New City Rotary Celebrates 60th Anniversary

By Michael Riconda

New City – The Rotary Club of New City celebrated 60 years of community engagement on Monday, March 25 with brief presentations on the club’s history and accomplishments, including an extensive record of community service.

“Rotary is all about service and service is all about people,” former president Sandi Jeanette said. “At a time when volunteer organizations have difficulty recruiting and retaining members, New City Rotary has managed to do both.”

The New City Rotary Club was formed in 1952 with 30 members and aid from sponsor chapters in Pearl River and Spring Valley. Since then, it moved several times before settling into its current meeting place at the La Terrazza restaurant in 1997 and became the largest Rotary chapter in Rockland, boasting almost 80 members.

Since its inception, the Rotary has engaged in a broad array of charitable and community service activities including blood drives, food service in the form of holiday food basket and meals-on-wheels participation, academic scholarships and a continued, mutually-beneficial service relationship with Rockland County BOCES.

Rotary also engaged in a number of international programs, including an Adopt-a-Soldier program, a clean water project in India, and participation with Schools to End Poverty (STEPS) to build schools and provide basic supplies for children overseas.

As part of the celebration, Legislator Ed Day (R – New City) made a brief presentation on the New City Rotary, lauded its efforts in establishing New City’s Little League decades ago, and presented the Legislature’s decision to declare March 25 to be Rotary Club of New City Day. “To me 60 years of Rotary is something that should be shouted out,” Day explained.

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