CdA Lions Club on prowl for members

TERRY STIDMAN ROARED and Coeur d’Alene’s Lions awoke from their lengthy hibernation.

“I didn’t want to lose 67 years of history,” Terry says, proudly displaying his Lions Club International pin on his jacket lapel. “They built Coeur d’Alene’s first ballparks. They have a proud history.”

To the unaware, Lions may seem like a cozy men’s club suited more for the 1950s than the 21st century. But Lions is a long-standing community service group probably best known for its dedication to helping people worldwide with vision problems. Lions collect used eyeglasses to distribute in developing countries where people can’t afford to care for their vision problems. Last year, Pacific Northwest Lions clubs donated 259,000 pairs of eyeglasses.

The club sponsors a van that stops in communities and tests sight and hearing for kids at no cost. Clubs raise money to help with eye surgeries. They also build ball fields that exercise thousands of eyes at every game.

So, Terry was not about to let Coeur d’Alene’s Lions Club snooze itself into non-existence.

“We have to carry on Lionism,” he says like the Lions vice district governor he is.

He knew Coeur d’Alene’s club was in trouble a year and a half ago when it asked Spirit Lake’s club, to which Terry belonged at the time, for help operating a food booth at the North Idaho Fair. The Coeur d’Alene club’s membership had shrunk so much that it couldn’t gather enough volunteers for its projects.

Coeur d’Alene’s problems weren’t unique. Community service clubs that drew working men in droves 50 years ago have struggled for the past few decades to attract a younger crowd to stay alive. Lions opened its membership to women 15 years ago, but many clubs resisted change. Members comfortably grew older and less energetic together and clubs suffered.

Terry fought the stagnation problem in Spirit Lake, where he lives. He started a Leos Club – school-age Lions – at Timberlake High with hopes of infusing the older club with fresh young energy. His work wasn’t appreciated. Terry left Spirit Lake’s club last year and joined Blanchard’s. Timberlake’s Leos unraveled.

Early this year, Terry learned Coeur d’Alene’s club had lost its charter. Membership had shrunk. The club was $209 behind on dues. It seemed beyond saving. Terry rushed to the rescue.

He’s admired Lions clubs since his boyhood in Ephrata, Wash. Terry played Little League baseball on ball fields the local Lions Club had built. He couldn’t imagine a better purpose for a group.

Traveling for his job as an adult stopped him from joining a Lions Club until 1997. He liked everything about the Lions. Dues were only $60 a year and went toward eradicating eye problems around the world. He shared a purpose with 1.4 million other Lions in 193 countries. Fifteen of those clubs were in Idaho’s Panhandle.

Terry was such an energetic Lion that he quickly established himself as a leader. That’s why Coeur d’Alene’s last three Lions went to Terry for help. He wrote to Lions International on behalf of the Coeur d’Alene club. If the club beefs up its membership and pays its back dues within a month, it can have its charter back.

Joy French and her brother, Dan Searles, volunteered to get the club going at Terry’s request.

Joy lives in Coeur d’Alene but has volunteered for years in Spirit Lake. Plenty of people on tight incomes live in the town just shy of the Bonner County border. Joy found dozens of ways to help. She joined Spirit Lake’s Lions in 2000 because she knew so many people in the town.

She was looking for a Lions group closer to her home when Terry asked for her help with Coeur d’Alene’s club.

“Terry needed someone to get it started in Coeur d’Alene. He has a way. I can’t turn him down,” she says.

She’s secretary and Dan is president. Three Lions from the old club decided to stay with the group and talked three new people into joining. The club will hold an open house at the Coeur d’Alene Inn at 7 p.m. on Jan. 8 to share with anyone interested in hearing what Lions is all about. Joy and Dan plan to stand outside Safeway on Fourth Street that week and recruit members.

“It’s important to keep this in Coeur d’Alene,” Joy says. “People here need us. We go out and clean up the streets and highways, help with glasses, hearing aids, Seeing Eye dogs. We need more people in the community to get off their butts and start working.”

Terry couldn’t have said it better.