Where were you born, education/degrees or associations/board seats? I was born in Waukesha Wisconsin and great up in the area. I have my BS in Kinesiology from UW-Milwaukee.

Name of company & position, or your very first job: I’ve worked at Newcastle Place for almost 9 years. My very first job was scoring basketball games for 5 dollars an hour!

Family: Just my wife Christina and I at the current moment. We do have a dog named Griffey that keeps us busy.

Interests/hobbies/last book read/favorite movie/what’s playing in on your car’s stereo/pastimes: Favorite hobby is soccer, playing and coaching. Playing with so many different people from different countries has made me love to discover new cultures. My wife doesn’t love soccer but when we travel abroad, we try to go to games and she loves it. Like the atmosphere at a Brewer tailgate you meet really nice people and soccer is a great bridge to start a friendship with a stranger you don’t speak the same language as.

I listen to books as my commute to work is long, and some of my recent favorites are Blacktop Wasteland, Beneath a Scarlet Sky, and Greenlights.

Best business decision, or hardest business decision: Sounds cliché but marrying my wife. She is so intelligent, thoughtful, and would make a great mom. I can’t imagine there would be any bigger business decision than picking a partner to do the business of life with.

Biggest career accomplishment/highlight to date, or what do you like best about your job? My job doesn’t involve making big deals happen or anything like that but instead it’s a culmination of being someone who consistently adds to our residents’ lives. Residents come to me for all sorts of things that are outside my “job description” and I see that as an accomplishment because they trust me and can count on me.

Most memorable Rotary moment or event? I’m still new to Rotary but the induction was pretty special. To be welcomed by successful people who want to make their community successful was a good feeling.

Your favorite vacation? Stepping out of the underground into the streets of Rome for the first time is hard to beat.  Also Negril Jamaica for the simple fact it was with my family, the sun was hot, and the ocean was blue.

What was your first experience or awareness of Rotary? Connie Pukaite was the first real experience with Rotary. She would talk to me about the initiatives Rotary had going on. I mean we all know Connie and if she can’t inspire you, I don’t know who can.

Have you ever attended Rotary International events? I have not but along my travels I see Rotary everywhere. I even have a picture of a Rotary international installment outside the tower of Belem in Lisbon Portugal.

What do you want to do to give back to Rotary and MT Sunrise? I’m still fairly new to Rotary but growing into the experience is something that excites me. Learning from all the great Rotarians and having an avenue to get to a point where I can have an impact in my community is something I think everyone should strive for.  

This project is the 14-mile modernization of Interstate 43, between the cities of Glendale and Grafton. The I-43 North-South Freeway is among the busiest routes in Wisconsin and is a critical Interstate link between southeast Wisconsin and the entire state.

For detailed information, real-time traffic updates and email updates CLICK HERE

Situated in different parts of the world, the Rotary Peace Centers offer tailor-made curricula to train individuals devoted to peacebuilding and conflict resolution — no matter where they land.

Rita Lopidia vividly recalls her experiences as a Rotary Peace Fellow at the University of Bradford in England. “The classes in African politics and UN peacekeeping were my favorite,” she says. “The politics course challenged me to dig deeper into research to understand the history of the continent, and the peacekeeping class aided my understanding of global politics. As a practitioner, that was an eye-opener to have a global view of events happening around the world.”

Lopidia's time at the Rotary Peace Center profoundly affected her. "After graduation, I traveled back to Africa and settled in Uganda due to the ongoing conflict in South Sudan," she explains. "There I established the EVE Organization for Women Development and started engaging the South Sudanese refugees in Uganda and their host communities. Through my organization, we were able to mobilize South Sudanese women to participate in the South Sudan peace process promoted by eastern Africa's Intergovernmental Authority for Development — and that led to the signing of the Revitalised Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan in 2018."

Lopidia is just one of the 1,500-plus peace fellows from more than 115 countries who have graduated from a Rotary Peace Center since the program was created in 1999; the first peace centers began classes three years later. Currently, Rotary has seven peace centers in various locations around the world; the newest, at Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda — the first in Africa — welcomed its inaugural cohort of peace fellows in 2021. Next, Rotary plans to establish a peace center in the Middle East or North Africa, perhaps as soon as 2024, and has set its sights on opening one in Latin America by 2030.

As you will discover, the curriculum at each peace center has been carefully crafted to address specific aspects of the peacebuilding process — and train the next generation of global change-makers.

Editors Note: This is one in a series of articles highlighting Rotary projects around the world.

Mangroves form an integral part of the coastal ecosystem of the Philippines. They serve as a source of medicines, alcohol, and timber; a haven for coral reef fish; and a buffer against typhoons. In a two-pronged effort to shore up the maritime trees and buttress a fishing village’s ecotourism drive, in November the Rotary Club of Bacolod-Marapara teamed with the Rotary Club of Victorias, the Rotaract Club of Marapara, the Pasil Fisherfolks Association, and other local organizations. They planted some 1,000 mangrove seedlings and provided the fishers with bamboo to construct two cottages in the native style for rental to tourists. “

Around the world, mangroves are threatened, but they are important,” says Rolando Corona, president of the Bacolod-Marapara club. “Their protection and restoration should be a high priority.”