Wednesday, March 4, 2026
Guest: Eric Axelrod from Wood4good
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Liz Marino presiding.
Birthday: Larry Jones. who is not present
Rotary Anniversary - none
Announcements:
Eric Denu spoke about the District Conference which will be held in Magog, Quebec. Eric also said we should think about attending the Sherbrooke Wine and Cheese Festival, which is a wonderful fund-raising event, and will be held on May 2nd this year.
Happy dollars.
Tim and Rebecca were late this morning.
Tim and T did not have name tags. I said he needs a new name tag, Eric announced that the club is getting new name tags for everyone soon.
Rebecca was happy for the help she had in filling and distributing spring vacation food bags.
Elise gave an update on Max.
Jason apologized for not sending the email he had promised. It will go out this week.
Michael is happy to have more snow.
Bill is happy that his former commander is the new head of the Vermont National Guard.
T is happy that 46 years ago he, Neil and Buster Brush all joined Rotary.
Eric noted that he did not get the plaid shirt memo this morning.
Nancy and Ellie both paid fines for the articles that featured them in the Addison Independent.
Liz introduced our speaker who was Eric Axelrod, the founder of Wood4Good.
Eric had an excellent presentation which he started by explaining the start of his non-profit organization. In 2019 his yard had more wood than he needed for himself for the upcoming winter. He wanted to teach his kids about community and the value of helping others in need.
They distributed the extra wood to people who did not have enough to stay warm for the entire winter. The project sky rocked after that.
He had some good photos of the people who have helped, which included teenagers as well as adults.
He talked about the growth in this organization since then.
Some of the points he made include that about 50% of Vermonters use wood for at least some portion of their heat, wood is overlooked by other aid programs that help pay for fuel for heating homes, and about 1/2 of the people who use wood are elderly.
They have expanded a lot in the years since they started. They attend Farmers' Markets to get support, and much of their wood comes from tree services. They need to have free wood to make this program work. They have been able to purchase equipment to make this a much more efficient process.
Last year they were able to distribute 250 cords of wood. Each family gets about 1.3 cords of wood. There is much more need in this state than there is supply.
He then talked about the plans for expansion of this program to other parts of the state--they are now primarily in Chittenden and Grand Isle Counties. They are looking for new sites in other parts of the state. They are working with the Vermont Land Trust to increase their supply of wood.
He has had excellent support from other Rotary Clubs in Vermont and is looking for even more support. There have been over 200 volunteers, but he is now hiring a couple people to help run this organization. He is also trying to start giving away at least one new wood stove every year, since many of the homes they supply wood to have old inefficient stoves. The need is great for a program like this!
Cow Tag: No winner this week