By Rick Reigner, 2026-27 governor of Rotary District 6440
In 2025, I attended the Zone 33-34 Conference in Pittsburgh due to a scheduling conflict that prevented me from attending the one in my own zone. I sat in on an interview session with Peter Salk, son of Jonas Salk who discovered the cure for polio.
I was moved by Peter’s story and his father’s unwillingness to patent the cure. It inspired me to pledge to do something to help eradicate polio during my upcoming year as governor.
When I returned home to my district, I shared the story with others and suggested we organize a walk that would take place in different locations but begin at the same time, raising awareness for Rotary’s polio eradication work. The idea caught on.
I next shared my story with my Midwest Presidents-elect Learning Seminar colleagues, and they wanted to participate as well, increasing the scope to six districts. We made a promotional video and highlighted it at our presidents-elect learning seminar last March.
While at zone institute in Minneapolis last fall, I was again asked to share my story and our plans with all the districts in our zone. Everyone wanted to be involved.
We came up with the strategy to promote the idea as the “World’s Largest Polio Walk,” a zone-wide walk that will take place Saturday, 24 October, starting at 10:00 Chicago time. The common start time underscores the collective nature of our efforts to eradicate polio.
Each district was asked to identify a champion. We held monthly meetings on Zoom to review progress, address questions, and share strategies. District champions then held calls with clubs in their district to coordinate local efforts.
We are not requiring clubs or districts to raise funds because our goal is awareness. But for those that do, we are using the Raise for Rotary platform.
A group of us will begin our walk from Rotary International World Headquarters in Evanston, Illinois, USA, with speakers from our district and Rotary International staff. A number of clubs in the Evanston area plan to join that walk. We are also working to attract coverage from Chicago-area media. There will be pre-walk events on Friday evening at a local brewery, featuring a special purple pinkie beer, and a post celebration on Saturday afternoon.
In addition, clubs and districts across the zone are planning their own events. To date, our district champions have reported that more than 450 clubs across multiple states have plans to take part with other community partners, with a goal of raising more than US$600,000.
What a wonderful example of the power of a story!
What is your club doing for World Polio Day? Find ideas and resources on endpolio.org and register your club’s event.
https://blog.rotary.org/2026/09/24/clubs-plan-collective-walk-on-world-polio-day/