Hello Everyone,

We have had our Organizational and the Second District is ready for our coming year. We are going to be trying some new things this year. I spoke with the officers and Exe Board about some new incentive programs this year. My focus this year will be Membership, Attending Second District Meetings and Convention attendance. This site was first set up for Unit 282, since then a lot of Sisters from the around the District have been added. Ypsilanti did a great job last year with their Membership drive. We received more then a hundred percent of membership. Congratulations to Mary Matthews for a great job. We had a few within the District to make a 100%. However; we had a whole lot more who did not. So Second District set in the back of the Convention floor. My incentive programs for this year will be attendance to Convention. there were only 5 Units represented at Convention out of 27. In March last year when our Department President Ruth visited our meeting only 11 units were present (about 15 to 20 ladies) out of over 2000 members in the district. I intend to come up with awards and some of them containing money for your attendance to District meetings and convention. Please come to the next District Meeting to see how you can cash in on some of the incentives.

My project this year will be palliative care at the VA in Ann Arbor. They have a 70,000 dollar project they are working on. Turning the rooms to a more at home bedroom feeling. The also want to work on the entrance and several other areas to give the hospital more at home feeling for the Veterans there. The changes I have seen are incredible. Mary Matthew is the new VA Hospital representative this year, Congratulations Mary! I am sure if you ask her she can also tell you how great the changes are for these Veterans.

Tonight Joyce Scott and myself went to Monroe to visit with Linda Leftcheck to start the process of forming a new Unit from the Monroe Post. We have several ladies that will be joining our organization. Linda would like their first project to be helping out with the Christmas shopping days at the VA. So if you see one of these new ladies from this new Unit, please be sure to welcome them to our organization.

I still have 3 Chairmanships open for this year. Legislative, Leadership and Music. If you would be interested in one of these please contact me.

Fall Conference is right around the corner. I hope to run into our Second District people all over the place. It is a great way to learn about our programs.

I will be putting out a letter very soon to all of the new Unit President. In this letter I will be requesting a date to visit your Unit. I will have a post card with in the letter to be mailed back to me. Please be sure to take a minute to respond.

We have a new web page under construction. When you go to www.post282.org you will find a new Second District link on it. Check out what's going on in the district. We will be adding news and pictures to this link through out the year.

Hope you all have a great year this year. Please remember to Thank a Veteran for their service.

Thank You,

Diane Mraz

Second District President