Mr. Gaddi H. Vasquez

Director

United States Peace Corps

The Paul D. Coverdell Peace Corps Headquarters
1111 20th Street NW
Washington, D.C. 20526

Dear Mr. Vasquez,                                                                                                                                                        February 21, 2002

                                               

We began 2001with a completely updated and significantly pared down CAPCA membership list.  This had been a focus of our efforts in 2000, when it came to our attention that our database contained some inaccuracies and a number of lapsed members.  At the start of 2001, we were down to fewer than 200 paid current members, almost half the number of members previously in our database.  We sent out a call to everyone on our mailing list asking them to renew their membership and update their records.  This effort, combined with NPCA’s membership development efforts, allowed us to rebuild our membership list to 388 by the end of 2001.  This figure includes both CAPCA-only and joint NPCA/CAPCA members.

 

CAPCA continued its long-standing tradition of hosting monthly dinner meetings at ethnic restaurants in a variety of Chicago’s neighborhoods and nearby suburbs.  Many of our monthly dinners featured a guest speaker, who gave a presentation on a topic of interest to RPCVs.  Our January monthly dinner meeting at Reza’s Persian restaurant to hear Michael Diamond, Executive Director of Global Chicago, speak about this new local initiative, whose mission is to unite all of Chicago’s global citizens to ensure Chicago’s status as a global city.  He expressed admiration for the international experiences and connections that RPCVs bring to the city.  In February, CAPCA ventured to Udupi Palace, where we enjoyed pure vegetarian South Indian cuisine.  The March dinner at Siam Pasta was scheduled to feature Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas and drew a large crowd.  One of his deputies came in his place and talked about teaching opportunities for RPCVs. Greek cuisine drew a crowd to our April dinner meeting at Papaspiros in Oak Park.  RPCV Doug Kenshol, President and CEO of the Urban Enterprise Fund, a non-profit organization that helps to create employment opportunities for hard-to-serve communities, was our speaker.  We did not have a May dinner since Founder’s Day was on June 2nd.

 

Planning for our annual Founder’s Day fundraiser took place from January to June.  This year’s event, coordinated by board members Nancy Kramer and Ben Peeters, was held on Saturday, June 2, 2001 at Maggiano’s, a popular Italian restaurant, and was a huge success.  The 100 people who attended enjoyed a delicious family-style dinner, world music, dancing, a silent auction, raffle and an exciting program, which featured Patrick Murphy, Cook County Public Guardian and returned Peace Corps Volunteer who had served in Somalia in the mid-1960s as our keynote speaker.  We also presented John Zeigler, leader of the Youth Guidance Connections program at Harper High School in the West Englewood neighborhood, with the Loret Miller Ruppe award CAPCA had won in 2000 for its successful partnership with Connections. Founder’s Day is an occasion at which we honor the founding and tradition of Peace Corps and raise funds to support CAPCA’s programs.  This year we raised nearly $5,000, significantly more than in years past due largely to the lower expenses at a restaurant versus a catered meal at a non-restaurant venue.  Proceeds from Founder’s Day 2001 enabled us to cover the cost of one student at $2,500 for the Connections trip to Africa, send a total of $2,500 to a Peace Corps Partnership Project in Morocco, the Ammeln Valley Women’s Training Center, which would provide women and girls in the five area villages with reading skills, job training and income generating activities and $500 to another Peace Corps Partnership Project in the Dominican Republic, the Los Miche School Construction project, which go toward two new classrooms for a three-room primary school serving 200 students.

 

In July, CAPCA hosted its monthly dinner at one of CAPCA’s favorite restaurants, La Creperie, which features a delightful outdoor garden seating area and is located in a popular part of the city.  Moldova RPCV Mark Sheehy entertained us with his singing and guitar playing. The August monthly dinner meeting featuring Eileen Mackevich, President and Executive Producer of the Chicago Humanities Festival, as guest speaker was at Jaipur Palace, a popular Indian restaurant.  Annual CAPCA board member elections took place at the September dinner at Ina’s.  CAPCA’s October dinner is now officially with the Oak Park Council on International Affairs at their Annual Peace Corps Partnership Fundraising Dinner.  On this, their 38th year, they were recognized by Peace Corps for their long-standing commitment of supporting Peace Corps volunteers in the field with over 250 Partnership projects funded so far.  They lead the nation in this regard. November’s dinner meeting was held at the Ethiopian Diamond Restaurant.  Our guest speaker was Mawi Asgedom, speaker, author and consultant.  He had recently appeared on Oprah to talk about his first book, a memoire entitled Of Beetles and Angels, which chronicles Mawi’s life as a survivor of a refugee camp in the Sudan and his arrival and coming of age in America.  Finally, we gathered in December for our annual holiday potluck at the Corinthian Yacht Club, which drew a record crowd of nearly 100 this year.  A great time was had by all!

 

In addition to the monthly dinner meetings, volunteer projects represent an integral part of CAPCA’s activity calendar.  We started the year with a volunteer opportunity with the Chicago Cares Celebration of Service on Saturday, January 13th, in honor of Martin Luther King Day.  This activity was coordinated by board member Trina Janes.  Another round of volunteer opportunities took place in May.  Board member Kara Malenfant organized a team of CAPCA volunteers, who participated in the Friends of the Chicago River “River Rescue Day”.  Another group spent an evening collecting food from the National Restaurant Association trade show at McCormick Place for the Greater Chicago Food Depository, which was coordinated by CAPCA President Leslie Wilson and Secretary Marie Erdman.  In honor of Peace Corps 40th Anniversary, Trina Janes organized another CAPCA volunteer opportunity in June as part of the Chicago Cares Annual Serve-a-Thon.  It was our goal to have 40 volunteers, but we fell a bit short of that figure.  The CAPCA team was made up of CAPCA members and several students from the Connections program at Harper High School, which CAPCA supports.  Everyone who participated had a great time.  In December, member Hannah Leiterman coordinated a CAPCA volunteer night at the Greater Chicago Food Depository.  These were the major group volunteer activities of the year.

 

The CAPCA-affiliated “Culture Shocks” softball team had a very successful year.  The team included RPCVs from Mali, Mauritania, the Gambia, Kenya, Russia and their friends.  The summer season began with spring training in March and concluded with a.500 record.  They made it through the first round of playoffs, but lost in the second.  The fall season took the team to the semi-finals, where they fell 28-19.

 

Other activities this year included the bi-annual winter and summer Camp Vista weekends in Dundee, Wisconsin.  These events are coordinated by CAPCA member Brian DeFilippo and several others and are always well attended by CAPCA members, family and friends.  Also, Bulgaria RPCV Paul Swider, founder of Greenstar, an organization that provides “solar-powered, web-enabled, e-commerce-funded remote village development” in Ghana and a few other countries, came to Chicago to talk with CAPCA members in August about this interesting approach to community development. Several CAPCA members planned to attend the Peace Corps 40th Anniversary Celebration and NPCA Conference in Washington in September, but were unable to due to the tragic events of September 11th.  Many will attend the rescheduled 40+ 1 celebration and conference in June 2002.

 

In addition to the Peace Corps Partnership Projects and Connections program CAPCA funds with Founder’s Day proceeds, a number of other funding requests came from members.  Board member Chuck Sheftel asked for funds to help with earthquake relief efforts in India.  CAPCA responded with a $500 contribution to the Indian Development and Relief Fund.  The board also approved a $500 donation to Save the Children’s earthquake response in El Salvador. Stephanie Arnold asked the board to match the $380 she had already raised for her participation in a Habitat for Humanity Global Village project in Cartago, Costa Rica in May.  Finally, Kara Malenfant requested $200 to purchase library books for the Inform the World Program in South Africa/Zimbabwe in conjunction with her trip in July organized by the World Library Partnership.  In order to support such projects, CAPCA has a number of other fundraisers throughout the year, which bring in several thousand dollars combined.  These include 50/50 raffles at the monthly dinners, calendar sales (those produced by the RPCVs of Wisconsin/Madison) and the sale of hand-painted Nepali notecards from a Save the Children-affiliated project.  Also, for the first time, CAPCA participated in the Very Merry Bazaar sponsored by the Newberry Libarary in November, selling high quality arts and crafts items contributed by RPCVs (from which CAPCA received a percentage) in addition to CAPCA’s calendars and notecards.

 

We experienced some turnover in CAPCA’s Board of Directors, but were fortunate to retain a majority of our very committed team.  In January, Newsletter Editor Hannah Leiterman resigned and was replaced by Melissa Hall in March.  At that time, the board proposed that the newsletter be published once every two months rather than monthly to save costs and reduce the workload of the Newsletter Editor, and this was approved unanimously.  We decided that postcards could be sent out when necessary to supplement the newsletter and inform members of upcoming events.  CAPCA’s listserv also became an increasing means of communication with members, and Kara Malenfant, Greg Nessinger and Juliann Salinas helped to keep our website www.capca.org up to date.  Alissa Stauss joined CAPCA’s board in February, replacing Mirium Hussain, but had to resign a few months later when she moved away to attend graduate school.  Immediate Past President Maxine Gere stepped down from the board in August after many years of dedicated service.  Annual board member elections were held in September and Wallace Goode, Trina Janes, Chuck Sheftel, Ben Peeters and David Pope were all elected or re-elected to two-year terms.  At the October board meeting, Stephanie Arnold was unanimously elected President for the coming year, and Leslie Wilson became the Immediate Past President.  Earlier in the year, the board nominated Wilson as their candidate for the Great Lakes Regional Representative seat on the National Peace Corps Association Board of Directors and she was successful in her bid for the position. Arnold, in turn, recommended that Wallace Goode and Marie Erdman remain in their roles of Vice President and Secretary, respectively, and the board agreed.  Kara Malenfant was elected Treasurer and Database Manager, the position Arnold had held for the previous three years.  At a subsequent meeting, Stephanie Arnold appointed Rachael Sharon (RPCV Russia Far East) and Stephen Maduli-Williams (RPCV Zimbabwe) to 1-year terms on the board, which was approved by the rest of the board.  In order to ensure that CAPCA remains active in its core areas, Arnold suggested that each board member not currently in an officer role take on a particular area of responsibility.  Melissa Hall is Newsletter Editor, Trina Janes is 2004 NPCA Conference Exploratory Committee Chair, Nancy Kramer is Special Events Coordinator, Stephen Maduli-Williams is Membership Development Coordinator, Greg Nessinger and Juliann Salinas make up the Web Site Team, Ben Peeters is Product Marketing Coordinator, David Pope is responsible for Education and Third Goal Activities, Liz Thomas is Liaison to the Regional Peace Corps Recruiting Office, Chuck Sheftel and Beth Versten are Grants Co-Coordinators, and Leslie Wilson is Immediate Past President and Liaison to the NPCA. The board proposed a few by-law amendments at the end of the year to be voted on by membership at the January 2002 dinner meeting.  The amendments were primarily intended to make it easier for the board to find highly qualified people to serve in certain capacities.

 

All in all it was another very active and successful year for CAPCA.  We look forward to 2002 and will continue to look for new ways to serve our membership and fulfill the Third Goal of Peace Corps.