2004 Distinguished Alumni Award Recipient Elsie Owens Has Passed Away

Elsie Owens, longtime health and civil rights activist and 2004 recipient of Stony Brook's "Distinguished Alumni Award for Public Service", passed away on July 23, 2005 after a long battle with heart disease. She was 77.

Owens was born in Abbeville, SC, and was raised on 125th Street and Lexington Avenue in Harlem, NY. She and her husband Robert Owens moved to Gordon Heights in 1959 and she immediately started fighting for her new neighborhood.

In the 1960’s, she lobbied town government for paved roads and street lighting. In the 1970’s, Elsie focused her efforts on establishing a community health center in Coram to serve residents who could not afford private medical treatment. The county established one and later named it for her. Replacing the aging building in Coram, a new facility the Elsie Owens North Brookhaven Health and Social Services Center was dedicated in October, 2005. While raising five children and continuing her community activism, Elsie found time to return to school, earning her Master's degree in Social Work from Stony Brook in 1978, which she often stated was her most cherished weapon in her quest for the health-care center. "I got that degree only so I could get that clinic," Elsie said. "I wanted the powers to be to know I know what I'm talking about." Owens was also a 20-year president of the Brookhaven NAACP.

The recipient of numerous awards, including the National Association of Social Workers "Social Worker of the Year Award" and the 1991 "Woman of the Year Award" from the Town of Brookhaven, Elsie served on the President's Diversity Council. She was named President of the School of Social Welfare Dean's Advisory Committee in 1998 by Dean Frances Brisbane, and in 2000 she received the School of Social Welfare "Distinguished Alumni Award".