VSAAC Presents 2006 Valley Community Champions Awards & Recognition Breakfast
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VSAAC held its first Valley Community Champions Breakfast and Award Recognition Event on November 17^th  at John J. Sullivan’s Restaurant in Ansonia.  The event honored several Valley citizens who have “taken action and effected change to help prevent substance abuse in the Valley community.”

Cathi Kellett, Girl Scout Troop 290 Leader/Program Coordinator for Griffin Hospital’s Valley Parish Nurse Program; Marlene Anderson, Oxford resident/Board of Education Employee; and Richard Kearns, Seymour resident/Seymour Public Schools Director of Security were this year’s Community Champions Award recipients.  Girl Scout Troop 290 members Calli Kellett, Sarah Kutash, Kaite Roberts, and Brittany Ruggiero also received special recognition.  “We are so excited about the awards and the positive response that we received from the community in participating in the nomination process,” said Pamela Mautte, Director of VSAAC.  “The work that is being done to help prevent substance abuse, on the grass-roots, community level, is so critical to our efforts to keep our kids safe from tobacco, alcohol and drug abuse – and these awards will help spotlight and applaud those efforts.”

The Valley Community Champions Awards were supported on a national level by General Mills.  As the makers of Wheaties cereal, General Mills created special memorial Wheaties cereal boxes featuring pictures of each award winner.  In addition to the awards ceremony, the breakfast event also featured David Pease as the main speaker.  Many Valley residents will remember Mr. Pease, who lost two sons to alcohol-related incidents, as a guest panelist at VSAAC’s much heralded Town Hall Meeting this past spring.

General Mills created special memorial Wheaties cereal boxes featuring pictures of each award winner.