Chamber bestows honors on outstanding citizens (updated)

By DAVID DUPONT

BG Independent News

Chet Marcin looked bemused at the question: Why is it important to do volunteer work?

After chuckling, he said: “Because it’s good for your community, good for your family, good for the public in general.”

On Saturday night The Bowling Green Area Chamber of Commerce at its annual Dinner Meeting and Awards honored Marcin and Shirley Woessner, the director of the Bowling Green Christian Food Pantry, as its Citizens of the Year.

Marcin, an attorney, said he would tell young professionals “find the things that interest you and get involved and help the community. You don’t get paid for everything you do.”

For Marcin that meant long involvement with curling in Bowling Green, first as a member and then through his son’s involvement in the junior curling.

He has also served on City Council, as an elder and trustee of First Presbyterian Church, as a president of the Optimists and Exchange clubs, and on the Wood County District Public Library Board.

Woessner became director of the food pantry after retiring from the university’s food service after the death of the previous director. She was reluctant. She wasn’t a public speaker. She would take the job for six months. She’s still at it, and still waiting for the public relations director she’d been promised at the time.

Woessner said seeing people in the need keeps her working as much as 50-60 hours a week. “You never realize how big the need is.”

She grew up on a farm, and though they weren’t rich “we had everything we needed.”

Now people come to her for help who are sleeping in their cars. “It’s an ongoing need. People always are going to be hungry. So as long as God gives me the strength, I’ll keep running the pantry.”

Woessner, who also delivers the Sentinel-Tribune, got involved because she’d been active for 25 years in the Salvation Army’s kettle campaign.  She schedules volunteers and rings the bell herself if someone doesn’t show up.

The Chamber also gave its Athena Award to Becca Ferguson, retired vice president for Human Resources at Bowling Green State University, president of Kiwanis, member of the Wood County Hospital Foundation Board, and vice president of the county Board of Developmental Disabilities.

She was also praised as a booster both of high school and university sports.

The Zeus Award was given to Dan Craig, president of Rosenboom Custom Crafted Cylinders, who has been active in the Wood County Economic Development Foundation, the hospital board and in supporting the community fireworks and holiday parade.

He was praised for his “no-nonsense approach to getting things done” and being “very supportive of the females working for him.”