Rotary's New Leadership - 2022-2023

Posted on Jul 12, 2022
Our New Leadership 2022-2023
 
 
About our New Leaders
Jennifer Jones
 
Jennifer E. Jones (1967- ) is a Canadian communications executive. She is president of Rotary International for 2022-23, the first woman to be selected in the 117-year history of the organization.
Jones had previously served as Rotary International vice president, director, training leader, committee chair, moderator and district governor. She said one of her goals as Rotary International president is to have double-digit growth in the number of female Rotarians and Rotarians under the age of 40.
Jones also said she is extremely proud of the work Rotary has done in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, providing $29.7 million to help local clubs respond.
Jones is the founder and president of Media Street Productions in Windsor, Ontario. She expects to leave daily operations of that company in the hands of Media Street CEO Kelly Blais while she and her husband, Nick Krayacich, live near the Rotary International headquarters in Evanston, Illinois. 
Jones is a member of the Rotary Club of Windsor-Roseland.
 
5180 District Governor Karen Cendro
 
Karen Cendro had her Rotary moment before she became a Rotarian. Husband Mike had been a Rotarian for about ten years and was President Elect of his Rotary club. This meant attending the RI Conference in Bangkok. During the trip, they had the opportunity to participate in a water project in a small Cambodian village. That day changed how Karen saw the world. She was inspired by the cultural differences and comforted by the things in life that are consistent across cultures. The young children of the village were riding bicycles with straws in the spokes just like we did with baseball cards back in the day. Upon returning home, Karen immediately joined Rotary.
 
Passionate about working with youth, the Rotary Youth Exchange program felt right. She served as the Youth Services Chair for her club and the RYE District Outbound Coordinator. Karen and family have hosted students from Japan, Italy, Bolivia, Brazil and Peru. Karen served as President of the Rotary Club of Laguna Sunrise in 2018-19. During her term, the club focused on at risk youth. Thinking out of the box, the club created a community based Interact club at their local Teen Center.
 
Karen and her family live in Elk Grove, California where they enjoy cooking, gardening, golf, and friends. Karen and Mike’s son, Kevin, a RYLA alum, will graduate from Regis University in Denver, Colorado in the Spring of 2021. Mike and Karen continue to operate their janitorial franchising business and of course remain passionate Rotarians.
 
President Richard Olebe:
 
Richard’s parents were farmers in Uganda, where he was born in 1945. He had five brothers and six sisters. He was smart enough to qualify to attend boarding schools in Uganda before going to the University of Nairobi in Kenya. He met his wife, Margaret, while she was teaching as a Peace Corp volunteer in Uganda. They were married in Nairobi and his two sons were born in Nairobi – it worked out that they have been married 49 years. He moved to the U.S. and went to graduate school at Stanford University. He earned a master’s degree in engineering and worked for six years for a construction company in Minneapolis where he was a Project Engineer on a tunnel project in North Dakota. Then he owned a construction company for 10 years in Sacramento. His company-built levees, roads and bridges. Moving on, he worked for the California Department of Water Resources for 22 years building concrete and earthen dams. He retired in 2014. He joined Rotary in 2016, after having been brought to Rotary by his neighbor, Dick Bauer.
What Richard was too modest to say is that he pioneered one of the greatest projects that Carmichael Rotary has ever accomplished (from 2017-2019), building water wells to provide clean water for 10,000 people in his old neighborhood in Uganda. He worked tirelessly getting funds from other Clubs and with his Club’s help obtained over $200,000 to finish the project ($50,000 from District 5180 Clubs, and matching grants from District 5180 and Rotary International –to  make up the $200,000. He is now president of our Club and a real superhero!