VVA Chapter 1069 Meeting Report for: Sept 9-13-2023
[posted on: 9-23-2023]

The meeting was held at the usual location, in the banquet room at Mikeska’s BBQ, (located on Hwy 59) El Campo, TX. The chapter officers and membership appreciate Mikeska's support for our VVA chapter! Thank you.

• Photo below shows Chapter Vice-President, Prudencio Arriaga, opening the meeting at 6:00pm. Note that chapter President, Richard Woods, could not attend this month's meeting.
  
  
• Prudencio then led the membership with the Pledge of Allegiance, followed up with a prayer by chapter member, Billy Orsak. See image below...
  

• There were about 25 members, spouses and guests that attended this meeting. Much thanks to all those that attended!
• All those who were having birthdays in September were recognized. Everyone then sang Happy Birthday to them.
• The meeting was then temporarily adjourned to allow our membership and attending guests to go next door to get an evening dinner from Mikeska's BBQ restaurant.
• The meeting was reopened at 7:00 pm - The following business shown below was conducted.
• Prudencio then asked our Wharton County Service Officer, Jessica Collard, to give a presentation to the attending members - see photos below.
  
  The chapter officers and membership do appreciate Jessica attending our meetings and presenting any new VA benefits information to us and also her helping our membership with any questions they may have concerning their VA benefits.
  
  Use the link below to visit her webpage that is posted on our chapter's website. The page includes her Wharton office hours and other informaton about the services she provides for all Wharton County Veterans.
  Jessica Collard
  Wharton County Veterans Service Officer (VSO)
  1017 North Alabama Road
  Wharton TX, 77488
  Phone: (979) 532-1311
  Fax: (979) 531-0758
  Click Here to View Jessica's webpage

• Prudencio then introduced a special guest, Frances Ziegenhals, from the "Stars for our Troops" organization. She gave a short presentation about her organization. See photo below...
  
  This organization shares & distributes embroidered Stars, cut from retired US Flags, with our Active military, Veterans & First Responders.
  
  She also brought lots of the STARS handout packet items for the membership. See the above and below photos...
  
  The contact information for Frances can be seen below. She is the Wharton County representative for the "Stars For Our Troops" organization.
  
  Use the link below to visit the "Stars for our Troops" website:
  Click Here to Visit the STARS-FOR-OUR-TROOPS website
  A big thanks from our chapter officers and membershiop to Frances Ziegenhals for attending our chapter meeting and for all the handout items. Thank you Frances!
• Prudencio then introduced our 2nd speaker for the evening. His name is Bob Wilkins and is from El Campo. Bob is an Aggie graduate and early (1965) Vietnam Veteran. He have a presentation regarding his tour in Vietnam. He had some interesting (and funny) stories about his time at A&M, the early Vietnam era, his early Vietnam tour and his overall military career. See photos below.
  
  Bob has spoken to other groups in the past, including the local Lions and Rotary Clubs and was well received by their members.
  
  Bob was well received by our membership too! The chapter officers and membership want to thank Bob for attending our meeting and presenting some very interesting stories of his tour in Vietnam and about his military career.
• Billy Orsak then gave a planning committee progress report regarding the upcoming April 3, 2024 event. See photo below.
  
  Note that the main agenda again for this meeting, was the continued reporting and discussion of our chapter's hosting and planning of the 'Vietnam War Veterans Day' fellowship gathering event, being held on April 3, 2024 at Taiton Community Hall. As a reminder, this will be the third year for this event that includes our chapter, VVA Chapter 1069, and 4 other local area VVA chapters; Hallettsville VVA Chapter 854, Schulenburg VVA Chapter 870, Victoria VVA Chapter 898 & Columbus VVA Chapter 1127.
  *** DO NOTE - THIS EVENT IS NOT OPEN TO THE PUBLIC ***
  Billy's primary presentation and progress report at this meeting included the following topics. Some of the topics were still open for dicussion and final decisions, but had already been decided in Billy's planning committee meeting that he held at 5:00 pm, before our chapter meeting started.
  Below were the latest event planning topics that Billy spoke about...
  • Taiton Hall
  • Hall Decorations
  • Missing Man Table
  • Chapter Fundraiser Raffle
  • Event Staffing
  • Event Meal Choices
  • Event Program Speaker
  • Event Slide Show Presentation
  Below are also items on Billy's action-items list...
  • Contact Mikeska’s about meal choices
  • Gather input for the raffle and notify group
  • Update Expense/Income Sheet
  • Get contract for Hall
  • Create sample program for handout
  • Create slide show of pictures for event
  Do note that Billy again held his planning committee meeting (5:00pm) before the start of our chapter meeting. The attendance included all members of the planning committee and other chapter members & spouses that wanted to attend. Billy will continue to hold these planning committee meetings from here on until March, 2024.
• Everyone should be aware by now, that we will be running a continuous slide-show at the April 3,2024 event with pictures & images collected from all 5 particpating VVA chapters, similar to what the Columbus VVA chapter did at their event this past March.
  Bob Supak is in charge of creating and setting up the slide-show, and collecting additional pictures from the chapters, including from the members in our chapter. So, at this meeting, Bob was running the current pictures he has collected so far from our membership, so the attending members have some idea of the type of pictures Bob is wanting. See example images below.
  
  
  These are the type of pictures that Bob wants from our chapter members for the upcoming event. Please send your pictures to Bob ASAP, along with the required caption text. It is a bit tedious process getting the slide-show together. He will do the final image prep and edit in the properly formatted caption. Please do not send a picture with an already included caption. Thank you.
• There being no further business, Prudencio then adjourned the meeting at 8:00 pm.
• Thanks to everyone for attending our August chapter meeting. See everyone at the October 11th meeting.

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