The Blanco County Association of Retired Educators will meet on Thursday, January 21, 2010 at the Blanco United Methodist Church on 1st and Main in Blanco. This will be the third meeting of the group since it reorganized last summer. The fifty current B-CARE members are encouraged to attend. Those retirees who have not yet joined are invited to come. The goal of the Blanco County group is to gather all local retired education personnel so they will have a stronger collective voice with the legislature on items of concern to all.

Blanco County retired educators plan to hold four informative meetings in this inaugural year and to work toward improving retirement benefits. In addition, B-CARE, as the group calls itself, seeks to provide meaningful and useful information to its membership to enhance health and well being.

Any retired school employee that receives a Teacher Retirement System (TRS) retirement check is eligible to become a member of the Texas Retired Teachers’ Association and Blanco County Association of Retired Educators. Texas Retired Teachers Association is now 70, 000 members, but it seeks to have a larger membership in order to have a stronger voice in Austin. In accordance with TRTA’s by-laws, members of B-CARE, the local unit, must also belong to TRTA, the state organization. B-CARE can accept your state TRTA dues of $25 per year and the local B-CARE dues of $5 per year. Your TRTA dues will be forwarded on to the state office.

This month’s program will be a Power-Point presentation about the Stillman Retirement Residence for Texas Educators of Waco, Texas. Stillman Residence, celebrating its 45th anniversary this year, is the second state home for retired educators. Information about the availability of such a residence becomes important as more people approach older age.

B-CARE hopes that all retired education personnel will attend the quarterly meetings. If for some reason you cannot be an active participant, please support these efforts by joining TRTA and BCARE. Dues may be sent to Membership Chair Mary Nabers at P.O. Box 40, Blanco TX 78606. You may contact Mary by email at mnab@txwinet.com.

Those who wish can bring canned goods or non-perishable food items that will be donated to the Good Samaritan Center of Blanco. After the October meeting, donated items were taken to the Johnson City Food Bank. Those who are keeping records of their volunteer hours or fitness activities in the Steps Program are asked to turn in their information at the meeting.