Appropriately, the first Rotary Wheel of the Week for July 6, 2016 is……..JULI SMITH! Juli is the President of McKinney Sunrise Rotary Club for this coming year. She also served as the President-Elect this past year and was in charge of inviting community members to present a program. In previous years she served as the Club Secretary. Juli was inducted in the McKinney Sunrise Rotary Club ten years ago, and this human dynamo works to make all our programs successful! Juli has been one of the driving forces with all three McKinney Rotary Clubs to plan the All-Abilities Playground at Bonnie Wenk Park and the establishment of the McKinney Sunrise Rotary Foundation, a 501 (c ) 3 organization to receive charitable funds. After one year, almost three-fifths of the needed funding of over $500,000 has been raised.
Juli is also on the Flag Committee and receives the flag orders and payments by check to enter in the flag database. Since McKinney Sunrise Rotary Club has over 2,000 flags, this is no small feat to manage the database so that it is correct. (Subscribers get upset if they are missed because they were not entered properly in the database!)
Juli is married to Floyd Smith who is retired. She has three children: Larry, Paul and Jolene all of whom are grown and have families of their own. Juli attended the University of California at San Jose and majored in English, and the University of North Texas, majoring in Gerontology, where she was awarded a Bachelor of Arts degree. She worked in Marketing for 30 years at Overhead Door Corporation/Bozel and Jacobs and Monster Company. Now retired, she worked for 10 years for the Collin County Committee on Aging.
Few people know that Juli played competitive sports in high school before Title IX made it mandatory to include girls who excelled in sports. She was the editor of her high school journalism paper that won recognition as #1 in the state of California. Juli and her husband love to travel and have been to England, Scotland, France, China, Italy, the Caribbean islands, and Mexico. If she had one day to herself, she would probably read a good book, not answer the phone, or go on the computer! Good advice!
Congratulations, Juli! Wishing you a great year as the President of McKinney Sunrise Rotary Club!