Why the Rotary Club Gala is next week’s hottest ticket
The festive event raises money for a variety of worthy causes. Oh, and Amy Paulin will be there, too.
Let’s party! The Scarsdale Rotary Gala will be held next week.
What are you doing next Wednesday night—especially since Dancing with the Stars isn’t on then? The Scarsdale Rotary Gala is your big chance to hit the dance floor yourself at the Scarsdale Golf Club. As you wine, dine, and bust a move, you’ll be helping to raise money for worthy causes far and wide, from world health to environmental activism.
Taking care of our trees
“Our motto is ‘Service Above Self,’” said Serkan Celyan, who has served as president of the Scarsdale Rotary Club for 20 years. One reason he has stayed in the role for so long is because he embraces the club’s ethics and goals, including its determination to protect the Earth’s health. “People are so worried about everything that we are dealing with in the planet in general,” he shared. “In Rotary, you can take action immediately.”
The Scarsdale club is saving nature by fighting to maintain the health of trees in our area. “We are supporting local organizations here in Scarsdale and Westchester to fight against the old, invasive vines that are killing our trees, and we cut down vines ourselves as well.” Ceylan said. “We go to the Bronx River Parkway and we remove the vines for hours.”
The Club also plans to launch an awareness campaign about the threat these vines pose. “Everyone believes that these green things are the trees’ friends, but they're not. They're killing our one-hundred and two-hundred-year-old trees slowly,” Serkan warned. “And if things keep going on like this, in thirty to forty years’ time we will lose all our old trees all of a sudden.”
Doing it for the children’s sake
The Scarsdale Rotary Club also advocates for the wellbeing of kids. “We are working on a couple of projects that we are so proud of,” Ceylan said. “The biggest one, that we executed last year with our friends, was to send sixteen big loads of toys to the kids in Ukraine. With the help of our Rotary friends in Poland, we made sure that [the toys] got to the exact right location.”
In addition, the Club coordinates with local organizations to provide vital services to young students. “For example, we are helping other organizations to distribute food to schools,” Ceylan said. It’s a vital step towards making sure that less fortunate children still receive adequate nutrition.
Rotarians at the Scarsdale Farmers Market. (Congressional candidate George Latimer can be seen in the back row, farthest to the right.)
Fighting physical and mental ailments
“We have two more projects that are very important. The first one is Rotary International is fighting against polio,” Ceylan shared. In fact, this has been a 35-year-long project for all Rotarians. The organization is a founding partner of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, which has reduced polio cases by 99.9 percent since 1979.
According to Rotary.org, members have contributed over $2 billion to the cause, along with countless volunteer hours, and in the process have helped to protect more nearly 3 billion children in 122 countries. But continued effort is vital, since polio still remains in parts of the planet and could spread farther if vaccine rates drop.
Another epidemic the Club fights against is loneliness. “It’s one of the biggest problem in our community and around the globe nowadays,” Ceylan said. “So, we are organizing social gatherings—the last one was in Barnes & Noble in Eastchester. We are trying to bring together people who are older than sixty, so they get to know each other, socialize, share their experiences, and develop friendships.”
Rotary members sorting coats for homeless and immigrant neighbors.
Don’t believe the myths
Many people believe that Rotarians have to be men, but it’s not true. “We are not an all-men’s club, for sure,” Ceylan explained. “We have thirty-three members and seventeen [of them] are ladies. Our past president and our previous past president were ladies, too.”
Nor is membership by invitation only. “If you believe that your abilities or your profession is valuable for your community, and if you have time and motivation to spend some of this energy to help the community, then apply,” Ceylan urges. “We usually prefer a reference, as you can imagine, but it's not mandatory. You can also fill out a form from the internet and you can apply. There's nothing against that.”
If you do decide to join the Rotary’s ranks, you’ll become a part of not just the 101-year-old Scarsdale Rotary Club, but also a network of 1.5 million people across the globe. And if you just go to the gala, you’ll be joining a crowd of civic-minded people who want to help Scarsdale, Westchester, our nation and the entire world—not a bad way to spend an evening.