Rotary Club of Auburn president doesn't take 'demotion' without a fight (song)

While leading the Rotary Club of Auburn's effort to contribute to the community, Rod Borges also brought fun to his one-year presidency. Most notably, he played a college fight song at each meeting. "Every Tuesday for 50-odd weeks," Club Services Director Dan Gustavson said. "It was amusing to the rest of us because they all sound the same." Each presidency ends with the fiscal year and, "Once you've done your year, you are booted out of office," Gustavson said Friday afternoon, about an hour before the Rotary Club of Auburn honored Borges with a blowout party that included an appearance by 13 members of the University of California Berkeley band. Gustavson said he reached out to Cal "on a whim," and even with school out for the summer, the band gathered 13 musicians, crawled through the Friday afternoon commute and marched into the Ceronix building in Auburn playing "Fight for California" as the crowd – and Borges, a Cal Economics major – cheered. The band – which included piccolo, trumpet, saxophone and tuba players along with bass and snare drummers – ripped through songs from the B-52's to the Beach Boys, the Moody Blues and a-ha as people danced and clapped. Rotary Club of Auburn's fiscal year was as successful under Borges' leadership as it was fun, games and fight songs. According to Gustavson, the club reestablished the student teacher awards for up to 20 schools in the Auburn area and earned $70,000 from a Rotary barbecue. The Rotary Foundation donated $27,000 to various programs, $22,000 in scholarships to high school students, $4,700 toward the Rotary Youth Exchange (Borges took exchange students to a Cal football game), $3,800 toward Stand Up Placer and $2,000 to the Placer and Colfax High School grad nights. Rotary Club of Auburn also put about $20,000 into the community project This Old House, "fixing fences, parks, anything and everything that comes to our attention," Gustavson said. Another $40,000 went to special community donations. Speaking to the crowd, including many dressed in Cal colors, Borges said the basic idea was "having fun in trying to be more visible in the community with our social outreach, and then be active in the community, and I really feel like we accomplish that, but it's through the efforts of everybody. Everybody did a lot. It was just an awesome year and a lot of fun. I just want to thank everybody." Borges will be succeeded as president by Bob Litchfield.