On their shoulders

This Thursday, July 26, is the Milwaukee Aging Consortium’s annual Excellence Awards and recognition event at the Italian Community Center. It’s also our fifth anniversary. The governor will be there, along with the mayor. We hope to see you, too!

This year, so we can reflect on all the people and organizations that went before us—and in so many cases, are still part of our Consortium—we have fewer award categories than usual.

We’ll be giving Starr Krause the Distinguished Caregiver award. She’s been employed as a caregiver for about 30 years and is about to retire from her formal caregiving job at Aurora Day Care Center.

We’ll also be giving Daniel Bader and the Helen Bader Foundation the Leadership award for their role in helping start and sustaining the Milwaukee Aging Consortium. We are privileged to be one among many of the programs for aging and Alzheimer’s disease benefiting from that organization’s stewardship.

But first, we’ll recognize the members of the Older Adult Service Providers Consortium that went before us, our first board members, and the original founding members of the Milwaukee Aging Consortium. What an impressive group they are!

In getting ready for this event, I got to learn more about the history of not only the Consortium but aging professionals in this area. Not only are they a wonderful bunch, but they are still out there, in the work world or in private life, making life better for older people.

Thanks seems like such a small word to express our gratitude.