New Lakewood Ranch Rotary president focuses on a successful year

As River Strand’s Lang Wooddy stood in front of his fellow Rotary Club of Lakewood Ranch members, he decided to tell a joke. 

“Anybody know the secret to having a smoking hot body as a senior?” Wooddy said. “Cremation.”

Rotary members might hear more jokes from Wooddy over time as he will be standing before them every week during the Rotary Club of Lakewood Ranch’s meeting as the club’s new president.

Wooddy, who has been involved in Rotary for 39 years, said he’s honored, humbled, excited and a bit frightened to take leadership of the community organization. 

Wooddy said members of the Rotary Club of Lakewood Ranch have high expectations to have successful events, raise thousands of dollars to provide grants to community organizations, and support its programs such as Books for Kids and its clean water and sanitation project. 

Photo by Liz Ramos

“It’s frightening to not meet expectations. You always have to be on-point, game-on, and they feel the same way,” he said. “Together, we will get a lot of stuff done.”

Wooddy said one of the biggest challenges he could face as president will come at the end of his year as the leader, having to step down after hopefully a year of working to progress the club and its mission. 

“The deeper you get into it, the more comfortable you get and the better you work,” he said.

This year won’t be the first time Wooddy has served as president. He was president from 1991 to 1992 for the Rotary Club of Dunwoody in Dunwoody, Georgia. 

Wooddy said his experience as president for the Rotary Club of Dunwoody gives him insight to know what it takes to have a successful term as president in Lakewood Ranch. 

Wooddy joined the Rotary Club of Lakewood Ranch eight months after moving to River Strand in 2019. He said he hasn’t looked back as the Lakewood Ranch club has a friendly attitude with dedicated individuals who want to make an impact on their community. 

The Rotary Club of Lakewood Ranch is known for constantly trying to expand its programs and increase its services to the community. The club raised $140,000 through its annual Suncoast Food and Wine Fest last year and presented $130,000 of those funds in grants to support local organizations. The club was $10,000 shy of its record of $150,000. 

Wooddy said the desire to keep raising more money happens inherently, which means he will be focusing on ways to streamline the food and wine fest to enhance the experience of attendees and raise more money. 

“(Food and wine fest) is never perfect,” he said. “We can always improve some part of it. Hopefully the improvements we make this year will make it more efficient, and at the end of the day, we’ll make a bit more money we will then give away.”

Wooddy would like to have the Rotary Club see sustained growth, improved financials, and of course, more fun.