For over 100 years, the Downtown Lions
Club has helped people across San Diego.
That includes scholarships for
underserved kids, programs to support
veterans and the homeless, and a free
summer experience for at risk y.
Joining us now is the Lions
Club's new president, John Mose.
John, I can call you John Ryan.
You're going to talk about the
Club's plan for the next 100 ye.
You actually joined the Lions Cb
when you were still active duty.
I was. I was in the Navy,
I was the CEO of the recruiting
district here in San Diego,
and I was approached and joined
the Lions Club back then.
So what made you want to join?
Well, it the club is made-up of
community leaders and when you'e
in the recruiting business,
you like to develop positive
relationships with people who
are leaders in the community.
And it certainly did that for me. So,
OK, So what? As you look ahead,
what is next for the Lions Club?
Well, the I would say we want t,
we want to regain the energy that we had
prior to the lockdowns of more personal
face to face service and expanding the
mission that we already have toy
and make the community a better place.
It doesn't take much imagination
when you walk around.
There's plenty of things that need to be
done to to help the community and I think
it was maybe it was Calvin Coolidge said.
You can't do everything at once,
but you can do something at onc.
So we want to do something.
How do y'all do that?
Well, generally speaking we
have a number of missions.
But you know some of the big bar
projects is you know we have the Lions
Manor downtown that was built by Lions,
took 10 years to do in partnership with
HUD but being able to provide se
affordable housing for seniors .
Handicap folks is kind of a big deal,
and we're looking at other optis
on how we might be able to partr
with the government to do housi,
because housing is one of the ts
that San Diego has a shortage o.
So we'd like to look in those a.
The other thing that we have
a welfare foundation,
we work with other nonprofits ad
award grants to nonprofits to
help them fulfill their mission
anybody's in the nonprofit busi.
Your budgets are always tight
and things will happen.
Like during the lockdown,
people have been doing a a
service mission in in one way,
found found out all of a sudden
they couldn't do it face to fac,
and they needed help to get technology
to adapt and do their mission.
We can be pretty nimble with the grants
to help folks overcome those kis
of shortterm problems that theyy
have where they just need a lite
help to keep their mission goin.
So how many members do you have?
We have about 120 members on the rolls
right now and they come from evy
possible background you can imagine and
that's really a strength of our club.
It is that you get when you get people
who want to serve the community.
Everybody has a different perspective
and everybody has a heart for
something different, so.
That's great. You want diversity
and you want to know everything
that's going on out there to to
help in the ways you can. Yes.
And we sent the lions, downtown lions.
We just sent 70 kids off
to camp just last weekend.
And that was all the result
of one guy who had a heart
for kids who were underserved.
He was a foster kid growing up,
and he wanted to.
Develop a mission where we
could send kids off to camp. I
love that. I love that.
Is there any event that you
want to highlight coming up?
Well, the we'll be going up to e
the kids at camp this week and we are
involved right now in trying to negotiate.
You know we have Lions Manor
Downtown at 4th and market 129
single occupancy apartments fore
low income and handicap seniors.
We are really, really intent on
trying to do another housing prt
because we see that as a really
a critical need in San Diego.
You know what, We're going to pt
more information about the Lions
Club on our website at cbs8.como
that the community can get invo.
Well, we have a website,
sandiegolions.org, the best way to get.
You can get involved in a number of ways.
Of course we can always use contributions,
but really what we'd like.
Is people who are interested in
community service go to the web,
There's a mission and
membership section there.
Shoot us a e-mail on through the website
and someone will get in touch with you.
We'll invite you to a meeting
and you can see what we do.
That's great perks my ears to hr
you're helping kids go to summer
camp that might not otherwise.
So John, thank you for what
you're doing in the community.
I really appreciate you having us here.