A Rotary club is flourishing in an office building on Australia’s Gold Coast
By Brad Webber
Paul Harris' summoning of three fellow businessmen for a meeting on 23 February 1905 is enshrined in Rotary lore. The Chicago skyscraper where they assembled was named, providentially, the Unity Building — an appropriately titled backdrop for the celebration of commerce and conviviality.
More than a century later and half a world away on Australia's Gold Coast, Andy Rajapakse set his sights on his own "unity building," Corporate Centre One in Bundall, Queensland. The building, with a rounded glass facade and white-pillared balconies reminiscent of the laces on an American football, is a hub for about 60 of the Gold Coast's top companies. A prime opportunity, Rajapakse reasoned, for the implementation of "this crazy idea" of his to start a Rotary club to attract young professionals from companies in one building and its surroundings.
Hoping to turn them from competitors into a community and a force for good in the region, he paid a visit in early 2020 as the governor-elect of District 9640. He noted the firms listed on the directory and sought a meeting with a managing partner of one of the law offices there.
The elevator pitch? "To explain that most of them work and live in this building more hours a day and a week than in their home. And to imagine that if we can all get to know each other in this building, what a friendly and safer place it would be," Rajapakse recalls of the buildup to what would become the Rotary Club of Gold Coast Corporate. "Every time I see a high-rise corporate office building in Australia or New Zealand, I see an opportunity for a Rotary club."
