August 5 Business Meeting Julie McCloud will be speaking for Washington county on the two ballot issues of Public Safety and Library funding. You can download a paper on the e and one for the. July 1 Business Meeting Good meeting , thank you to 16 members attending. Thank you New Seasons Market for hosting the meeting for us. Jennifer Allain of The Insurance Coach LLC provided us with a memorable discussion of the current Federal Exchange we use in Oregon – the tax credits and how we might use them. Jennifer always puts the needs of the family first in her coaching. We learned the three main parts of the Affordable Care Act ACA 1) There is the Exchange where we get our insurance and some of the factors that affect what we can get depending on employment / retirement situations. 2) The Advanced Premium Tax Credits (APTC) may have an attractive premium offer but can have a down side if we are not careful. 3) Cost Saving Reductions (CSR) are impacted by the cost of the insurance and thedeterminations of the APTC. It is important to see Jennifer if you do not understand these three factors of the Affordable Care Act. 503 307-4811   2015 SHRED EVENT In the United States over 40,000 tons of plastic and metal is saved from landfills annually as a result of cartridge recycling. For every 100,000 used cartridges recycled, we can save 1,000,000liters of oil. Ink cartridge recycling has virtually become synonymous with successful sustainable development. Griffin Hampson from Cartridge Network processed over 150 cartridges that folks brought in to the SHRED EVENT and is quite pleased with the turnout.   E-waste is the most rapidly growing segment of the municipal solid waste stream. Moreover this waste contains valuable materials such as aluminum, copper, gold and silver. In order to conserve natural resources and the energy needed to produce new electronic equipment from virgin resources, electronic equipment can be refurbished, reused, and recycled instead of beinglandfilled. What is called “E-waste”  also contains toxic and hazardous materials including mercury and lead which have the potential to leach into our soil and water. Frankie Bax reported that Eco Binary received over 1300 pounds of electronics.   At some point every business has to dispose of confidential information.  Customer lists, confidential client information, credit card and sales receipts, personnel and payroll records all need to be kept secure.  Both your customers and employees have the legal right to have this information protected. This provides some security for identity theft. Our paper shreader processed over 2 and a half tons of paper. Last year we were just a few pounds over 2 tons so that is a significant improvement. The truck will shred 9 tons so we have a way to go for next year. Batteries are made from a number of different materials including acid, lead, nickel, lithium, cadmium, alkaline and nickel metal hydride. Tossing your batteries in the trash sendsthem to an incinerator or landfill where their casing can disintegrate, releasing this toxic mix into our environment. Annette Fernald of Interstate All Battery collected 760 lbs of batteries of all sizes and shapes and has disposed of them in a safe manner   January 7 Meeting We had a great breakfast meeting today sponsored by New Seasons Market. Thank you for all who attended. The 10 Safe Computing Tips Are Patch, Patch, PATCH! Set up your computer for auto patching. An un-patched machine is more likely to have software vulnerabilities that can be exploited. Install protective software. Software is available as a free download for Windows, Macintosh, and Linux. Commercial software from Naorton McAfee and others. Choose strong passwords. Use letters, numbers, and special characters to create a mental image or an acronym that is easy for you to remember. Create a different password for each important account, and change passwords regularly. Backup, Backup, BACKUP! Backing up yourmachine regularly can protect you from the unexpected. Control access to your machine. Don’t leave your computer in an unsecured area, or unattended and logged on, especially in public places. Use email and the Internet safely. Ignore unsolicited emails, and be wary of attachments, links and forms in emails that come from people you don’t know. Use secure connections. When connected to the Internet, your data can be vulnerable while in transit. Protect sensitive data. Reduce the risk of identity theft. Securely remove sensitive data files from your hard drive, which is also recommended when recycling or repurposing your computer. Use desktop firewalls. Macintosh and Windows computers have basic desktop firewalls as part of their operating systems. When set up properly, these firewalls protect your computer files from being scanned. Most importantly, stay informed. Stay current with the latest developments for Windows, Macintosh Linux, and Unix systems. Stay Safe and watch for otheritems of interest as we discuss Emergency Preparedness for 2015 Neighborhood Night Out Tuesday August 5 Was a fun for all night getting acquainted with our neighbors and with the community services team from Washington County. A big thanks to Lee Blevins of the Washington County Sheriff’s Office for priming the pump for this project.  Pictured below representing RHBA are Liz Utter – New Seasons Market, Robin Curtin – Univera and Diane Snedecor – Mountain Man Nut and Fruit Co. Thank you ladies for your dedication and thank you to all who turned out. June 11, 2014 RHBA Annual Meeting April 26, 2014 Shred Event Raleigh Hills Our first Shred Event was a huge success. We send a bigh thank you to for the use of their parking area on Saturday for the event.  The cars were lined up even before the truck arrived for the event and we were taking boxes and sacks from folks to dump just as soon as they arrived. A special thank you to Diane Snedicor of as well as Mary Sherman of for theirsponsorship in the event. The rain was held at bay while we toiled away at shredding over 4000 pounds of unwanted paper items form more people than we could count. We all get a ton of junk in the mail, credit card applications, insurance packets,  a retirement fund report from 10 years ago and more. Thankfully, deciding what to keep is simple, and once you do you can shred pretty much everything else. In general, you want to keep physical copies of anything related to state or federal matters, such as certifications, licenses, or deeds. The reason is twofold: you want to have easy access to these in case you need them, and they’re also a pain to replace because you typically need to make a direct request to the government agency, which takes a lot of time. Everything else you have you can safely shred. You should shred anything that has personal information like your name, address, phone number, social security number, or bank account information. This might include a few documents youdon’t initially think about, including ATM receipts, credit card receipts, bills, and even used airline tickets. You should also immediately shred expired credit cards, visas, passports, and IDs. April 2, 2014 New Seasons Market Raleigh Hills Our April meeting was well attended and if you did not make it you really missed good information on the Oregon Food Bank presented by Laura Golino de Lovato. Laura is the Director of Development, Marketing and Communications. The Oregon Food Bank is the center of a large network of over 900 organizations in Oregon providing food for those who for some reason are not able to provide for themselves at that time. The Oregon Food Bank  works with a large  cooperative of partners statewide to distribute emergency food to hungry families. Your gift can be in the form of dollars donated, food or you can volunteer to help in many of their projects from cooking to distribution. The Mission:  “To eliminate hunger and its root causes … because no one shouldbe hungry. “ The Oregon food bank also offers training in a 6 week course on cooking nutritionally in the Portland and Beaverton areas. These classes can also be arranged for organizations that have the space and facilities to house the venue. A welcome visitor this morning was Joy Patterson. Joy is the new Community Participation Organization (CPO3) Chair for our area. She is your representative for issues and concerns and she can be reached at cpo3chair@gmail.com, we look forward to having Joy visit with us to share events in our Raleigh Hills community. OTHER VISITORS Jon-Michael Kowertz from Portland Community College, Stewart Bartlett of WEO Media and Debbi Smith with Juice Plus Tower Garden.