President Ronnie called the meeting to order at 12:35 p.m. Doug Booth warmly introduced visiting Rotarians and guests to the membership. Henry Bostic was welcomed back. Worth Williamson, in his distinctive style, recognized Jim Graham as a returning new member of Charlotte Rotary.
     Before leaving for Singapore, Worth was asked to share his plans for his year as Rotary President. Worth has carefully reviewed the action plans submitted by his forty-four committee chairs. As Worth indicated, "Committee chairs don't just die . . . they live forever to torment their successors." Worth carefully selected his new committee chairs and described his unique criteria for their selection: 1) perfect attendance, 2) possession of a personally autographed photograph of Paul Harris proudly displayed in one's office, and 3) a willingness to go to the ends of the earth on behalf of Rotary (even a District meeting). Despite Worth's humor, an impressive roster of new committee chairs was presented to the delight of the membership.
     Jim Kelley gave the invocation and President Ronnie "remembered" to lead the group in the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag.
     Marilynn Bowler introduced our guest speaker. Jerry Grohowski. Jerry is President of the Better Business Bureau in Charlotte. Jerry was a career Army officer for twenty-one years, retiring as a Lt. Colonel. He became President of the Better Business Bureau in Norfolk, Va., in 1986 and served in that capacity until taking charge of our Bureau in September of 1997.
     The mission of the Better Business Bureau is to promote and foster the highest ethical relations between business and the public through voluntary self-regulation, consumer and business education, and service excellence. The basics of what the Better Business Bureau does are: 1) investigations, 2) developing reliability reports, 3) handling complaints, 4) charity reviews, and 5) advertising reviews. Their job is to be a helping agency for consumers and businesses with marketplace issues.
     A few years ago the BBB began getting requests for assistance from a new kind of consumer: the cybershopper. In 1991 the BBB system decided that they must address the outlandish claims being made on the internet. Shoppers were held back because of their concerns for three issues: security, reliability and privacy. Of the three consumer concerns, security of transactions was handled primarily by the bank credit card industry. Jerry indicated that they had done an excellent job of solving the problem. Today, it is safer to use your credit card on a secure web site than in almost any other retail operation. BBB, in conjunction with leading technology companies, was asked to help develop a mechanism that might help consumers find their way around this rapidly growing entity called the Internet.
     They borrowed an idea to create a symbol that could be electronically placed on a company's Home Page. Now a cyber-visitor can know if they were visiting a site that is legitimate, trustworthy and has been checked out by an independent party.
     At the present time there are over 3,000 companies that are carrying the BBB reliability symbol on their Internet home page. In the Carolinas there are about 83 companies using the seal.
     Jerry also discussed the issue of "privacy" on the Internet. Every time one goes on the Internet, a record of that event can be collected and recorded. This includes your name, e-mail address, physical address and the kind of web sites you visit. A group of major companies was formed into an entity called the Internet Alliance Group. It is their job to develop self-regulatory initiatives in which those that are doing business.

 

New Member

JAMES E. GRAHAM, JR.

Joined 1983
Rejoined 1999

Senior Active
(Former Class. Dentistry, General)

3219 Country Club Dr. (28205)
334-2243
fax 334-5713
e-mail: JGraham5@Bellsoulh.net

Paul Harris Fellow (2)

     Jim served in all of his military reserve connections for thirty-eight years, retiring as Captain in 1982. During this time he was commanding officer of a dental reserve company, and with the outstanding assistance of Rotarian Capt. Barry Miller this company won three awards as the outstanding unit in the Sixth Naval District and finally as the outstanding unit in the United States.

     In civil life Jim practiced dentistry in Charlotte for forty-seven years. During this time he served a term as President of the Charlotte Dental Society, the Second District Dental Society, the Midwood Men's Club and N.C. State Board of Dental Examiners, and was a member of a number of other organizations too boring to mention. He also joined The Charlotte Rotary Club in 1983 and made the mistake of resigning in 1998. This grievous error has recently been corrected and he is delighted to be back amongst all you good people.

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on the Internet would voluntarily adhere to a Privacy Policy Standard which would inform their online customers of the company's information collecting policies and practices
     The BBB was approached and now has a pilot program to address this issue. Any company interested in learning more about how they can qualify for the Privacy program can do so by going online to the BBB national web site at www.bbbonline.org. Jerry encouraged the members to join BBB.
     Following questions, the meeting was adjourned at 1:28 p.m.

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Dress is casual — Dinner at 6 p.m. Reservation Required Needed
by Friday, June 4

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Powell Majors

POWELL'S

OBSERVATIONS

     Jim Woodward says a low-grade effort is underway to win a World's Fair for Charlotte. He cautions not to hold your breath. The soonest it might happen is ten years.
     David Zimmerman was on the list of 40 under 40 whom the Business Journal spotlighted as having made Charlotte a better place to live and work.
     Mike Myers was the speaker at the Senior Forum. Don Sanders is President of the Forum, Doug Booth, program chair, and Lee Morris, immediate past president. Other Rotarian members: Gordon Berg, Charlie Briley, Tom Burgess, Jay Deyton, Mac Jackson, Powell Majors, AI McCulIoch, Hoke Nash, George Page, Ed Pickard, Ralston Pound, Tom Robertson, Reagin Warren, and Speck Wilson.
     Dave Parsons is pictured in the Business Journal under the heading "In the Driver's Seat." Dave has put AAA Carolinas in the lead for innovation.

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