The spirit of Rotary will come to life at SanDestin this April 25-28. A year of good Rotary deeds and fellowship will be highlighted at SanDestin in one of the most unique district conferences we have ever had.

It will start when you register for the conference with early registration raffles. The three raffle winners will get to choose from

• two free nights in a two-bedroom suite
• free tickets to the Thursday night festival and $200 cash, or
• just plain old $400 cash.

Start with part of your conference experience paid for simply by registering early if you win.

Thursday evening will be our Rotary festival on the Grand Lawn. Final preparation for the event is not complete but will be announced on our district website. Club Hospitality Suites will be available starting Thursday night throughout the conference for more fun and fellowship.

Friday morning will be our fishing rodeo followed by an evening reception, dinner, and the opening General Session. This opening session will be “Rotary salutes America.” The House of Friendship will be open - offering an opportunity for all clubs to show off any projects they are proud of. You will have tables and electrical provided at no cost. Projects are for the enjoyment and education of the clubs; they will not be judged. The costume march in will proceed the General Session with the theme dress being of your choice to agree with the theme of Smokey and the Bandit

This is an eco-friendly conference and the door prizes are all green. Door prizes will vary from $250 to $1,000.

We will have our registration site available in late September and we want you all to take advantage of the early sign-up raffles. We will provide you with a complete description of the conference when the registration site is released.

To make this conference financially stable, we need your help. There has been a trend to book rooms outside the Rotary room block reserved through the hotel. While you may save a few dollars, it adds up to serious dollars to the district that must be made up out of the district budget. You can guess who pays the district budget; it is the Rotarians of District 6900. When you use an outside booking agency, you are seriously impacting the budgeting process that takes place to enable us to have great conferences. If this continues, the only choice we have is to lower the standards of what we have today, and to raise registration fees by significant amounts. We are setting up the website so that when you register, you can link directly to SanDestin to reserve your rooms. Please use this and do not try to save a few dollars at the expense of other Rotarians. Remember: Is it fair to all concerned?

See you at Sandestin!