[00:00:00] Fuzz Martin: Well, look who it is. Thank you for joining me. I am Fuzz Martin, and this is 15 minutes with Fuzz. On this show, we focus on. Good things happening in Washington County, Wisconsin. No drama, no politics, none of your uncle’s social media rants, or if you are an uncle, none of your nieces or nephews bothering you, just good, old, clean, positive fun.
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Uh, in a good way, not an enlarged heart way. But, uh, if you don’t want to I’m just glad you’re here right now. Today, I’m speaking with West Bend’s Mayor, Chris Jenkins, about an event coming up this weekend, Saturday, February 12th at Silverbrook Middle School in West Bend. The event is called Super Bowl Saturday and it’s hosted by the West Bend Early Risers Kiwanis, of which Mayor Jenkins is also the board secretary.
And with that, here’s Fifteen Minutes on Super Bowl Saturday. With Mayor Jenkins on Fifteen Minutes with Fuzz.
Mayor Jenkins, thanks for joining me. Now let’s talk a little bit first about Kiwanis and what it does, because there are a lot of great organizations in the area and I think it’s important for people to know which ones, Uh, what, what they focus on and, and who’s involved in all of that.
[00:02:16] Christophe Jenkins: Absolutely. I, I live and breathe the nonprofit world.
We have a lot of great nonprofits in the city of West Bend that are supporting a lot of different causes. Um, so that’s always great to see and support them. So I’m a part of, uh, West Bend Early Risers Kiwanis. I am currently the secretary. I was a past president and I’ve been involved in this organization for a number of years.
Kiwanis overall, it’s been around for a long time. It’s been established since 1915 as a local organization. And what they do is they have little clubs, you know, throughout each, pretty much each community throughout the United States and throughout the world. And their, their emphasis is on raising funds and then turning around and using those funds for different programs and things that help children in the community.
So that’s the big, big thing. So a good example of, uh, some of the causes that we support here in the city of West Bend. We have the Kids Free Fishing Clinic that we do in April, that’s a big, exciting event. We do our Duck Derby every year, that’s a larger event that we do as well. And then we support programs like the West Bend Library Family Night, so across the street, whenever we do an exciting event and bring in, you know, magicians and musicians and all that good stuff, that’s supported by Kiwanis, so that’s pretty cool.
We help to raise money for iPads for the Focus on Autism project. We’ve raised money for the History Center, Washington County, Threshold, Musical Maskers does a youth program, so pretty much anything that has a program that also needs financial support to help kids in the community.
[00:03:40] Fuzz Martin: When did you So, uh, I’m gonna go ahead and get started working, uh, or getting involved with Kiwanis.
[00:03:45] Christophe Jenkins: Well, everything, it feels like everything that I do, you know, including my job as mayor, has all been because I’m suckered into it because of my kids. Sure, yeah. So I have, I have five kids and they keep me busy. Yeah. Um, so, I can imagine how five kids
[00:03:57] Fuzz Martin: would keep you busy.
[00:03:57] Christophe Jenkins: So generally everything that I do is somewhat connected to them.
So I joined Kiwanis, uh, because they were directly impacting some of the programs and things that I brought my own kids to. So I got invited, uh I don’t know, it’s gonna be seven years ago now, by a club member. I used to be working at Bebo Harris Bank, they stopped by my office, said, Hey, you’d make a great member.
I’ve seen you at some stuff. And I said, Sure, why not? I’ll come check him out. And it, what’s, what’s great is that they definitely welcome, you know, newbies like me with open arms. And you built that, uh, that kind of sense of sorority, right? That community that we have. Amongst each other and it’s a great place to network just like any other community group would be.
[00:04:36] Fuzz Martin: You’re now the secretary which I assume is the board, right? And so you get to be the one, uh, take all the meeting notes and do all that stuff. But also, um, tell me about how, uh, how people can get involved with Kiwanis, what’s involved with the early risers, if somebody wanted to be a part of that.
[00:04:51] Christophe Jenkins: Absolutely. So we’re called the Early Risers for a reason. We wake up early and that’s when we meet. We currently meet, uh, seven o’clock in the morning at the, uh, braising pan on Thursday morning. So Thursday morning, seven o’clock, braising pan. Everybody’s welcome to come check out a meeting, learn more about us.
Typically at our weekly meetings we have guest speakers that come in, so maybe you’ll have to get yourself to come in and tell us a little bit about yourself and your career. And that’s pretty cool, because then we have, you know, whether it’s local celebrities like our police chief or myself, or otherwise we bring in other non profits and leaders just to learn more about them.
And then what’s cool is that typically those groups then end up getting funding the next year, right? Because we’ve learned about them, we said, oh, this camp that’s running on next year is really cool, we want to help invest in that. As I said, it’s just a great experience to get to know your community a lot more, and do it with a group of people and the camaraderie that you get.
[00:05:39] Fuzz Martin: Yeah, very good. And how many people are typically there at the Brazing Pen on a Thursday morning?
[00:05:44] Christophe Jenkins: Oh, it can vary. Uh, our current membership is about 30, 40 people. Okay. That are probably regular people that attend. Sure. But there may be people Just like any club that come in and out. Yep,
[00:05:53] Fuzz Martin: yep, I totally hear you.
Um, coming up, you have an event, which I assume is a fundraiser for you being able to support these great organizations, and that is your soup! Erbol Saturday. You got it.
[00:06:06] Christophe Jenkins: Super Bowl Saturday. Uh, this is a tradition, uh, that we’ve been doing. This is our 13th annual, uh, celebration. It’s called Super Bowl because we do it before the Super Bowl.
Yep. Every year. I think we’re all kinda still miffed that the Packers aren’t there, but Right, yes. That’s okay. We’ll celebrate anyway. And, you know, especially this year is really important because last year with COVID and the pandemic, we didn’t get to do it. Um, so that really hurt our fundraising efforts pretty much for the whole next year.
And this is the largest fundraiser that we do every year. So, so really drawing in the community support is important for this, not only this event and our club, but then all the other events that we help sponsor too. So that’s going on Saturday. February 12th from 11 to 2 at Silverbrook Middle School.
The event itself, uh, you know, we, we do it with many sponsors that are able to help support this event. We have some new sponsors this year, too, and people that have upped their wagers from the previous year. We have different sponsor levels, I won’t get into that. Uh, but just some big names, uh, Chris, Quick Trip is a huge sponsor this year.
West Bend Mutual has always been great. And Wallace Lake Supper Cub, uh, those, those three are our platinum sponsors that are just really going above and beyond to help support this effort.
[00:07:12] Fuzz Martin: So tell us about the, the chili portion of this now. The soups and chili, are those made by local individuals or by.
Restaurants,
[00:07:21] Christophe Jenkins: we opened it up to restaurants and businesses. Okay. The past years it’s been been sort of a mix between, between the two. This year it’s pretty unique because restaurants came out in full force. You know, we talk about throughout the pandemic that, oh well some restaurants kind of died down and, you know, maybe they didn’t have the staffing Right.
Um, this year surprised us just ’cause how many people were beaten down our door ’cause they wanted to participate and they, they wanted to be the top chill. uh, Chili Soup. Right. Um, so we have thirty participants this year. I believe twenty eight of them are restaurants. We just have two that are not restaurants.
[00:07:53] Fuzz Martin: I see one is the West Bend Firefighters. Yes,
[00:07:55] Christophe Jenkins: they’re not a restaurant.
[00:07:56] Fuzz Martin: Yes.
[00:07:57] Christophe Jenkins: But, you know, they’ve won in the past, so they could
[00:07:59] Fuzz Martin: Well, that, that was where I was going to go. Is that, is that a sleeper here on this? Is the, uh, cause I, I know that those, uh, guys and gals are, are very competitive, so. Yes, they are.
In a good way, in a good way. We, if you have a fire department You want them to be the ones that always want to win.
[00:08:16] Christophe Jenkins: Absolutely. So what’s cool about the event is that, you know, participants, they’re there to lay it all on the table, right? They’re bringing their top level soup or chili, and then the visitors that come in, everybody gets a little voting card, and you can literally taste test every single chili that’s there, every soup, and you’re voting to decide who’s the best.
All right. And then obviously we tally these up at the end of a three hour event, and, you know, we determine a winner. We have a big trophy that we hand out, uh, and really these restaurants, especially those that have been around and been coming for years now, they take great pride in this. I mean, I still go to some restaurants where that trophy is proudly displayed.
Yes, yeah, I bet.
[00:08:52] Fuzz Martin: I bet. I see, um, yeah, thirty. That’s, uh, pretty much anybody you can think of in the, uh, Kind of West Bend area. There’s some from just a little outside of West Bend, but, uh, it’s a great mix and it looks really cool. Now, we once here at Epic Creative, so this show isn’t like a part of Epic Creative, but since I’m one of the partners, it comes up a lot.
We had a soup or a chili cook off here at Epic one day and this pre pandemic and we had been in the building in this building here next to the library for maybe. A six month, I think we moved in October, and this was the February, coming up to the Super Bowl right before that. And somebody started our kitchen on fire.
So it was like, we were in here, it was cold outside, and we all had to go outside because somebody left a crock pot on too high or something like that. And yeah, started the nice little kitchen fire. So, no damage. I thought you
[00:09:47] Christophe Jenkins: were going to say that maybe Epic Creative should join us next year. But based on that story, no.
No, you should not. Well, the
[00:09:55] Fuzz Martin: firefighters are there, so we might be okay. How much are tickets to the event? Where can people get them if they want to come to the event?
[00:10:03] Christophe Jenkins: Yes, so you absolutely can just show up at the event and get tickets. That is 10 for adults, we have a little 1 discount for seniors 55 and up, and then kids about the age of 6 to 12 get a 5 ticket, and then kids 5 and under are free.
With all this, you can eat as much as you want. Get free dessert, which is great, too. You can get tickets in advance. You can get a 2 discount when you do that. Those are available at the Fox Brothers, Piggly Wiggly, Horicon Bank, or just really any Early Risers QAnus member like myself. I have tickets right here on hand that I can give ya.
Um, and happy to, to, to sell those out as much as possible.
[00:10:37] Fuzz Martin: Awesome, um, so again, it’s 10 for adults, 9 for seniors 55 plus. Five for kids, six twelve, and if I, now as a parent, and you have five children, if I could get a five and under to eat chili, I would actually probably pay you, um, money to get them to eat chili, but they are free.
So
[00:10:56] Christophe Jenkins: speaking of having unruly kids that might go crazy during three hours, I did want to share that we have a BAX contest going on, um, in, uh, so if you’re familiar with Silverbrook, they have a gym right next door, so that gym’s now open to us and our event as well. So we’re going to be doing an open gym, open bags tournament.
There’s gonna be little prizes associated with that. So it’s a great place to kind of let your kids run, blow off steam. In addition, we do silent auctions and raffles. Our big prize every year is we have this giant flat screen TV that’s been donated by PML. And so that’s always been the big prize that somebody wants to win.
Cool different raffle prizes that you can get as well.
[00:11:32] Fuzz Martin: And the Super Bowl is the next day, right? Yes. Is that correct? So then the, if you win the TV, There you go. You can watch it. Watch in style. Awesome. It is the Super Bowl Saturday Soup and Chili Cook Off from the West Bend Early Risers, Kiwanis and Kewaskum.
That is happening on Saturday, February 12th from 11 a. m. till 2 p. m. at Silverbrook school. Mayor Jenkins, thank you for coming on the show today. You are welcome to come back and talk about some of the other great events that the West Bend Kiwanis Early Risers have going on throughout the year. I know that it’s important to our community to help support these organizations that support our youth and And I appreciate all that you guys do.
[00:12:14] Christophe Jenkins: Thanks so much for having me.
[00:12:19] Fuzz Martin: Spicy. I’ve been wanting to say that all episode, you know, it’s chilly. That’ll do it for another episode of 15 minutes with fuzz. If you ever have an idea for a guest, if you would like to be a guest, do not be bashful, email me 15 with fuzz at gmail. com. That’s 15 spelled out 15 with fuzz. Don’t put in one five with fuzz.
That won’t get you the right place. I’m always looking for people, places and things in Washington County to talk about. And then we put them out on a Monday morning said midnight. Thank you for listening. Enjoy your chili. We’ll talk to you next week, right here on 15 minutes of fuzz.
