ADRIAN — A Lenawee County philanthropist and a community organization are the recipients of two of the ProMedica Foundation’s 2022 Philanthropy Awards.
ProMedica’s Philanthropist of the Year was posthumously awarded to Frank Dick, a news release said, and ProMedica’s Ebeid Healthy Partner of the Year Award was awarded to the Lenawee Community Foundation.
Philanthropist of the Year
The ProMedica Philanthropist of the Year Award is given to individuals or couples who set a standard of excellence in the health and well-being in the community, the release said. Recipeints have provided financial support to improve health care at a ProMedica institution or within the community. The candidates have volunteered their time and have taken a leadership role to encourage and inspire others to help ProMedica achieve its mission.
Dick was a health care advocate and community leader in the Lenawee County community. He was a member of the ProMedica Bixby Hospital Foundation board, Herrick Hospital Foundation board, and Charles and Virginia Hickman Hospital operating board. He died Sept. 5 at the age of 96. He served in the U.S. Army during World War II, including during the Battle of the Bulge. He received the Bronze Star and the Purple Heart.
After the war, he returned home to Ohio and pursued a career in education, including as superintendent of schools in Portage, Pandora-Gilboa, Sylvania and Toledo.
Following his retirement from education, he was hired by the Gleaner Life Insurance Society, becoming its president and CEO, leading the organization from the late 1970s to 2000. He oversaw the Society’s move from the Detroit suburbs to Adrian and the growth of its assets from $39 million to more than $1 billion.
Along with serving on ProMedica boards, he and his wife, Shirley, helped fund a dementia care unit at ProMedica Charlotte Stephenson Manor in Adrian, endowed several scholarships through the Lenawee County Education Foundation, and provided funding to build the Frank and Shirley Dick Family YMCA on North Adrian Highway, next to ProMedica Charles and Virginia Herrick Hospital.
“He was generous, he was giving, he led by example, he was supportive of causes in the community,” Gary Cates, ProMedica’s chief philanthropy and government relations officer, said in a video announcement of the award for Dick. “… Frank, although we’re giving this posthumously, it really represents a lifetime of that type of leadership and dedication and generosity.”
“Frank was a gentleman above and beyond all. He was so very kind and thoughtful,” former Lenawee County Circuit Judge Margaret M.S. Noe said in the video. “It was incredible how he has put a fingerprint on our medical community, the educational community, our arts community, but he also taught us to give of our time and our talents.”
Randy Oostra, former CEO and president of ProMedica, said Frank and his late wife, Shirley, were examples of what community residents should be.
“He was there,” Ooostra said in the video. “He loved the people he was around. I think to a person they all said he made them feel good and he made their lives better.”
“Frank is deserving of this award, I think, because he spent his entire career and beyond, up to the age of 96 helping youth, friends and organizations be the best that they can be,” Gary McDowell, former Adrian Mayor and one of Dick’s many friends, said in the video. “That was his goal, that was what he set out to do, that was just his innate character to want to help people progress and get ahead.”
Ebeid Healthy Neighborhood Partner of the Year
The ProMedica Ebeid Healthy Neighborhood Partner of the Year is given by the ProMedica Foundation to a partner agency that has joined with ProMedica to help create communities where all individuals reach their highest potential for health, the release said. These businesses or individuals are committed to reshaping the health care delivery model to focus on the root causes of poor health by increasing access to healthy food, delivering nutritional education and providing job training opportunities.
In February 2022, the Lenawee Community Foundation partnered with ProMedica to help establish the Adrian Ebeid Neighborhood Promise, which intends to foster economic opportunity and improve health outcomes in Adrian and represents one of the nation’s largest place-based investments made in a rural community.
Dr. Julie Yaroch, president of ProMedica Hickman Hospital, said she remembers when the community foundation started and made a pledge to build on what others had started and to lower overhead costs and to put money back into the community.
“They’ve kept true to that promise,” Yaroch said in a video announcing the award. “They’re innovative, they have big ideas and they’ve made a huge impact on so many.”
The values of the community foundation and ProMedica align “so perfectly,” former community foundation president and CEO Joe Williams said in the video.
“The Lenawee Community Foundation is all about improving the health and happiness of everyone in living in Lenawee County while also giving them hope for a better future,” Williams said. “I can’t think of a better organization where their values match up with ours, or align, like ProMedica.”
Both the community foundation and ProMedica are anchor institutions in Lenawee County, community foundation board chairman David Hickman said in the video.
“We’re both the type of organization that you can count on, will get involved in the community. We’ll contribute to things in the community and just make it a better place to live,” Hickman said.
Kris Schmidt, a community foundation board member, said she never expected the Ebeid family to become involved in Adrian. Russell Ebeid was a business leader, longtime philanthropist and champion of the Arab American community in southeastern Michigan and the Toledo area. He was a benefactor of the ProMedica Ebeid Hospice Residence in Sylvania and the ProMedica Ebeid Institute for Population Health in Toledo.
“I’m sure glad because they did continue that philosophy of handing up and extending it to the Adrian area,” Schmidt said in the video. “The Lenawee Community Foundation is so proud to be part of this project, and we can’t wait to see how it expands and helps us to continue to grow health, happiness and hope, for now and forever.”
Yaroch said the community foundation is deserving of the award because of the number of lives it has touched over the years.
“Their efforts align with our mission and our efforts toward social determinants of health,” Yaroch said in the video. “To have them join our efforts and see the need in the community to support and develop the Adrian Ebeid Neighborhood Promise has been wonderful.”
“We appreciate what ProMedica is doing through the Ebeid Neighborhood Project. It really just warms my heart to know it’s all about the people, it’s all about the purpose, and it’s all about putting that in action,” community foundation board member Doug Gray said in the video, thanking ProMedica for the award and for partnering with the community foundation to serve more people.
A private recognition ceremony took place in November.
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