South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Sunday)
‘Hidden Heroes’ honored for work at Broward nonprofits
The Community Foundation of Broward has named Coral Springs resident Tina Cortez and Parkland resident Samantha Kelly as winners of its “Nonprofit Hidden Heroes” initiative.
Among 10 other award recipients, Cortez and Kelly were recognized for their work at their respective nonprofits, earning a $500 prize and two-night vacation at the Bahia Mar Fort Lauderdale Beach Hotel. In addition to the prizes, each of the winners’ nonprofit organizations received up to
$25,000 and a VIP seat in Community Foundation’s upcoming Resilience and Recovery program, which is intended to improve nonprofit crisis preparedness.
Working as the director of the Wildlife Hospital at the Sawgrass Nature Center in Coral Springs, Cortez was praised by the center’s CEO, Robin Reccasina, emphasizing her commitment to injured animals.
“Tina designed a contactless dropoff for the public to drop off injured animals at our gate and responded to every dropoff herself,” Reccasina said in a statement.
Kelly, vice president of Rehabilitation Programs at Lighthouse of Broward for the Blind and Visually Impaired in Fort Lauderdale, helped the facility transition into an electronic format as well as organized a plan to continue providing services.
“Sam provided vision and leadership,” Lighthouse of Broward CEO Ellyn Drotzer said in a statement. “We knew we had to pivot to an online platform, but our clients’ fundamental lack of sight made this seem almost impossible. Sam led the creative plan to provide uninterrupted rehabilitative services. We closed the building on Friday and by Monday, all of our programming was transformed into an electronic format and services were constructed using a web-based platform.”
Other winners selected were: Timothy Curtin, executive director of Community Services at the Memorial Healthcare System (Hollywood) Rebecca Gould, STEM Center for Education and Career development manager at the Museum of Discovery & Science (Fort Lauderdale)
Tammy Holder, Teaching Artist-inResidence at Broward Performing Arts Foundation (Fort Lauderdale)
Xenia McFarling, vice president of rehabilitation programs at LifeNet4Families (Fort Lauderdale)
Natasha McFarquhar, emergency basic needs navigator at Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies Coalition of Broward County (Lauderhill)
Alex Nesar, director of communications at Habitat for Humanity of Broward (Fort Lauderdale)
Belinda Paulicin, director of program services at Gilda’s Club South Florida (Fort Lauderdale)
Sandra Powell, regional laboratory manager at Broward Health (Fort Lauderdale)
Patricia Ryan, director of marketing at Broward Education Foundation (Fort Lauderdale)
Elise Samet, volunteer program manager at Canine Assisted Therapy (Oakland Park)
Visit cfbroward.link/hiddenheroes.