Parker Honored As LAA Partner Of The Year
Thursday, February 15th, 2024
Dalton City Administrator Andrew Parker is being honored by the Latin American Association (LAA) as the organization's 2024 LAA Northwest Georgia Partner of the Year. The organization will honor Parker at its annual Compañeros Awards Luncheon in Atlanta.
The LAA presents its Partner of the Year Award each year to "an LAA partner who has gone above and beyond in serving the Latino community. Award recipients are people who have shown unparalleled passion, dedication, and expertise in their work." The organization further says that recipients of the honor "are leaders who put their heart into every aspect of their service and have inspired a multitude of individuals with their selflessness.
Caption: A graphic from the LAA announcing Andrew Parker's 2024 NWGA Partner of the Year Award
"I’m extremely honored but it’s a little awkward for me to be the face of a Partner of the Year Award when I know that so many people have had as much or more of a role than I did in making these connections and bridging the gap to build a better community, which really means engaging all of the members of the community," Parker said.
Discussing the honor on Thursday, Parker was quick to laud the leadership of former Dalton Mayor David Pennington and current Mayor Annalee Sams in stating an initiative to engage leaders in the Hispanic community to form an advisory group for local leaders. Mayor Sams was a member of the City Council at the time. The group held several meetings in 2022 which led to better engagement and several members of the group being appointed to City advisory boards and committees. That group has since moved under the umbrella of the Greater Dalton Chamber of Commerce as "HOLA" - the Hispanic Leaders Association of Dalton.
That effort also led to a partnership agreement between the LAA and the City of Dalton to provide workspace inside of the Mack Gaston Community Center.
"The services that they are providing (at the Mack Gaston Community Center) to the local Hispanic community are basic quality of life services," Parker said. "Everything from helping them with their day to day paperwork, job placement, connecting members of the community with job opportunities, helping with emergency situations if there are emergency type needs that they have, home repairs, things like that. That’s an outlet that folks can go to."
Parker also mentioned that he shares credit for the honor not just with other City leaders but also other members of the local Hispanic community.
"I want to recognize CLILA, and America Gruner for all of the contributions their organization has made and they’ve also helped the City in better engaging the Hispanic and Latino community here in Dalton," Parker said. "And, certainly, Believe Greater Dalton and the Chamber for basically prioritizing two of their primary goals have been unity as a community and community pride and both of those initiatives touch the lives of everybody, but certainly those members of the community who are Hispanic and Latino."
"I can’t accept this without honoring all of the Mayor and Council members, Believe Greater Dalton, the Chamber, LAA, and CLILA," Parker said. "It has taken all of us to get to a point where we can have some celebration in the fact that we have made strides."
"I want to extend my heartfelt appreciation to the LAA, Santiago Marquez, and Rafael Huerta for selecting me as recipient of the award, but more importantly for their tireless efforts to improve Dalton for all," Parker concluded.
