The Probus Club of Mercer Island is changing locations for summer.
The club will have its monthly meetings at Holy Trinity Lutheran Church.
Also, this month the club will have its monthly meeting on a Thursday. The meeting begins with a social hour at 1 p.m. on Thursday, July 11. The program begins at 2 p.m. (The meeting was postponed a week later than usual so it wouldn’t conflict with church events.)
In July, the featured speaker is Mike Woodsum of the Mountain to Sound Greenway Trust.
The trust is a nonprofit group working to conserve and enhance the landscape of Seattle across the Cascade Mountains to Central Washington, according to a Mercer Island Probus Club press release.
Mercer Island Probus program chairman Robert Wiley speaks highly of the nonprofit noting how much people enjoy the green space of Interstate 90 from Bellevue through to Ellensburg. The route has very little development abutting the pavement in either direction. According to the Mountains to Sound Greenway website, the greenway connects some 1.5 million acres surrounding the highway.
“Everybody who drives out there recognizes how beautiful it is, and this is the group that keeps it that way,” Wiley said of the Mountains to Sound Greenway Trust.
Woodsum is the director of development at Mountain to Sound Greenway Trust.
Probus Club’s goal is to “provide regular meetings for retired and semi-retired persons with opportunities to meet others, enjoy hearing guest speakers on various topics and visit organizations and places to appeal to members,” according to a press release.
Wiley says the Mercer Island club is branching out in its membership.
“It’s not necessarily just for retired members. We’re making a push for younger people as well as retired business people,” Wiley said.
But as the club branches out in membership, bringing in speakers remains a key focus.
“We try to engage interesting people from across the area to come speak with us,” club president Becky Thibodeaux said.
Speakers are curated by the club for their expertise in “standout things that the community is aware of or should be aware of,” Wiley said.
And while the audience might be centralized to the Island location and the speakers are curated by the Island’s club, it’s bigger than the Island.
“This is just on Mercer Island, but the speakers are from all over,” club past president Michael Finn said.
Upcoming speakers include Seattle Town Hall executive director Wier Harmon on Aug. 7, and Woodland Park Zoo executive director Dr. Alejandro Grajal and animal care manager Erin Sullivan on Sept. 4.
The meetings are open to the general public.
