Dick Breckon

Dick Breckon, a representative from the POA Governmental Affairs Committee spoke to the membership about the dealings of the committee with various city, county, state, and federal agencies. The Committee is especially involved with the two Quorum Courts that have jurisdiction within the Village, as well as the agencies, both county, state, and federal, that deal with water, roads, disaster relief, environment, and other projects that come up that affect the Village but are not overseen by the Village POA.

L to R, Wayne Kapple, Marvin Young, Bill Hurley and Bill Janser.

On Saturday morning, October 15, 20 members of the Sacred Heart Men's Club, led by Ray Ambrozich, met at the El Acapulco parking lot to pick up trash along Highway 7.  They cleaned up approximately one mile of the highway located south of the Village West Gate entrance.  The great turnout allowed the members to finish in less than an hour. Fifteen bags of trash were gathered.  The Men's Club does this service project twice yearly.

Tim Keating, (left) past Men's Club President receiving past president's plaque from current Men's Club President, Bill Patterson.

Bill Patterson (right), President of Sacred Heart Men’s Club, and Buddy Dixon (left), Program Chairman, welcome John Paul to the club’s October meeting.

On October 11^th members of the Men’s Club at Sacred Heart of Jesus Catholic Church gathered for a dinner meeting. They were joined by John Paul, Director of Golf for Hot Springs Village. Following dinner, Mr. Paul updated the members on the status of golf in the Village. He explained that the spring tornado and extremely hot summer had taken a toll on the Village courses. Coronado, Balboa and Ponce were particularly hard hit. At present, he reported that 95% of the tornado clean up has been completed thanks to lots of hard work and also partly to an insurance policy taken out a year ago that has paid over $300,000 in reimbursements for work completed. During his talk John mentioned the newly implemented E blast email system that the POA is now using to inform residents about activities in the Village. Of interest to golfers, there are golfing specials now being offered such as a two for one special at DeSoto on a Sunday afternoon.
 

John spent time reviewing the discussions underway on changing the course greens from Bent Grass to Bermuda Grass. Hot Springs Village is in the “transition zone” from a weather standpoint which makes this a difficult issue. There is no perfect solution, just a series of pluses and minuses depending on which way you go. At this point no decision has been made and John emphasized that any change will be made slowly and only following careful evaluation and trials.
 

After briefly outlining the plans for renovations and improvements projects during the coming year John took questions from the audience. Bill Patterson, President of the Men’s Club, thanked John for his presentation and for taking time to stay and answer the member’s questions.

Father Bill Elser is busy serving some of his home made ice cream assisted by students from the religious education program.

Student Hazel Bonilla takes an order from Bill Patterson, Men’s Club President, and his wife Diane.

On Friday, September 30^th, the Men’s Club of Sacred Heart Catholic Church held their annual fall Chicken Bake.  This is one of two major fund raising events that the Men’s Club conducts each year.  They also have a spring Fish Bake during Lent.  The monies raised at these events will go to the various charities that the club actively supports.  This includes Jackson House, the Boys & Girls Club, Mission Outreach as well as others.

Members of the Men’s Club prepare the dinner and also serve as waiters.  Over 400 guests enjoyed a baked chicken dinner with salad, bread, potato, vegetable and coffee.  Father Bill Elser, Pastor of Sacred Heart, made several flavors of ice cream that were sold and served by youngsters from the religious education program to raise money for the program.  Bill Patterson, President of the Men’s Club, said following the event that the club had exceeded their goal and was very pleased with the success of this year’s Chicken Bake.  The Sacred Heart Men’s Club is open to men of Sacred Heart parish and spouses of Sacred Heart parishioners.