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WINNEBAGO COUNTY RETIRED TEACHERS ASSOCIATION www.winnebagocountyrta.org October 2018 Newsletter OFFICERS/BOARD Co-Presidents................ Norm Alpers and Fred Kunz Vice-President and Program................ Jacque Bolger Immediate Past President………………. George Whinna Secretary........................................ Laura Jernigan Treasurer............................... Dorothy Schoonover Thursday, November 15, 2018 Ethnic Heritage Museum 1129 South Main Street, Rockford MAXIMUM # OF ATTENDEES = 50 GUESTS Program- “Downtown Renaissance” --Gary Anderson Doors Open at 11:00 a.m. Registration: 11:30 a.m. 12:00 noon: Box Lunches distributed 12:00 - 12:45 p.m.: Please dine respectfully as architect Gary Anderson presents an updated program on his collaboration with the City of Rockford to preserve historical buildings throughout the city, including the Ethnic Heritage Museum andthe Graham-Ginestra House. 12:45 - 1:00 p.m.: Q & A with Gary Anderson 1:00 p.m. - ??: Turkey raffle and Tours of the Ethnic Heritage Museum and the Graham-Ginestra House Stroll through the Ethnic Heritage Museum, where each of the 6 Galleries focuses on one of the 6 groups of immigrants who first settled in Rockford, contributing to its rich diversity: African American, Hispanic, Irish, Italian, Lithuanian, and Polish. Walk next door to the Graham-Ginestra House, an historic residence that is on the National Register of Historic Places in Winnebago County. Take a docent-led tour of this architectural jewel, a special favor to the WCRTA, since these museums are only open to the public on Sundays! Cost of program, box lunch and tours = $15.00 per person Our Program is limited to 50 participants!! Parking is availableat corner of Loomis and South Main Street or in the municipal lot near the Graham-Ginestra House. PLEASE enter the Museum on Loomis Street. Please fill out the reservation form below indicating your choice of wrap. Send the completed form, along with a check made out to WCRTA for $15 per person, to Gayle Haab, 3767 Doreen Drive, Roscoe, IL 61073or phone (815) 742-1331 Reservation deadline: November 8, 2018 -------------------CUT HERE---------------- Cost of the Program, Box Lunch and Tours = $15.00 PER PERSON Name (s) ____________________________ _________________________ Phone Number(s) ________________ _________________________ Email Address _________________________ _________________________ Box lunch includes wrap, Hawaiian salad, chips, cookie and a bottle of water. Please choose your filling: _____ Egg Salad _____ Chicken Salad _____ Ham Reservation Deadline is November 8, 2018 Program is limited to 50 participants!!! If any questions re November 15 meeting, call Jacque Bolger (815-282-4933 or 815-871-5890) OR Gayle Haab (815-742-1331) Letter from Co-President, Norm Alpers, n_alpers@yahoo.com October is nearly over, and we have under 10 days till the mid-term elections will be over. Even if it is the mid-term election, there are important local offices, state representatives and senatorsandUS Representatives to Congress to be chosen. We, who are retired educators in Illinois, have important choices to make for our state representatives and senators. Please reread the Legislative Article in last month’s Newsletter to take advantage of some excellent work done by John Carleton, the WCRTA Legislative Chair. He and several people working with him, interviewed the candidates who are seeking our votes for those state representative positions. His summary of those interviews presents information about their standing on issues pertaining to our pensions and benefits. Therefore, please educate yourself if you haven’t already, and vote. It is important. Last month we had our yearly welcome breakfast for new retirees, the 2018 group. Many of those retirees and some earlier retirees, who were not members, joined WCRTA members and enjoyed the breakfast served by The Stockholm Inn and the speakers representing the Illinois Retired Teachers Association (IRTA). On October 10th, Fred Kunz and I were present at ceremonies presenting IRTA Foundation Education Grants to four teachers in Winnebago County. One teaches at Harlem Middle School and three teach at Hononegah High School. Congratulations to those teachers. The last membership meeting of the year will be on November 15, 2018. It will feature a presentation by Gary Anderson of Gary W. Anderson Architects. Be sure and read the description of that presentation and the locations involved, which are in this newsletter. Join us for a very interesting presentation. In December, the WCRTA Board will be holding a planning meeting to decide programs and events to be part of our membership meetings during 2019. We could use your suggestions and ideas. Think about it; if you come up with any ideas, e-mail me or call me at n_alpers@yahoo.comor 815-988-0523. We could also use some additional board members! Lastly, we are going to work on the possibility or delivering our newsletters via e-mail to those with e-mail addresses in addition to the traditional mailing. The idea would be to save money on mailing the newsletter and to develop an immediate method of delivering important information to our members. We will be asking for your advice and help in 2019. Thanks for your membership and support. Message from Co-President Fred Kunz, djfk7@aol.com And the winners are!!! The IRTA Foundation received 368 Grant Applications with 74 coming from Area 1 (7 from Winnebago County). Area 1 had 17 winners with 4 from Winnebago County. Our winners are Melissa Angeles, Hononegah HS $420 for titration equipment; Anita Bond, Hononegah HS $286.50 for test-making program; Brian Zimmerman, Hononegah HS $500 for microscopes for students with vision problems; and Chris Noble, Harlem Middle School, $484.11 for a 3D printer for the Makers Club. Visit the IRTA website (irtaonline.org), where you can read a paragraph summary about each project and photo of the presentation. See anyone you know? It is my honor to be Area 1 Delegate-at-Large on the IRTA Foundation. I read almost 300 of the applications in the selection process. At the Foundation meeting October 16, we voted to evaluate the label fundraiser packet since income has been a little less than last year. There is time to donate. Retired teacher assistance program for this year totaled $52,554 and the grants totaled $36,000. Wanted Board members for WCRTA. Suggest some one or volunteer yourself. Call me at 815-398-7927 or e-mail at djfk7@aol.com Plan to join us for the upcoming events: Join us at our November 15 meeting at two museums on Main St. to hear Gary Anderson on Rockford development. We will also remember our fellow teachers who have passed this year. Join us for our December 11 Field Trip to Chicago. There are still seats open. See flyer in this newsletter for more information. Hopefully, several of you can join us for our Board retreat at 11:00 am at Fatt Cat Restaurant, Rockton, on December 6. Come help us plan!!! Legislative Update for October 2018 Dr. John Carleton, Legislative Chair Recently I had the opportunity to attend a “meet & greet” put on by the League of Women Voters at the North Suburban Library. It included all the candidates for County Clerk, Sheriff, and most important to our WCRTA members, the candidates for the 67th, 68th, and 69thlegislative districts. The Legislative Report in the August 2018 WCRTA Newsletter had a detailed report of our visits to the candidates and our recommendations; so I won’t repeat all that information here. I will, however, encourage you to review that report as you get ready to go to the poles. As I reflect on what I heard the other night as the candidates responded to questions addressed to them, it only confirmed for me that those recommendations are in the best interests of WCRTA members. As a summary, you will recall that the WCRTA Board did not make any recommendations for districts 67 and 68 as in the former Maurice West is uncontested and Jake Castanza and John Cabello in the latter both seem supportive of pension issues. In the 69thhowever, Joe Sosnowski, once again, made it clear that he is not a great supporter of public education and would seek to draw resources from them to support private schools. But most important: he is very anti-pension, is a real threat to our pensions, and will work to reduce them even to working to pass an amendment eliminating the protection clause in the Illinois Constitution. The choice is clear here; if you value your pension and health insurance and the pensions and health insurance of future teachers, you need to vote for Angelique Bodine. As I reflect on our efforts to provide you with information about the candidates for November of 2018, it is clear we need to know a few more things about all of you. We are making efforts to identify the senate and legislative districts in which all our members reside as those districts cut across Winnebago County, sometimes in strange ways. We’ll be talking about the best way to do that soon. We also need to set up a way to let you know about such events as the aforementioned LWV Meet & Greet in a timely manner. Be watching future newsletters as to how we can approach this and when you see it, please respond in order that we can have the information we need to keep you informed. And in closing, Vote! As someone reminded everyone at the Meet & Greet, democracy is not a spectator sport. Again, find your polling place and please Vote! Many things may depend upon your vote, and one of them may very well be your health insurance and pension. WCRTA BOARD CLARIFIES PAYMENT OF ANNUAL MEMBERSHIP DUES By Betty Davison The WCRTA Board of Directors at the May 16, 2018, board meeting passed a motion designed to clarify when annual dues paying members must pay dues to continue membership for the next year. WCRTA annual dues are $10.00 per year. The Winnebago County Retired Teachers Association (WCRTA) is the local unit in Winnebago County of the statewide Illinois Retired Teachers Association (IRTA). This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY The WCRTA annual membership year runs from January 1 thru December 31. The first notice asking members to pay the next year’s annual dues will be in the October WCRTA Newsletter. The notice will ask that annual dues for the next year be paid by January 1of the next year. A second notice will be in the WCRTA January Newsletter. A third and final notice in the WCRTA March Newsletter will state, “If you have not yet paid your annual dues for the current year, this is your last notice prior to your membership being deleted on March 31. The March WCRTA Newsletter will be the last newsletter you will receive.” Forms will be available in each of these newsletters to send in along with the payment of dues. These forms will provide an easy opportunity for members to update their contact information such as changes in email address, phone numbers, or home addresses. Please consider paying the annual dues as soon as possible after the October notice in the newsletter. We encourage everyone to continue their membership. The more members we have, the more our unit can accomplish. We need strong representation from all Winnebago County School Districts. Members can check their membership status by reviewing the mailing label of the WCRTA Newsletter. For example, paid membership for 2019 will be indicated on the mailing label by “LA2019”. This stands for Local Annual 2019 membership. This action does not impact WCRTA Life Members who paid $100 for their life membership. It does not impact state IRTA dues. The new procedure is the same as used by the state IRTA for deleting non-paying Annual Members. 2018 retirees who pay their dues in 2018 will be paid up for the 2019 membership year. They will not have to pay again until the 2020 membership year begins on January 1, 2020. MEMBER BENEFITSGayle Haab, Member Benefits Chair Endorsed Benefits OverviewIRTA has two types of member benefits--Endorsed and Informative Benefits. In an effort to improve the quality of benefits available to IRTA members, the IRTA board agreed to endorse products. These products were selected due to superior benefits and competitive premium rates. These products have been heavily negotiated on behalf of retired school educators, and the IRTA board believes that they are the finest available anywhere. Informative benefits are products that are available to IRTA members as a service. Available endorsed benefits include Annuity Policy, CSIdentity protector, Credit Card, Dental and Vision Insurance, Flexible Choice Cancer, Heart Attack & Stroke Policy, Liberty Mutual, Life Line Screening, Life Policy, Long-Term Care, and Medical Air Services Association. Available Informative Benefits include AAA, American Hearing Benefits, Apple Products, Dell Computers, Flower Discounts, Globus Vacations, Hearing Plan Discount Benefit, La Quinta Inn & Suites Discount, MediPendant, myAMBAdining.com, Orlando Employee Discounts, Rental Car Discounts, Road Scholar, Vacations By Rail, and Veterinary Pet Insurance. AMBA 1.800.258.7041 MEMBERSHIP UPDATE By Georgia Sullons, gsullons@aol.com, 815.988.4093 Thank you for joining WCRTA. We are now 507 members strong, but many retirees have not joined. I urge you to renew or join IRTA if you have not already done so. Snowbirds: Please enjoy your time in the sunny South, but please send me your winter address and dates so that WCRTA will not have to pay return postage for newsletters while you’re away. CURRENT MEMBERSHIP STATUS Check the mailing label on this newsletter to determine current status of your membership on record for both the state IRTA organization and our local unit, the Winnebago County Retired Teachers Association (WCRTA). The symbols on the mailing labels stand for: LA2017means Local Annual Membership in WCRTA for the year 2017 has been paid LLmeans Local Life Membership in WCRTA Free, 2017means free Membership for the year 2017 in WCRTA DDmeans dues deduct membership in the State IRTA SA2017means State Annual membership in IRTA for the year 2017 has been paid SLmeans State Life Membership in IRTA WINNEBAGO Local UNIT (WCRTA) NEWSLETTER WINNEBAGO UNIT #6 OF IRTA Editor: Sharon Vinson Printing made possible by an agreement with Dr. Lori Fanello at the Winnebago-Boone Regional Office of Education WINNEBAGO COUNTY Non-Profit Org. RETIRED TEACHERS ASSOCIATION U.S. POSTAGE c/o Sharon Vinson, Co-Editor P A I D 11966 Tresemer Road Permit #4466 Roscoe, IL 61073-7708 Rockford, IL Return Service Requested Form to pay WCRTA Annual $10.00 Dues Please mail this form and your check to our treasurer: Dorothy Schoonover, 4143 Catalpa Woods Drive, Rockford, IL 61101 Last Name_____________________________First________________________Initial_____ Address _______________________________City_________________________ State_______________Zip___________ Retirement year ________ Phone:__________________________Cell____________________ E-mail______________________________ School building retired from:________________________________ Are you a member of IRTA? Yes or No IL Legislative District Number _____ IL Senate District Number _ |
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