Joyce Handa leads all-female Poway Kiwanis officer corps
By Emily Sorensen
The Poway Kiwanis Club will be looking to expand its membership and take on new service projects under new President Joyce Handa.
Handa, who took over Oct. 1 for Jeff Wilson, has been a member of Kiwanis since 2011. Joining her on the club leadership team are President-elect Liz Carlson, Treasurer Thelma Fisher and Secretary Gina Sheehan. It is the first time in the club’s 40-year history that it has had an all-female corps of officers.
Handa said she has three goals for the club during her presidency: to educate the community about Kiwanis’ many contributions; to expand new service projects for the club and to welcome new members.
“I want to make sure that the organization leaves an impactful footprint,” said Handa. “We all have one thing in common, that we want to better serve youth in our community and internationally.”
Handa said she became interested in joining Kiwanis through her twin daughters, Ellen and Sara, who were the president and treasurer, respectively, of Key Club when they attended Poway High School. “When I was going to school, Kiwanis was a men’s club. When Ellen became president and Sara treasurer of Key Club, I learned more about Kiwanis from them.”
Kiwanis member Bob Krans, who is the advisor for Key Club and its middle and elementary school equivalents, Builder’s Club and K-Kids, invited her to a meeting to see what Kiwanis was all about. “I asked to wait until my daughters went away to college,” said Handa, whose twins now attend Southern Methodist University in Dallas.
In October 2011, after seeing her girls off to college and finishing a year volunteering with the National Charity League, she joined the club and has been a member ever since. Prior to taking over as president, she served as a board member for both Kiwanis and the Kiwanis Club of Poway Foundation. She was named the Kiwanian of the Year for 2012-13 for her dedication to the children of Poway, and in June 2011, the Handa family was voted Family of the Year by Kiwanis Divison 37, comprised of 18 North County clubs.
Born and raised in Seattle, Handa graduated from the University of Washington and lived in Boston and Chicago before moving to San Diego. She is a CPA and spent five years working for PriceWaterhouseCooper and another five as audit director for the Price Club warehouses, now known as Costco Wholesale. She then left her career to stay at home with her twins, before returning to her work as a CPA. Currently, she is a business consultant for Premier Alliance Group, specializing internal audits of publicly-traded companies in San Diego County. She has been married to her husband, Doug, for 32 years.
Right after joining the club Handa started the “” project, which has collected about 2,600 cell phones which are sent, along with a 60-minute phone card, to soldiers stationed overseas so they can call home.
This year, as president, Handa said she wants to continue serving the community. “Service is at the heart of every Kiwanis International club no matter where in the world it is located,” said Handa.
She also plans to focus the club and its members on new service projects, including assisting in the Special Olympics host city events in 2015 and refurbishing Starridge Park in Poway. The club will also continue to contribute goods to the city’s adopted 1st LAR Marine Battalion from Camp Pendleton, and work to expand the Holidays with Heroes event in December, which pairs up needy children in Poway with Marines from the 1st LAR Battalion to shop for family members, enjoy dinner and visit Santa.
The club’s largest fundraiser is the Padres Spring Training Kickoff Luncheon, held each February. The club also sponsors the Tour de Poway Bike Ride.
Handa said she also wants to welcome new members to the group. “At a roster of 60-plus members, we are looking forward to being able to increase the number of service hours and projects that we can undertake to help the children of the world, both locally and internationally,” said Handa.
The Kiwanis Club of Poway meets from 7 to 8 a.m. Thursdays at the Hamburger Factory, except for the third Thursday of the month, when they meet from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. at the Mainstream Bar and Grill. The evening meeting is to encourage young professionals who may not be able to attend breakfast meetings to join the club, said Handa. “If we get enough young members, we might spin off a young professionals club,” she said.
Prospective members are encouraged to attend a meeting and see what Kiwanis is about for themselves. For more information on the club visit
or the club’s Facebook page.
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