Bob Burkman’s Prayer
Heavenly Father,
We Optimists are people who believe that tomorrow will be better, even if today comes with a few surprises.
Help us to live by the spirit of the Optimist Creed. Give us the wisdom to keep our promises, the courage to admit when we don’t and enough good humor to laugh at ourselves when our best intentions somehow end up on next week’s to-do list.
Bless our club, our families and especially the young people we serve. May our efforts continue to make a positive impact in our community.
Remind us that when we stumble, we simply get back up, smile and tell everyone it was part of the plan.
Amen.
CNO Featured on WDTN’s Tell Me Good News
Kelly King of WDTN Channel 2 visited the club on July 7, 2026, and her Tell Me Good News segment about the Centerville Noon Optimist club has now aired. The segment features the club’s $50,000 donation to the Washington-Centerville Public Library, which will fund indoor and outdoor interactive elements and new equipment in two children’s areas and a greatly expanded Creativity Commons, the library’s amazing maker space, as the library completes its renovations.
You can watch the segment here.
Announcements
Putt-Putt and Pizza Results
President Sarah Umbreit reported that the Putt-Putt and Pizza social at Magic Castle on Sunday, August 23, 2026, was a success, with a great turnout of foursomes. Joyce Swiadek and her husband, David, each shot a 46, taking first place and a cash prize.
Tri-Star Soccer Signups
Mike Creech announced that volunteer signups for Tri-Star Soccer are now available, and online registration is open for kids who want to play. Pass the word along. Please sign up using the Member Calendar.
Haunted Trail
Debe Dockins announced that the Haunted Trail will be held on Tuesday, October 13, and Wednesday, October 14, 2026. The committee has already met, and signups are now on the website. Trail guides are especially needed, and you know how much fun it is. Please sign up using the Member Calendar.
Raffle Baskets and a Coming Live Auction
Debe Dockins also ran a raffle of six baskets, including a golf foursome from Yankee Trace, with proceeds supporting the children. She teased one more surprise in a couple of weeks: a live auction.
Capable Kids Open House
Andy Higgins announced that the Youth Mental Health Initiative is holding a Capable Kids Open House on the evening of Thursday, September 10, 2026, at Epiphany Lutheran Church. The event is about guiding kids toward reasonable childhood independence. Talk to co-chair Joan Cordonnier to find out how you can support the effort.
Constitution Contest Volunteers
President Sarah Umbreit announced that Centerville High School junior Nissi Xavier’s passion project, the Constitution Contest, will be held on Saturday, September 12, 2026, at the Woodbourne Library. Elementary students compete from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM and middle school students from 1:30 to 4:30 PM. Nissi is running the event herself and mainly needs CNO volunteers to help grade the quizzes. You can give a full shift or just part of one; reach out to Sarah Umbreit if you can help.
The Dayton Development Coalition with Julie Sullivan
Mike Bevis introduced Julie Sullivan, Executive Vice President of Regional Development for the Dayton Development Coalition (DDC). When Mike asked her what she knows about kids, Julie had a ready answer: she is one of ten children, seven girls and three boys. She has been with the DDC for 13 years, and before that she spent about five years with the Downtown Dayton Partnership. She has been named one of North America’s Top 50 Economic Developers and one of the Dayton Business Journal’s Power 50 influential women in the Dayton area. A proud Flyer with a degree in Marketing from the University of Dayton, she also serves on the Board of Chaminade Julienne Catholic High School.
What the DDC Does
The DDC is a nonprofit economic development organization that has been around since 1994 and serves twelve counties in western Ohio, reaching from Auglaize County in the north to the southern border of Montgomery County, east to Springfield, and west to the Indiana border in Preble County. Its mission is “to attract, expand, and retain jobs in the Dayton Region,” and its vision is “to drive an economic development engine for the Dayton Region that is nationally recognized,” guided by the core values of Leadership, Collaboration, and Integrity.
Three Areas of Focus
The work falls into three areas of focus: supporting companies on their path to growth, attracting new companies to the region, and Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, where the DDC protects, grows, and attracts defense missions in much the same way it supports private industry.
The Everyday Work
The foundational work of economic development is simply meeting with companies. In conjunction with local communities, the DDC visits companies regularly to hear where they see success and where they see challenges. If a company needs a building expansion or a new facility, the DDC helps identify funding and sites, drawing on its database of available sites and buildings across the region. It also does business development across the country and around the world, and it makes its research and data available to anyone who asks.
The DDC is one of seven regional partners in the JobsOhio network, the state’s privatized economic development organization created in 2011 so the state could work at the speed of business. When JobsOhio needed a model, it based the design on the Dayton Development Coalition.
Focus Industries
The DDC concentrates on tradeable industries: advanced manufacturing, aerospace and aviation, automotive, advanced mobility, energy and chemicals, financial services, food and agribusiness, healthcare, logistics and distribution, military and federal, and technology. It does not directly support retail, restaurants, or housing; instead, by bringing in the industries above, it creates the employees who become the customers for all three.
A Year That Picked Up
The DDC grades itself on job creation and capital investment, typically helping create 2,500 to 3,500 new jobs in a given year. In 2025 the team was busy, but companies unsure about the economy were slow to commit, so the numbers looked short: 37 projects won, 984 new jobs committed, and $1.7 billion invested. The first half of 2026 felt much the same, but the second half has picked up considerably. The region has already committed nearly as many new jobs this year as in all of 2025, and one very large project has not yet shown up in the metrics.
Electra Aero Chooses Springfield
The DDC courted the company for six to eight months, and its leadership visited several times to get to know the community. The region won.
Strategic Regional Projects
Beyond individual company wins, the DDC works on long-tail strategic projects that set the region up for future growth. In Beavercreek, a developer is building a technology park under a unique enhanced use lease on land owned by Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, an effort roughly 15 years in the making. The first building is coming out of the ground with tenants lined up, giving defense contractors a place to land right next to their customer, the base.
Advanced Air Mobility: NAAMCE and Joby
The National Advanced Air Mobility Center of Excellence in Springfield, which opened in 2023 after years of work with the Air Force Research Lab, anchors the region’s advanced air mobility strategy and was a big reason Electra Aero chose the region; Electra’s plant will sit immediately adjacent to it. Joby Aviation continues to pursue FAA approval for its electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft, and once approved it will move to full production near the Dayton International Airport.
The onMain Innovation Hub and the Honda Battery Plant
Near the University of Dayton, the former Montgomery County Fairgrounds is being transformed into an innovation district called onMain, where the first building is under construction; the Air Force, higher education institutions, private companies, and students will share the space to solve problems for the Air Force. And the Honda battery plant in Jeffersonville, near I-71, is finally up and running, producing batteries for automotive and pivoting into areas like battery storage for the power grid.
Wright-Patterson and NASIC
Wright-Patterson Air Force Base is Ohio’s largest single-site employer, approaching 33,000 employees with an annual economic impact of $15.5 billion. The DDC works with base leadership to support its missions, including the National Air and Space Intelligence Center, which is headquartered at Wright-Patt on behalf of the entire Department of the Air Force. Julie described NASIC as the people watching the bad guys every day; your friends and neighbors may work there, but they cannot tell you what they do.
NASIC has been adding about 100 jobs a year for more than a decade, and the DDC worked with the federal delegation for years to secure military construction dollars for a new facility. By the time the building opened a couple of years ago, NASIC had already filled it, so the DDC is now working to secure funding for the next one. It was a huge win for the community.
The AI Question
Asked how artificial intelligence is showing up in her conversations, Julie said the DDC’s role is to stay close to employers, hear how they are incorporating AI into their operations, and share that back with workforce development partners and higher education institutions so the region’s workforce is ready for the jobs of the future. Some impacts can already be planned for, and some are still unknown, but she expects everyone to be affected. She attended an AI roundtable for business executives in Columbus the day after the meeting, on August 26, 2026.
Slides
The slide deck contains additional photos and details beyond what is covered in this article.
You can view the slide deck of the presentation here.
Thank You
Thank you, Julie Sullivan, for educating us about how the Dayton Development Coalition brings jobs and investment to the Dayton Region.
New Member Readings and Inductions
- TR Amrine, First Reading, sponsored by Art Hung
- Julia Johnson, Third Reading, sponsored by Kelly Stone
Happy Bucks
- Liz Fultz gave a happy buck because, after nearly a year and a half of construction, the Centerville Library is ready for its grand reopening on Sunday, August 30, 2026, from 1:00 to 3:00 PM. It is going to be a big party, so come on out if you are available.
- Debe Dockins gave a happy buck because, after 25 years of living in this area, she finally visited Schmidt’s Sausage Haus in Columbus with her son Michael on Sunday, August 23, 2026, and it was just fabulous.
- Kelly Stone gave a happy buck because she and Bill Stone leave on Friday, August 28, 2026, for a little over two weeks in Ireland, London, and Paris. They will miss everyone terribly.
- Don Kelley gave a happy buck because his granddaughter is going into her third year of law school at Boston University and has already been hired by Jones Day.
- Joyce Swiadek gave a happy buck for winning the first golf event of her life at the Putt-Putt social two days earlier.
- Mike Creech gave a happy buck because he was happy to see Dan Cline at the meeting. Dan played on the club volleyball team with Mike years ago. Once, when Mike walked into a Kentucky restaurant with his family after a football game, Dan walked in shortly after, and the whole place shouted “Dan!”, exactly like Cheers.
Sergeants-at-Arms Fines: Mike Creech and Bob Myers
- Steve Kohls was fined in what Bob Myers called the first fine through the generations. Bob’s father and Steve’s father were engineering students at The Ohio State University, and when a friend married, the two of them put a mercury switch under the newlyweds’ bed, wired so the doorbell rang every time the bed was sat on.
- Val Huff was fined for trying to intimidate the rest of the field at Sunday’s Putt-Putt social by showing up like a professional, with her own club and golf shoes. She did not win, so it did not work.
- Art Hung told the Sergeants they can fine him and they did.
- Larry Larrimer was fined simply so he would stand up and everyone could get a good look at him.
- Don Kelley was fined $2 for impersonating a Sergeant by falsely ringing the bell.
- Sarah Umbreit was fined for losing the bell, which turned up after a journey that apparently began with Scott Langer.
- Paul Boeckman was fined because he fined Mike Creech every single week back when Paul was a Sergeant. It is now payback time.
Welcome Guests
| Guest | Guest Of |
| Mary Ann Russell | Blanca Criner |
| Dan Cline | Gail Aiken |
| Mitch Gehle | Mike Bevis |
| TR Amrine | Art Hung |
| Vivian Steenrod | Nancy Lehren |
Club Membership Anniversaries
| Member | Joined | Years |
| Penny Culhane | August 26, 2019 | 7 |
| Jeff Busch | August 31, 1979 | 47 |
| Ken Peacock | August 31, 2001 | 25 |
Birthdays
| Rick Altvater | August 25 |
| Debbie Parks | August 25 |
| Rick Kempfer | August 28 |
| Julie Cochran | August 31 |
| Chris McAlpine | August 31 |
| Jim Mogan | August 31 |
No Thank You Notes Received this Week
Links to PowerPoint and Pictures
CLICK HERE to see the PowerPoint Slide Deck from this week’s meeting