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‘HOW I FOUND SUPPORT AND ACCEPTANCE IN MY ROTARY CLUB’

By Monica Mulholland, Rotary Club of Queenstown, New Zealand, From Rotary Voices, 15
Aug 2019

When I made the decision to come out as transgender to my Rotary club, my wife and I were worried
that we would be shunned by our community and lose many of our friends, including those in the
Rotary club. It is common for transgender people to lose half their friends and half their family when
they come out. But we couldn’t have been happier with the acceptance and support we received from
club members.
Like most transgender people, I realized quite early on that something was not right. I didn’t quite fit where people
were trying to put me. When I was three or four, my mother caught me parading around in some of her dresses. It
was made clear to me that this was not a good idea. She took it as a childhood prank, but looking back, I can see it
was probably a lot more than that. I took everything underground after that, but it was there all the time.
I knew my girlfriend was the one for me when I was about 21. I didn’t have the words back then to tell her I was
transgender, but I did alert her to the fact that I was different in that way. Later, we got married, and I always had
my own stash of women’s clothing and makeup at home. My wife and I sometimes travelled together in the U.S. as
a female couple.
My wife and I have been members of our Rotary club for more than 15
years. She was the first female president of our club and only the second
female governor in our district. We had been planning for me to come out
for a year or so … and each time the deadline approached, one of us would
get cold feet and we would postpone it. We decided that I would approach
the current president and the incoming president. We sat down for coffee
and with much trepidation I explained the situation. There was no
hesitation from either of them about supporting me.
It was decided that I would write a letter to the club explaining my
situation. Soon after, the club had a barbecue. We didn’t attend, but the
president read the letter and at the end, instead of a stunned silence there
was an outbreak of applause.
Many of our non-Rotary friends had expected club members, if not the
club as a whole, to give me a hard time. I can honestly say that I have
never had a negative or snide remark from any of the members. They
made me exceptionally proud of them all. So much so, that when they
were looking for a new incoming president; I put up my hand and was
unanimously accepted. I served as president of the Queenstown Rotary
Club in 2017-18. Monica Mulholland, right, and wife
In the final stages of my presidency, I held a Rotary/LGBT Information Exchange meeting where I invited members
of the LGBT community in Queenstown to come to our Rotary meeting and tell us what it is like being an LGBT
person in our community and how we, as a Rotary club, could help them. This brought the whole LGBT situation
out in the open and allowed members to ask questions. The meeting was a big success.

My advice on inclusion and diversity is to have a meeting where you invite the LGBT community and let members
ask the questions. It is hard to hold a prejudice when you understand somebody’s story!

‘2021-22 RI PRESIDENT SELECTED’

From Rotary Weekly, 9 August 2019

Shekhar Mehta, of the Rotary Club of Calcutta-Mahanagar, West Bengal, India, is the selection
of the Nominating Committee for President of Rotary International for 2021-22. He will be
declared the president-nominee on 1 October if no challenging candidates have been suggested.
Mehta acknowledges that current membership trends are a challenge and says that membership
development should be Rotary’s highest priority. He believes that focusing on regional plans,
successfully transitioning Rotaractors into Rotary clubs, and increasing diversity and female
members could yield a 5 percent net growth in membership each year.
“A major brainstorming is needed to find effective solutions suited to different areas of the world,” says Mehta. He
adds that regional ethos and culture have to be taken into account to find localized solutions, as “one size does not
fit all.” He believes Rotary can extend to new geographical areas and countries.

Rotary on the Move September 2019 Page 3