Newsletters
February 2023 Newsletter
We have a new newsletter editor. He has his own format and left space for a President Column.
The featured speaker for the February 1, 2023 meeting was Helena Morgan, Dementia Education Specialist with Hospice of the Valley. Helena gave a very thorough and informative presentation on Dementia. There were 22 attendees who asked many questions. An important take away from the meeting is to walk 30 minutes every day.
The March Club meeting presentation will feature the Arizona Military Museum one of the best kept secrets in the Valley situated at National Guard at Papago Buttes. Presenter will be Joe Abodeely, member of the Board of Directors for the Museum.
Joe will offer background and displays at the Museum as well as comments about the Vietnam War-origins, international and domestic politics, polarizing effects of media, education, antiwar groups, communistic propaganda, and U.S. military successes.
January 2023 Newsletter
Happy new year, club members!
A handful of important announcements for you:
- Scholarship applications submitted on our website and the deadline is April 1, 2023
- Our February meeting topic is “What is Dementia Anyway”.
- The newsletter has a questionnaire for the upcoming April Spring picnic. Please respond to help plan our spring event!
Our First 2023 meeting was on Jan 4 at Scottsdale Granite Reef Senior Center
Our guest speaker was Gary Snyder, AARP. Topic was Fraud and Identity Theft. Gary reviewed common scams, tactics used by Con Artists and prevention strategies. He listed two AARP guidance sources you can trust, and are free of judgment.
AARP Fraud Watch Network Helpline: 877-908-3360
Toll-free service available Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. ET
Gary usually has handout pamphlets but AARP is updating them. He will mail them to us when they become available and we will have them at future meetings. There were 18 attendees.
Important Membership DUES announcement
Several months ago, the Board decided to terminate memberships for those dues who are 2 or more years delinquent. If your dues letter showed that you owe $35 or more, you are in this category. This is the last notice. After February 15 if you are still $35 delinquent you will no longer be a member of the CLUB. Please become current and enjoy the Club including the scholarship benefit for your descendants.
Currently there are approximate 100 members owing $35 or more.
December 2022 Newsletter
Our Dec 7 Holiday Charity Luncheon was held at the Scottsdale Plaza Resort.
Diane Bennett, our event director, did her usual outstanding job. The lunch entrees including salad and desert were excellent. Room decorations, prizes, centerpieces were all done by Diane. 31 Club members enjoyed the Luncheon.
In addition to the room and meal, Diane also does our traditional donations to two local families each with three children. Diane gets our families from Vista Del Camino, a Scottsdale City authorized agency. They supply the families after vetting them and we ask for two families with three children each. We never know the families name, only the children’s first names. They never know our name either. We and they are identified only by our assigned numbers.
The children give us their “Wish Lists” and we try to fill as much as we can with our allotted monies, $100 per child. Normally, we get by with less than the allotted amount and then we then add a gift certificate for the family to buy food for their Christmas dinner. The family also gives us the child’s clothes needs and sizes allowing us to purchase clothes for them.
The monies ($600) for this comes for our dues.
Again great job Diane for all you do for our December Holiday Charity Luncheon.
Garrett Employee $5000 Funeral Benefit
The Garrett Corp provided a sum of money to cover funeral expenses of Garrett employees upon their death. The benefit is still available.
- The amount of money is $5000
- The benefit is recognized within the Honeywell system as a “death benefit”. When contacting Honeywell that term should be used, along with mention of the sum of $5000.
- To request the benefit, call 1-877-258-3699. This is the number contained in the November 21, 2022 letter and recent postcard sent to participants.
- Press a phone key for option 5 to start the process.
Now Accepting Scholarship Applications!
The 2022-2023 club scholarship application is open, applications are now accepted via our website. All donations go to descendants of our members, and are tax deductible. Good luck to our 2023 applicants!
November 2022 Newsletter
Our Nov 2 meeting was on Fundamentals of Estate Planning presented by Attorney Megan Selvey. Megan specializes in Elder Law & Long-term Care Planning.
Common goals of estate planning include:
- Assets delivered to correct individuals or entities
- Tax efficient outcomes
- Incapacity planning – with increasing life expectancy, this has become a big item today
- Asset preservation planning
- Fundamental documents that everyone older than 18 should have include:
- Powers of Attorney for Health care, Mental health, Financial
- Living Will
- HIPPA Medical Release
- Revocable Trust (probate avoidance)
- Last Will & Testament
- Deeds for real property
Megan gave out copies of her 21 slides plus a checklist of basic estate planning and a list of 10 common estate planning mistakes. Megan recommended that once you have a plan in place it should be periodically reviewed particularly:
- It was created prior to 2009 due to major law changes
- It has been more than 3 years since last review
- You have economic or personal changes in circumstance
- Your beneficiaries have had personal changes in circumstance
- Your named decision-makers have had personal changes in circumstance
- You have documents created in another state
The presentation was very informative and well received with many questions from members.
Big thanks to Scholarship donners – Since we obtained IRS 501(c)(3) status, scholarship donations have increased. All dues and donations are tax deductible. In future newsletters we will list donors, names only. Also, we are following IRS rules about who receives written receipts. Donations of $250 or more are the only ones which require a written receipt. Our Treasurer is grateful since he is he receipt writer and mailer.
October 2022 Newsletter
Happy fall, club members! Please find our October announcements below:
Club members –Our first meeting was Oct 5
Guest speaker was Mike Madsen, President and CEO of Honeywell Aerospace. His presentation was upbeat and very positive for the future of Honeywell Aerospace. Below are some of his comments.
The trend for APUs and other aircraft accessories is from bleed air systems to electric systems. No bleed port on the APU but a megawatt 800-volt generator on the APU. All electric increases efficiency, 800 volts reduces the size of the wire connecting the accessories.
Mike was asked how he viewed the company now as opposed to when he first began as a performance engineer at Allied Signal in the 80’s. He described how the company was operating then, when many employees from Garrett and Allied Signal knew a majority of people from other departments within the company that had 5,000 people at times. Things functioned much differently then, as we all know remember well.
Today, the work environment is so much different. There are many smart people coming together throughout the world. He was just recently in India, and it was quite clear how global everything has become there and now mostly everywhere in the aerospace industry. Employees are communicating and functioning in various capacities throughout the world.
After some financial charts, Mike commented the No. 1 money maker is the Turbofan 731 engine. We are still making them (Huge amount of applause from the audience).
Big thanks to Scholarship donors
Since we obtained IRS 501(c)(3) status, scholarship donations have increased. All dues and donations are tax deductible. In future newsletters we will list donors, names only. Also, we will follow IRS rules about who receives written receipts. Donations of $250 or more are the only ones which require a written receipt. Our Treasurer is grateful since he is he receipt writer and mailer.
Upcoming Meetings
November 2 meeting will feature Stephanie Bevins. She is an attorney with more than 25 years of elder law, special needs and estate planning experience. She will speak about issues concerning people in our age group. The meeting will be held in room 8.
December 7 Our first social event will be our traditional Holiday Charity Luncheon. Event. Director Dianne Bennett is putting together a special luncheon like she has in all past years. The Holiday Charity Luncheon we enjoyed at last year’s function at the Plaza Resort Hotel will be repeating again this year. Prepare yourselves for a wonderful meal. Tickets will be on sale by the first of November for December 7th 2022. See you there!
September 2022 Newsletter
Club Members, we hope you are all staying cool and enjoying the summer!
A few important annoucements:
Upcoming Meeting on October 5.
Guest speaker is Mike Madsen, President and CEO of Honeywell Aerospace. He will be presenting the state of Honeywell Aerospace. The meeting will be held in Scottsdale Granite Reef Senior Center room 8 starting at 1:00 p.m.
Family Day at Honeywell Engines on November 5.
All Club members are invited to attend. Those who would like to be volunteers on Engine history and Club info will get a t-shirt. Club volunteers would be in the Cliff Garrett conference room to explain company history. The Cub would have a table to promote the Club to those who may be retiring in the near future. Members please volunteer. We have close to 500 members and if we all volunteer Honeywell Engines would have to provide a lot of t-shirts. Mark Steele has the lead on this event. If you plan on attending or being a volunteer, you please let Mark know by Oct 14.
Club Dues on November 15
We now have a due date, Nov 15 and a late fee of $5 to encourage prompt payments. Our Treasurer has to manage bank deposits to avoid excess bank deposit fees.
Year 2019 and earlier dues were $15 each year, 2020 and 2021 were $5 each year since we were not having live meetings, 2022 and forward we are back to $15 per year since we having live meetings and the Scottsdale Senior Center is charging us rent for the room and audio video equipment.
Our members are consistently generous. This season one member donated $1265.00. This is the largest single donation ever in the history of the Club. We hope to receive a $500 and a $250 from 2 other members. This year all donations go to our Club member descendants.
August 2022 Newsletter
Club Members, we hope all of you are having a wonderful summer. Soon it will start cooling off and we will have our first meeting October 5.
Big news – This summer Honeywell-Garrett Retirees Club became a nonprofit corporation. We were a nonprofit association. We also expect to obtain IRS 501(c)(3) status shortly. That means both dues and donations are tax-deductible and 100% of your donations will go for scholarship assistance to Honeywell-Garrett Retirees Club descendants. This is great.
Dues – Prior to the Oct 5 meeting, you will be receiving via paper mail Club Dues Notice. As mentioned in the May newsletter we had to raise Dues to $15. The prime reason is we are back to having live meetings and the Scottsdale Senior Center is charging us rent for the room and audio video equipment. The Dues Notice will show if you are delinquent or paid in advance.
May 2022 Newsletter
Our May 4 2022 Meeting was held at the Scottsdale Senior Center, room 8. There were 21 attendees. Club members present voted on two items. The revised Operating Guidelines were unanimously approved. The second item was election of our four elected officers. Club members present voted unanimously for Dolf Strom President, Ken Krieger Vice President, Recording Secretary Mark Steele and Treasurer Jim Brink.
Our featured speaker was Katherine Gudgel, Gudgel Professional Services, (https://gudgelprofessionalservices.com). The subject was Scams we need to be aware of. Our vice president Ken thanked Katie for the very fine presentation. There was a lot of very good information in the material presented and one of the most important was “slow down”. Do not rush if you get called by a scammer. Legitimate inquiries are most likely to correspond via mail, not phone calls or email. Very basic, but usually overlooked at the moment.
Further news include an increase in dues this fall, a big change to the Scholarship Foundation, and the announcement of our next meeting this October 5, 2022.
April 2022 Newsletter
Our next club meeting is on May 4 with guest speaker Katherine Gudgel discussing “Scams we need to be aware of”. This is a very important topic for all of retirees. This meeting will be held in the Senior Center Room 8. The room opens at 1 p.m. and the presentation starts at 2 p.m. We hope to see you there!
Also, at the May 4 meeting, club members will be voting for approval of the revised Operating Guideline’s. Emails were sent out to all members with email addresses. For those members without email there will be paper copies available for review.
March 2022 Newsletter
Upcoming Club Meeting on April 6 – Bob Buddecke, Vice President of Integrated Supply Chain for Honeywell Aerospace is our guest speaker.
Supply Chain management is extremely important in today’s world. Bob has considerable experience as a member of the Honeywell executive management organization, and has particular experience with the Garrett Auxiliary Power Systems organization. His presentation will be a very relevant discussion relating to today’s business atmosphere. Past presenters from the Aerospace corporate headwaters were very popular with Club members. We anticipate a large number of attendees. We also welcome Club members from HRSC and AAC. This meeting will be held in the Senior Center Room 2, Ballroom. This room holds 318 so we need a big turnout.
Our March 2022 Meeting was held at the Scottsdale Senior Center, room 8. The subject was model aircraft competition pylon races and control line aerobatics. The presenters were Jim Allen and Jim Hoffman. Both had their entire careers at AiResearch/Garrett/Allied Signal/Honeywell and are now retired. Jim Hoffman is a Club member.