AA Women of Color Rewarded For
Dedication
"It was an experience that I will never forget as long as I live," said Aliceteen Wade, at right, of the Service to Youth Award presented to her with both the gratitude and admiration of the community at the seventh Tribute to Women of Color awards ceremony in Annapolis March 6.
Wade, 80, spoke enthusiastically about the youth in her community, to whom she has opened both her heart and her home. "I felt within myself that God wanted me to help somebody and that had to be the young people," she said.
With personal time, she has raised two children who have given her seven grandchildren, supported her church -- Mt. Moriah AME -- and delivered food, clothes and blankets to the homeless of Annapolis and Baltimore.
She has also joined
in youth initiatives including the Bay Ridge Garden Keep the Children from
Drugs Program and a Christmas Baskets for Kids Program. Many of the young
people she currently works with are members of the Little Doorkeepers, children
from four years old active in church and community.
Currently, Wade is preparing for a six-week youth workshop on April 16. Children from the ages of four to 18 will cook, sew and do arts and crafts while working with tutors in school subjects.
The Tribute to Women of Color awards recognize women behind the scenes who have served their community as pathfinders, Samaritans and youth leaders. The awards are given by A Tribute to Women of Color in partnership with the YWCA Racial Justice Committee, Nationwide Insurance Enterprise and Anne Arundel Medical Center. All nominations come from the community.
Sharing honors with Wade for uncommon dedication to reach out beyond themselves into the world are Grace Maria Dennis, at left, and Mary C. Brown.
Dennis, an area business woman and recipient of the 1991 Governor's Citation, is the owner of a beauty salon. She spends free time both speaking on television and instructing others on techniques of success. As a member of the Vocational Education Advisory Board, she also visits schools to encourage students to excel and persevere through graduation.
Brown, recipient of the Good Samaritan award, serves in many capacities -- Sunday school teacher, bible class instructor and education director -- at the First Baptist Church of Annapolis. As the first African American member of the American Association of Universities, Annapolis Chapter, and the first president of the Annapolis Alumnae Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, she is no stranger to success. Her life is highlighted by service projects and community lectures.
Also honored are 14 young women, mostly 11th and 12th graders, who receive Future Leader scholarships for the promise they show of living up to the high standards set by this year's mature award winners:
--Mary Catherine Ball
New South Arundel Team's Work Cut Out for It
Land preservationist Debra Osbourne, at right,
will lead the largest of Anne Arundel County's 16 small planning areas in
tailoring the principles of the 1997 General Development Plan to sprawling
South County. The area stretches from Route 50 in the north through the
horse farms and subdivision mansions of Davidsonville in the west to the
Bayside villages of Fairhaven and North Beach Park in the southeast, at
the county's end.
"South County has a huge geographic area with a very diverse population and unique combination of resources," noted Osbourne.
Charting the area's future is likely to be hugely demanding, according to Peter Edmondo who should know. For over a year, he's chaired the first Southern Arundel Small Area Planning Committee, Edgewater/Mayo, which is about to wrap up its work. "South County has acres and acres of undeveloped land, and the owners have equity in that land that they can't be denied. That makes the job difficult -- but not impossible," Edmondo advised.
Osbourne, undaunted, brings a professional's experience and a landswoman's passion to her job.
On the professional side, Osbourne begins with a master's degree in city and regional planning. To that she adds years of practical experience. With the Maryland 2020 Growth Commission a decade ago, she helped develop the strategies used by Chesapeake Bay Agreement to restore the Bay, among them preserving rural resources and natural areas and concentrating growth in areas with existing infrastructures. "Our recommendations became the state's growth management legislation," she says.
Now, says Osbourne, "I professionally save land." At the Trust for Public Land in Washington, D.C., she is director of the Chesapeake Bay Field Office, overseeing land protection efforts in Maryland, the District of Columbia, Virginia, Delaware, West Virginia and Kentucky.
In South County, Osbourne's office helped citizens
of Rose Haven buy three Bayfront acres for a park from Steuart Chaney, of
Herrington Harbour Resort and Marinas. That project introduced her to two
other newly appointed members of the South County Small Area Planning Committee:
Chaney and Susan Barber.
She's also worked in South County with The Countryside Exchange who, she said, "demonstrated a lot of our concerns, with our agricultural character and historic, water-oriented communities." The Exchange, a group of international citizen-planners, visited South County last year to look, listen and make recommendations for its future.
On the personal side, Osbourne says "I feel like I live in a little piece of paradise" of her 33 open acres above one of the county's most rural roads. "It's amazing to me you can find such a variety of natural resources and history so close to such intense development."
As committee chair she says she has "no specific agenda, which lets me work on overall policies, which is what I'm very interested in.
"I want to coordinate our small area planning with Deale and Shady
Side as we all work together on growth pressures we all face. I hope it
is a very inclusive process."
Osbourne, of Tracys Landing, was chosen from 46 applicants. Seventeen other residents and business people were also named by Anne Arundel County Executive Janet Owens to complete the committee. They are:
In Other Committees --
The Deale/Shady Side committee appointed last week got a surprise 19th member
with the addition of Robert "Bobby" Sturgell. Sturgell, of Owings
in Calvert County, is a former Deale resident eligible through the family
business, Happy Harbor. A graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and University
of Virginia School of Law, the United Airlines flight operations supervisor
last year ran against Maryland State Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller.
Explaining the addition, county land use spokesman John Morris said Sturgell was an original appointment whose name was lost in the count.
Also named, to complete this year's round of appointments, was the planning group for Jessup/Maryland City
The citizen planners in all six newly formed groups will gather to celebrate March 23. They'll get to work March 31.
--SOM
In Nassau, N.Y., a 79-year-old woman named Hildegard von Waldenburg showed loggers along her property that she meant business. Wielding a shotgun, she said: "If you don't stop cutting my trees, I shoot," the New York Times reported. She remarked later: "They are rugged men with big muscles; I'm a little German woman"...
In Maine, lobsters are everywhere. Despite warnings by scientists that the fishery is on the verge of collapse, the National Marine Fisheries Service reported last week that last year's haul was 45.5 million pounds, close to the 47 million pounds landed in 1997. But a fisheries spokeswoman asserted: "the abundance won't last forever"...
In New Mexico, you wouldn't have wanted to have been driving near the town of Anthony last Wednesday, the day that the Bonestroo Dairy spilled 40,000 gallons of raw cow manure in the road ...
Australia had better hurry cleaning up a toxic waste dumping ground at Homebush Bay in Sydney: The 2000 Olympic Games will take place there in 16 months. It's also where Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome was filmed. No word on whether Mad Max is preparing for global competition ...
Our Creature Feature comes to us from a company called Exploratoy, which is selling lusty little sea monkeys that you have to watch.
Exploratoy's Sea Monkey Digital Watch has a detachable 8cc aquarium in which sea monkeys, which actually are brine shrimp, gambol. Exploratoy's George Atamian explained what the sea monkeys are doing on your wrist while you're going about your business: "They're almost constantly mating."