The Rotary Club of Arcata Sunrise


We hope that you will attend one of our lively Friday meetings,
whether or not you are interested in joining Rotary.
We meet (almost) every Friday at 7 am in the Plaza View Room
of Arcata’s historic Jacoby Storehouse.

For more information, please visit the RCAS Website.


Rotary Vision

Together, we see a world where people unite and take action to create
lasting change – across the globe, in our communities, and in ourselves.


The RCAS Calendar

RISE: “Rotary Involvement Strengthens Everyone

  • April 21 – AHS Interact Spaghetti Feed at the AHS Fine Arts Building from 5:30 to 8:30 pm
  • April 22 – Eureka Rotary’s Bootlegger Ball at the Sequoia Conference Center in Eureka
  • April 29 – Pancake Breakfast at the Arcata Presbyterian Church to support Cairo’s Rotary Exchange Year
  • April 29 – Arcata Noon Rotary hosts its annual Wine Festival at Baywood Golf and Country Club
  • May 4-7 – District Conference at Konocti Harbor Resort
  • May 27-31 – Rotary International Convention in Melbourne, Australia

For Openers

We voted for the 2024-2025 Club President, along with one of the members of our Board of Directors. There was not much nail-biting, as Brandi Easter was elected overwhelmingly to the top slot, and Bob Judevine was confirmed as Director in another landslide … Tom Tellez, Marty Lay, and AJ Gonzales discussed our Club’s Mini-Library Project. We plan to build and place several of these, and register each on the Little Free Library” website … Marty had other news as well – he told us that the fire truck that we helped purchase was scheduled to leave Virginia on April 16th, heading for Ameca, a town in Mexico about 85 kilometers west of Guadalajara … We were reminded that the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee meets via Zoom on the second Thursday of each month. Chair Romi Hitchcock Tinseth noted that our Club led the DEI discussion at the recent Rotary District Training Assembly … We were reminded of upcoming events that merit our support. These include the AHS Interact Club’s Spaghetti Feed, the Bootlegger Ball presented by the Eureka Rotary, Exchange Student Cairo’s Pancake Breakfast, and the Arcata Noon Rotary’s Wine Festival. Dates for these events are listed in the calendar above …

A Great Trail

Sunriser Carol Vander Meer was our Featured Speaker, and she told us about the Master Plan for the Great Redwood Trail (GRT) – a proposed rail -to-trail project that will connect Humboldt Bay to San Francisco Bay. Parts of the 316-mile trail are already built, but there is still much to be done. The trail will follow the old North Coast Railroad Authority rail line. The trail will turn the rail corridor into an economic engine for the North Coast, helping the counties of Marin, Sonoma, Mendocino, and Humboldt.  The Master Plan focuses on the portion of the GRT that lies within Humboldt, Mendocino, and Trinity Counties. The portions of the GRT in Sonoma and Marin Counties will be planned by Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit (SMART).

Carol provided a quick lesson in the concept of Rail Trails, which are multi-use paths built on the beds of former railway corridors. There are over 25, 000 miles of rail trails in the US, with over 1,000 miles of those in California. Rail trails support recreation, economic development, tourism, and environmental restoration in the towns and rural areas in which they are situated.

The Master Plan for the trail  will provide details on operations and maintenance, trail design, cultural and natural resource protection, habitat restoration, project prioritization, and funding sources. There are many meetings, workshops, and online surveys scheduled to garner input from the public, along with discussions with community-based organizations and other stakeholder groups (including Rotary Clubs).

For more detailed information, visit the Master Plan website by clicking on the photo below:

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