KEYWAY WEEKLY NEWSLETTER

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December is Disease Prevention and Treatment Month

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ROTARY CLUB OF
Atlanta West End

LEADERSHIP

Dec. 19, 2025
This Week’s Program

The December 19 meeting will feature two speakers who model service through community building and disciplined Rotary leadership: Jack Gerblick of the FSHD Society and Rotarian Bob O’Brien.

Jack Gerblick is the Chapter Director of the FSHD Society’s Atlanta Chapter and has lived with facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD) since 1991. He also serves as Chair of the Society’s Community Engagement Committee, where his work centers on connecting individuals and families affected by this rare neuromuscular disease. Jack focuses on building durable support networks, increasing public awareness, and strengthening community ties through intentional engagement. His leadership reflects a values-driven approach to turning lived experience into collective progress. At our meeting, Jack will share insights on how community, when designed and stewarded well, can advance both resilience and impact.

Bob O’Brien is a longtime member of the Rotary Club of Dunwoody, having joined in 2014, and has served as fundraising chair and public image chair over the past five years. His Rotary service includes work with Junior Achievement, Special Olympics, and the Bounds Garden project. Bob often credits an early, imperfect BBQ fundraiser as a formative lesson that later informed his successful leadership of the club’s golf tournament. A 28-year Dunwoody resident, Bob recently sold his Farmers Insurance agency and now enjoys traveling with his wife, Andrea, and time with their growing family.

JOIN ONLINE: Zoom Link - Click hereMeeting ID: 874 0116 4307 Passcode: Service

KeyWay Report on Our December 12, 2025 Meeting
Audrey Clark of the Good Samaritan Health Center

AWER member Bridgette Long provided a warm introduction to Ms. Audrey Clark, Health and Wellness Leader at the Good Samaritan Health Center, which serves the English Avenue and Bankhead Highway communities on Atlanta’s Westside. Audrey is a passionate advocate for healthy living, drawing in part from her own journey of improved nutrition, active lifestyle habits, and sustained attention to personal wellness. Because she has experienced the transformative effect of these changes, she is committed to helping others discover pathways to better health through accessible, practical self-care.

Audrey shared that Good Sam believes healthcare is a basic human right, yet those living in poverty are often the least likely to receive timely or effective care. This lack of access contributes to worsening health outcomes and deepens the economic challenges many families face. To address these inequities, Good Sam provides full-service medical and dental care for all, turning no one away. When necessary, the center partners with hospitals and specialty providers to ensure patients receive care at the lowest possible cost. Residents in zip codes 30314 and 30318 receive priority access, and much of the center’s programming is offered at no cost or on a carefully designed sliding-scale model.

Good Sam’s medical services include sick visits, checkups, physical exams, wellness visits, school screenings, immunizations, and athletic physicals. Its dental clinic offers extractions, fillings, crowns, bridges, and dentures, while behavioral health support and nutrition counseling expand the center’s whole-person approach. Wellness initiatives include diabetes prevention, nutrition education, fitness classes, and community walking groups. Transportation is provided for patients who need assistance getting to and from appointments, and an on-site pharmacy helps ensure affordable access to prescribed medications.

Audrey highlighted the center’s strong emphasis on nutrition and preventive wellness. Good Sam operates a one-acre organic farm that supplies low-cost produce, with nothing priced above five dollars. This farm supports the center’s “farm-to-table” teaching model and helps address food access challenges in the neighborhood. Each Friday, the center hosts a dedicated clinic serving unhoused individuals, offering free healthcare, meals, and hygiene kits.

Audrey next described Good Sam’s fitness and community engagement programs. In partnership with the YMCA, the center offers a full gym and classes at sliding-scale prices. The Good & Active program supports seniors through mobility and strength activities, while the Good Pace walking club meets twice monthly on the Westside BeltLine. Audrey’s own 100-pound weight loss and recent participation in a bodybuilding competition demonstrate her personal commitment to the health practices she teaches.

Audrey Clark - Good Sam Powerpoint NPU.pdf

Origin of the West End/Westview Interfaith Council

In the spring of 2025, the Atlanta West End Rotary Club hosted its Inaugural Interfaith Fellowship and Prayer Breakfast, a fantastic initiative conceptualized by AWER Treasurer and Past President Rose Caplan, that brought together faith leaders, civic partners, and community members in a shared space grounded in fellowship, service, and the Rotary Four-Way Test. The purpose of the gathering was not only ceremonial but relational: to build trust across traditions, affirm shared values, and explore how organizations might collaborate more intentionally in service of the West End.

The breakfast demonstrated both the willingness and the capacity of diverse community institutions to engage constructively around common community challenges. Conversations during and following the event revealed a strong appetite for continued dialogue, deeper coordination, and practical action, particularly around issues affecting the well-being of the business corridors and unhoused neighbors.

Importantly, Myrna Fuller, President of the West End Merchants Coalition (WEMC) and a longtime friend of the Atlanta West End Rotary Club, was in attendance at the Interfaith Fellowship and Prayer Breakfast. Building on the relationships and shared purpose established at that convening, Ms. Fuller played a key role in advancing the work from fellowship into operationalization. Through WEMC’s organizing capacity and its Business Watch framework, she helped move the metaphorical football down the field toward a structured, action-oriented collaboration.

From this continued momentum, partners including WEMC, District 4 Councilmember Jason Dozier, and providers of services to the unhoused convened alongside faith leaders to formalize the effort at the inaugural convening of the West End / Westview Interfaith Council on December 16, 2025, with plans to reconvene in January and continue the work.

The Council represents a natural evolution of the Rotary-hosted breakfast: moving from convening and relationship-building into an organized, mission-driven collaboration focused on assessment, education, coordination, and aligned action. Embedded within WEMC’s Business Watch Program, the Interfaith Council provides a platform for faith-based leadership in the community to contribute constructively to addressing homelessness, reducing tensions, and strengthening the overall health of the West End business and residential community.

The Atlanta West End Rotary Club is proud to have played a catalytic role in seeding this effort, to have a representational seat on the Council, and to see it carried forward through strong operational leadership and sustained partnership, exemplifying Service Above Self in action. Stay tuned for ways that the Atlanta West End Rotary Club membership can be more involved.

December's Theme
Disease Prevention and Treatment

The Rotary focus for December is Preventing and Treating Disease, one of Rotary’s seven global causes. During this month, Rotary clubs highlight their efforts to fight diseases such as polio, malaria, and HIV/AIDS through initiatives like vaccination programs, medical missions, and improving sanitation and clean water access. Rotary’s most famous global effort is the fight to eradicate polio, with continued work toward achieving a polio-free world. Clubs also support broader health initiatives through screenings, training, and partnerships with local providers. Improving health infrastructure and promoting health education remain key strategies to help communities stay healthy and prevent disease.

Calander, Agenda, Connections, & Four-Way Test

Never a Bad Time to Catch Up!

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