[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 126 (Monday, September 20, 2010)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7197-S7198]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   TRIBUTE TO ALICE AND EDWARD PALMER

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, today I recognize Alice and Edward 
``Buzz'' Palmer for their service and dedication to Chicago's African-
American community.
  The Palmers have worked for many years in a variety of capacities to 
build a strong, involved, and educated African-American community in 
the city of Chicago.
  Alice graduated from high school at the age of 16, and with the help 
of four jobs and a scholarship, she was able to attend Indiana 
University. When she graduated in 1965, she used her degree to help 
others. She became an educator. While she taught at Malcolm X College, 
Northwestern University, and the University of Illinois at Chicago, she 
also managed to continue her own education, earning a master's degree 
from Roosevelt University and a Ph.D. from Northwestern.
  Alice realized that education extended outside of the classroom, and 
so did her work. She helped create voter education programs and founded 
the Metropolitan Chicago chapter of the YMCA's youth and government 
program. The YMCA program aims to inspire young people to civic 
engagement and create opportunities to interact with the political 
system through service learning and model government.
  As a teacher, and later as a legislator, Alice firmly believed that 
all students could learn. She made it her job to see that each student 
had that opportunity. She began a drop-out intervention program in the 
Chicago

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Public Schools to give students the skills and encouragement to stay in 
school. As an Illinois State senator, she made it a priority to bring 
charter schools to Chicago. She knew the status quo in the public 
schools was not good enough, and she worked to create more opportunity 
for Chicago's students.
  Alice has always strived to provide the African-American community 
with the education and tools necessary to build a better future. Alice 
shares that goal with her husband, Buzz.
  Buzz grew up in Chicago and experienced the racism that plagued the 
city in the 1940s and 1950s. After serving in the Air Force as an elite 
intelligence officer, he returned to Chicago and joined the Chicago 
Police Department. There, Buzz observed firsthand the tense 
relationship between the police and the African-American community, and 
in response, he created the African American Patrolman's League. The 
league worked within the department and the African-American community 
to counteract racism and change the way the CPD was perceived and the 
way it behaved.
  In the 1970s, Buzz focused his energy on addressing racial prejudice 
in the health care system. He started a community group that petitioned 
local hospitals to provide better quality health care for Black 
families and to hire more African-American medical professionals. He 
joined with other health-focused community groups and Chicago area 
medical schools to create the Chicago Area Health and Medical Careers 
Program. The program uses structured academics, counseling, 
motivational and financial support to help underrepresented minorities 
pursue degrees in medicine.
  Over the years, Buzz expanded his view and took a keen interest in 
better connecting African Americans with the international community. 
Together Alice and Buzz Palmer founded the Black Press Institute to 
compile and edit news from Black media outlets throughout the United 
States for distribution worldwide.
  On October 2 of this year, Alice and Buzz Palmer are being honored 
with lifetime achievement awards from the United Black Fund of Illinois 
for their decades of work with the African-American community in 
Chicago. I congratulate them on this award and thank them for their 
lifetime of dedication to Chicago and the African American community.

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