BY BERNADETTE LAURITZEN
Executive Director
Champions of Youth Ambitions
Champions of Youth Ambitions is submitting our final installment of individual nominations received for the Community Asset Awards.
Steve Sanderson is a postman that goes above and beyond the call of duty. When local mail was experiencing extreme difficulties, he took matters into his own hands. His nominator had the following to say:
“While delivering mail in our neighborhood, he noticed two large boxes by a cluster of mailboxes. The boxes were addressed to us, but had been misdelivered. Although it was not his responsibility to notify us, Mr. Sanderson called us and we were able to retrieve our packages. This happened several times.”
Shannon Cde Baca was nominated for talking the talk, walking the walk and caring about businesses.
Father Christopher Adams has been a truly, impressive community leader, who approaches his vocation with contagious compassion.
Kenyon Mackey is a community treasure, a renaissance man and has a passion for purpose.
The YMCA Los Alamos Teen Center Director George Marsden is working so hard to reach the community’s teens and jumps in feet first to help in initiatives around the county that bind the community together.
Scott Smith is a local volunteer for the Help Driver program at local senior centers. The program has volunteers who take residents of all ages to medical appointments outside the county. His nominator said, “Mr. Smith has been extremely helpful providing numerous critical medical rides during this difficult period. He has gone above and beyond, often taking last-minutes rides.”
Chris Judson, known to many as a retired National Park Service park ranger, has spent the pandemic brightening the days of seniors by hand making note paper. The bundles of stationery have arrived throughout
the pandemic and have been used for morale bags, gifts during the holidays, to brighten the day for home-delivered meal recipients and as a special treat for the 90 and up birthday celebration.
Fuller Lodge Art Center had several nominations including; Catherine Ozment, Chris Cude-Woods and Joanne Kozchowski. They are a team of people that can be counted on to keep the boat floating.
Ryn Herrmann, Los Alamos Chamber of Commerce executive director, continues to make our county one of distinction and has been praised for her many accomplishments during the pandemic.
Maire O’Neill, the editor of the very educational, online news page The Los Alamos Reporter was nominated for being a true go getter who supports local business and fosters community spirit. It’s rare to find someone so willing to talk and take on a crusade for something she believes in strongly to make Los Alamos a better place.
Many stories are posted on our Facebook page, Champions of Youth Ambitions. We hope you might take the time to take in some good news and great stories. It was our pleasure to attempt to recognize members of our community. We hope that next year we can go back to a gathered event where the stories are shared in one big happy night.
You can learn more about us and our projects at www.cya-nm.org. The nomination process for 2021 is already open. Feel free to contact us, if you have someone to recognize when we begin 2022.