 home regional awards
The Julia "Bess" Combs Extension Award and the Julia "Bess" Combs Membership Increase Awards
The Julia Bess Combs Extension award was originated by Soroptimist International of Santa Rosa to honor Past Southwestern Region Governor "Bess" whose passion was the chartering of new clubs. Bess was instrumental in chartering many new clubs in both Southwestern and Founder Region. The Santa Rosa club donated an award trophy of a bird in flight fashioned in pewter which was purchased from a Smithsonian Institute gift catalog. The award was to honor a club who chartered a new club and the winning club would be determined by adding the annual net growth of their own club to the charter membership of the new club.
Bess Combs was presented with a duplicate copy of the award trophy as a gift. She later donated it back to the region because she believed there should also be an award for the club who attained the greatest net increase in membership whether they chartered a new club or not.
The trophies were traveling awards and clubs kept them for a year. Over the years it became difficult to keep track of the awards and get them to conference. One of the awards was lost at a conference and the trophy was no longer available for purchase. Past Governor Marjorie Conley who had purchased one of the birds in flight from the Smithsonian catalogue for her personal use kindly donated her statue back to the Region.
The original awards were retired in 2002 by conference action. Currently the awards presentation at the annual Founder Region Conference consists of the presentation of a special certificate to the winning clubs.
The determination of the winners of the awards is based solely on the Founder Region Treasurer's records and in order that the results can be known for presentation at conference each year, the membership increase tracking time frame is April 1 through March 31. It is therefore imperative that clubs get all new member transactions filed by March 31. The awards are based on net growth which is understood to mean increase above and beyond current regular membership minus those who resign or regular membership terminated for other reasons.
The awards are presented by the Chair of the Founder Region Member Services Committee or a representative of the committee.
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