President's Update - 9 October 2021

Greetings! While it is officially fall, as usual in Oklahoma the weather seems to have a mind of its own. We’ve already had some cool fall like days; but the last few days have been in the mid to upper nineties, and now the forecast calls for severe weather over the next few days. Football season is in full swing at all levels and I hope that your favorite teams are doing well. I just finished watching the crazy game between OU and Texas, exciting for all, but certainly disappointing for some. For me, October always kicks off the busiest three months of the year with a number of major holidays squeezed into such a short period of time. It will be January before we can really catch our breath. For this update I have just two topics that I want to address.

Looking Forward: First, our final General Membership Meeting of the year will be held on 10 November at 11:30 in the Prairie Building at the Great Plains Coliseum. Stop what you are doing right now and save that date on your calendar as you will not want to miss this meeting. Our guest speaker is scheduled to be CAPT (Ret) Erin Stone, Senior Director of Council and Chapter Affairs at National MOAA. It is not often that we have the opportunity to hear from a national staff member. This is also the perfect opportunity to invite a guest/prospective member to one of our Chapter meetings. Please watch your email for the invitation which will be sent out NLT 25 October. I am looking forward to seeing you there.

Looking Back: I also want to say a few final words about the fundraiser we conducted just a few weeks ago. I attended the VFW Post #5263 monthly meeting last Thursday, 7 October for the check presentation with the final tally from the meal. VFW Post Commander Ron Albert presented a check to SWOK MOAA for $2088. (See photo.) Combined with the money from our Silent Auction and Sale ($686.00), the event raised a total of $2774.00. These funds will be used over the coming year as our Chapter supports organizations in the Lawton Community that assist Service Members, Veterans and their families. Again, my personal thanks to all who assisted in any way with this year’s fundraiser. Learned a few lessons this year which next year’s fundraiser even more successful. I also included a few photos from the fundraiser.

Dennis Clippinger
President SWOK MOAA