PORT ANGELES — About 420 Rotarians flooded Port Angeles this weekend, exploring the downtown and giving a bump in business to some of the storefronts.
In addition to packing the Red Lion Hotel, some of the delegates to the Rotary District 5020 conference stayed in private homes.
“This exceeded our expectations,” said Steve Methner, president of the Port Angeles Rotary.
“Although the [recent good] weather may have encouraged some to go ahead and make the trip, most of the group had [already] registered, so they planned to come.”
The conference had been held in Victoria for the past 10 years, said general chairman Chris Koenig, a member and past president of the Port Angeles Rotary Club.
Both Methner and Koenig said Port Angeles had offered a welcoming place — and weather — for the conference.
Nelson Allen of Nanaimo, British Columbia, said he had taken some time throughout the weekend to explore the downtown.
“I am the type of person who really enjoys history of the place,” he said.
“I’m absolutely fascinated by the way that the town seems really focused on revitalizing itself.”
Glenn Clark of the Daybreak Rotary in Campbell River, British Columbia, said he, too, had enjoyed his stay.
“We’ll for sure be back on holiday sometime,” he said.
Local shops enjoyed good business.
Kim Powers, cook at Rick’s Place Restaurant, said it had been hopping all weekend.
“Breakfast especially was pretty busy, and it is really nice because it is February — need I say more?” she said.
“But it has kept us busy just like the basketball tournament a couple weeks ago.”
Barista Marie Haller at the Itty Bitty Buzz said mornings especially had been busy.
“People definitely needed their caffeine boost before the meetings started,” she said.
“The weekend was much busier than it usually is.”
Restaurants Thai Peppers and India Oven — right across Lincoln Street from the Red Lion Hotel — also were busy.
Rotary District 5020 — one of the largest in 1.2-million-member Rotary International — is made up of 81 clubs stretching from Port Hardy, British Columbia, to Longview-Kelso in Southwest Washington and includes the population center of Tacoma.
Seven of those clubs are on the North Olympic Peninsula.
Each of the 81 clubs has officers and directors responsible for club, community, world and vocational service efforts in their towns, as well as secretary and treasurer functions.
This weekend’s training assembly was designed to brief and motivate them toward those responsibilities in advance of the July 1 start of their terms.
John Blount of Sebastopol, Calif., a member of the board of Evansville, Ill.-based Rotary International and veteran Rotary trainer and motivational speaker, was the keynote speaker, wrapping up the event on Sunday.
“It was very moving,” Methner said.
“You would be hard-pressed not to be emotional listening to him talk.”
District Governor-elect Bob Martin said the conference was just as he envisioned.
Martin, of Gig Harbor, was responsible for the move to Port Angeles.
“With the Canadian currency being just about equal, it just made sense to have it here,” he said.
“And this is a perfect halfway point for the Canadians to easily access as well as those who are coming up from the Columbia River area.”
He said the idea of the conference was to give new officers a chance to learn about the international efforts of Rotary.
He said he had attended the same conference in Port Angeles in 1994 — when 150 people attended.
“Those 150 were almost more than we could handle then, but that was when we were holding it in a much smaller venue,” he said.
In addition to Rotary’s well-known efforts to eradicate polio throughout the world, the conferees also heard about the ShelterBox and other international programs.
The ShelterBox program provides tents and survival kits for victims of disasters worldwide, most recently earthquake-stricken Haiti.