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 Previous: Chip Margelli, K7JA, Moves to Heil Sound Ltd |  Next: ARRL Granted Experimental License for 500 kHz Research by Radio Amateurs |
President's Volunteer Service Award recipient Greg Ybarra, N8HXQ. [Maria Ybarra Photos] |
ARRL Genesee County, Michigan, EC Greg Ybarra, N8HXQ -- visible just below the presidential seal on the plane's fuselage -- waits, as President George W. Bush and his entourage deplane from Air Force One. |
Ybarra is flanked by Genesee County Emergency Management Director Grace Ranger, KC8BOE (right), and Emergency Management Program Manager Tami Yorks, KC8YGS, with Air Force One in the background. |
Ybarra faces the media mob after receiving his award from President Bush. |
NEWINGTON, CT, Sep 14, 2006 -- President George W. Bush has presented the President's Volunteer Service Award to a Michigan ARRL member and Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES) volunteer. Genesee County Emergency Coordinator and RACES Radio Officer Greg Ybarra, N8HXQ, of Flint, accepted the award during the president's September 8 visit to Flint. Ybarra told ARRL he got word just a couple of weeks ago that local emergency managers had nominated him for the honor. On September 6, Ybarra got the call from the White House informing him that not only had he been selected as a "USA Freedom Corps Greeter," he'd be meeting the president in person.
"I was in shock and didn't know what to say," Ybarra told ARRL this week, "so I said, 'That is great.'" Ybarra -- who calls himself neither a Republican nor a Democrat -- says his apparent initial lack of enthusiasm on the telephone prompted the White House aide to ask if he wasn't excited to be meeting the president. But, as he put it, "I felt my heart was going a hundred miles an hour, and I was trying to stay calm and focused."
Ybarra says Genesee County Emergency Management Director Grace Ranger, KC8BOE, and Emergency Management Program Manager Tami Yorks, KC8YGS, submitted his name to recognize his work as a volunteer with Genesee County ARES (GCARES). At first, Ybarra was advised not to say anything about the pending award to anyone -- not even his wife, Maria. And even when he got the okay to tell her, "Well needless to say she didn't believe me," Ybarra said.
When the big day arrived, Ybarra and his wife got to Bishop International Airport early. "I was instructed to go to the right of the steps just under the presidential seal, where the president would make the presentation," he recounted. "I was fine until the president started walking toward me. Then I got nervous and tongue tied. It was a great honor to meet President Bush in person."
The President's Council on Service and Civic Participation created the President's Volunteer Service Award program as a way to express appreciation for and honor Americans who inspire others by their example to engage in volunteer service.
Ybarra, 52, is an electrician at General Motors Powertrain -- North Flint. He's been a radio amateur and GCARES volunteer for about 20 years. He also teaches Amateur Radio licensing classes.--some information from Jerry Baker, KD8AYL/GCARES
| Previous: Chip Margelli, K7JA, Moves to Heil Sound Ltd | Next: ARRL Granted Experimental License for 500 kHz Research by Radio Amateurs |
