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Touch
of Gray - June / July 2003
Carolina
Meadows Habitat Home Dedicated in Pittsboro
Arnold Lau
Carolina
Meadows Habitat Home Dedicated in Pittsboro
Volunteers worked late into the night to be ready for the
dedication of Chatham County's 39th Habitat for Humanity house
in Pittsboro on May 17. Forty Carolina Meadows residents attended
the dedication, arriving in two buses. More than forty local
officials, community and church leaders, friends and neighbors
joined the community in welcoming Charity Lassiter and her
two youngsters to their new home. Prominent in the celebration
was Charity's grandmother, the Rev. Linda MacCrimmon, associate
minister of Alston Grove Congregational Church in Chapel Hill.
Rev. MacCrimmon gave the opening greeting and blessed each
of the rooms in the house.
To Carolina Meadows residents this bright new home on Eastwood
Drive had special meaning. It was the first ever Habitat home
completely funded by a continuing care community in the State
of North Carolina.
The dedication on a cloudy spring day marked the end of a
yearlong effort by Vickie Badrow and Bert Morhart, and the
active support of Carolina Meadows residents and staff to
fund, build and equip this home.
First, there was a six months campaign to raise the $50.000.00
needed. By November the goal was reached with contributions
from 228 residents and staffers. Groundbreaking, originally
planned for December but delayed by the winter ice storm,
was held in January. Then followed many trips to Pittsboro
by residents and staff members to work on the house. While
Habitat subcontracts for HVAC and plumbing, volunteers, Habitat
Partners and future homeowners perform the bulk of the construction
labor. Working as construction volunteers with Americorps
staffers were Carolina Meadows residents Dick Ballard, Bert
Morhart, Jack Parry, John Rocco and Dave Hopp (Vickie Badrow's
son-in-law). Incidentally Jack Parry also did double duty,
as a member of Chatham Habitat's electrical crew. Maintenance
Department staffers who took part were Jim Herndon, Krist
McLasughlin, Michael Lach and Robert Poteete. Another Meadows
group who played a big part in getting the house in shape
was the interior paint group. These residents were Vickie
Badrow, Lois Morhart, Pat Ballard, Glenn Johnson, Alan Kaplan,
Jody Sitz, Janet Welanetz, and Ted White. Also wielding brushes
were staffers Jody Hite and Wynne Thomas. Other local groups
who helped to build and equip the new house came from UNC-CH's
Habitat for Humanity Student Chapter as well as a group of
UNC Medical Students who gave up vacation time to work on
the project.
"We all know the hard work and love that went into the
building of this house", commented Vickie Badrow at the
dedication. "Carolina Residents can feel proud that they
have made a difference in the lives of our Chatham County
neighbors."
Habitat for Humanity - "Building Houses - Changing Lives"
had its beginnings in Georgia in 1976, barely a generation
ago. Its purpose was to provide, all over the world, decent,
affordable housing for those who needed it. Today Habitat
is building in more than 3,000 towns, cities and villages
in more than 80 countries worldwide. Habitat houses are purchased
by the homeowner families. Three factors make Habitat houses
affordable to low-income people worldwide. Houses are sold
at no profit, with no interest charged on the mortgage. Homeowners
and volunteers build the houses under trained supervision
and so save greatly on construction costs. Individuals, corporations,
faith groups and others provide financial support.
Chatham Habitat for Humanity, or CHFH for short, was established
by community volunteers in 1989 to address the local problems
of inadequate and unaffordable housing. Since building its
first home, CHFH has partnered with families of all faiths
and backgrounds to purchase homes, and has supervised hundreds
of diverse volunteers to bring them to completion. Amy Powell,
its Executive Director, comments 'CHFH views the process of
bringing people together from all walks of life to hammer
nails just as vital to community building as the resulting
affordable homes."
The Carolina Meadows Habitat house sits on the site of an
old well and the ruins of a local church, the Church of God
and Prophecy. The house is 1,056 square feet in area, with
3 bedrooms, a bathroom with a shower/tub combination, and
a modern well equipped kitchen with a double stainless steel
sink, beautiful wooden wall cabinets, and a refrigerator and
stove (which, by the way, are donated to all Habitat affiliates
by Whirlpool). There is a washer and dryer in a closet at
one end of the kitchen. There is a comfortable living room,
as well as a dining area. The house is heated and cooled with
a heat pump. Habitat is enrolled in an energy efficiency program
that guarantees the owner's heating/cooling portion of their
electric bill for the first year at a very affordable sum.
This is due to specifications Habitat incorporates into the
design. The house also contains some "universal design"
aspects, including hallway, doorways and bath to accommodate
a wheelchair, and light switches and windows placed lower
for accessibility. There are drapes on the windows and most
of the floors are carpeted. And there are cooling fans throughout.
This is indeed a comfortable and very livable home.
To date over 100 Chatham County residents--the majority of
them children--have benefited from moving into a safe, decent
Habitat home. And the work does not end with the house just
dedicated. Construction crews have already begun work in Bear
Creek on the next three houses to be built. There are also
major plans for building Habitat Homes in the Siler City area.
By way of postscript, Carolina Meadows residents are happy
to know that there is an international impact from their financing
of the Lassiter house. Their contributions are also making
a difference in far-flung corners of the world. All Habitat
for Humanity affiliates--in 87 different countries--sign a
covenant agreement to tithe a portion of the money raised
locally to fund construction of houses in other countries.
For each home completed in Chatham County, $1500 is sent to
Habitat International to construct homes in other parts of
the world. Last year affiliate tithes totaled over nine million
dollars worldwide, and Chatham Habitat for Humanity was honored
to share its blessings in mid-East Africa and in El Salvador
hurricane relief.
-- Des Reilly, Resident
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Arnold
Lau
The time was 1960. Front and center
was Arnold Lau, now a resident of Carolina Meadows, but then
a Secret Service agent assigned to protect President-elect
John Kennedy who was vacationing in Palm Beach. Through Secret
Service channels came word that a dangerous man well known
to the Secret Service was headed to Palm Beach, possibly to
harm Kennedy.
The agents, working closely as usual with the local police,
informed them of the possible threat. Says Lau: "We knew
about this man's car. One day the Kennedys were going to church.
I was posted at the family compound. We didn't see this fellow.
He was a block or two blocks away, at a spot where he could
see into the Kennedys' compound. He had his car rigged with
dynamite. His intention was to crash into Kennedy's car when
he left for church. On this occasion, the man saw Mrs. Kennedy
and the children, and in his mind, said he wasn't mad at her.
He would wait and get a better shot at the president-elect.
So he passed it up. A couple of minutes later the Palm Beach
police spotted his car and bagged him. We know that he was
dead serious, and potentially a suicide bomber. He was probably
a mental case. There was no evidence that he was working for
a foreign government."
Like other thwarted attempts on presidential lives, this one
was not publicized at the time. "They don't like to publicize
such attempts," said Lau. "It could generate more
attempts."
That was one of the memorable incidents that Arnie Lau, age
80, a big man with a big laugh, recalls from his 27-year career
with the Secret Service. That career began in 1952, when Lau
opted out of a teaching job in his native New Jersey and emerged
successfully from the rigorous selection process used to pick
new agents.
Lau first encountered the Kennedys on election night of 1960.
Under the law of the time, the Secret Service did not protect
candidates, only presidents and their families and presidents-elect
and their families. Anticipating a possible Kennedy election
victory, the Secret Service posted Lau and other agents in
a motel at Hyannis Port, where they registered as The Savings
Bond Committee.
Recalls Lau: " We were in touch with the Director, and
when it became apparent that Kennedy had won the election,
we had orders to move in to the Kennedy compound." Soon
afterward John Kennedy appeared, and invited the agents to
come inside out of the cold. He opened a refrigerator crammed
with cans of Heineken beer and invited the agents to help
themselves, an offer that the agents were obliged to decline
while on duty. However, the president-elect made a pot of
coffee and cut a cake that was on hand, and the agents enjoyed
the snacks as they rotated duty posts.
Lau got his first experience as a presidential bodyguard in
the later months of the Harry Truman administration. As he
recalls, "I first went to the White House with Truman
on a 30-day assignment. I stayed for three months. I had just
been married, and my wife was able to come down on weekends.
The big thrill for her was when my boss arranged for her to
sit on the platform at the White House Christmas Tree lighting."
While presidents do not ordinarily get chummy with their Secret
Service agents, Truman was less formal that some of his predecessors-and
successors. Lau recalls the late afternoon when Truman had
just completed an unusually trying day in the Oval Office,
and with Lau trailing by a few respectful paces, walked outside
the White House headed for the residential wing. The President
stopped, asked Lau his name, and remarked in a dejected tone,
"It's a great life, isn't it? But you know, I wouldn't
swap it for anything!" Moments later, he said, "Mr.
Lau, will you do me a favor? Will you call Admiral Graham
for me." Admiral Graham was the White House physician.
"Please tell him I thought he did a hell of a job on
television today."
After the President had left for his living quarters, Lau
turned to a White House policeman. "How do I call Admiral
Graham?" he asked. " Just pick up a telephone and
tell the operator you want to speak to Admiral Graham,"
said the policeman. It worked, and the Secret Service agent
passed the presidential word to the Admiral, who remarked
to Lau, "He's a hell of a guy, isn't he!"
After the Eisenhower landslide election of 1952, Agent Lau
was detailed to help guard the president-elect, who was still
president of Columbia University. Early in the Eisenhower
Administration, Agent Lau accompanied the President to a summit
conference in Geneva. Said Lau: "The President stayed
in a villa right on Lake Geneva, and I can recall driving
through the streets in a follow-up car and hearing people
screaming 'Mon ami!, Mon ami!"'
While President Eisenhower seldom exchanged personal comments
with his Secret Service agents, Mrs. Eisenhower made it a
point to know the men and their names, especially the ones
who protected her grandchildren at Gettysburg, PA.
In the Lyndon Johnson administration in the 1960s, Lau was
on White House security duty on West Executive Avenue when
word arrived that a mob of 500 protesters was headed to the
White House with intent to break into the grounds. The Secret
Service called on the mounted U.S. Park Police who with their
horses managed to break up the mob before it could invade
the White House grounds.
In 1961 Lau was promoted to agent-in-charge of the Secret
Service office in Scranton, PA. There the work still involved
presidential security, running background checks on suspicious
individuals, but much of the work also involved the government's
continual fight against counterfeiters of currency, bonds,
and other government documents. In fact, the Secret Service's
original mission, from its founding under Andrew Johnson in
1875, was the suppression of counterfeiting, which was rampant
at the time. The SS was charged with presidential security
after the assassination of President William McKinley in 1901,
and the mission has since been extended to the protection
of vice-presidents, former presidents, presidents-elect and
vice presidents-elect, major presidential and vice- presidential
candidates, widows of former presidents until their remarriage
or death, and minor children of former presidents to the age
of 16, and visiting heads of state. Logically, considering
its early mission to suppress counterfeiting, the Secret Service
remained part of the Treasury Department until 2002, when
it was folded into the new Department of Homeland Security.
After completing his tour of duty in Scranton, Lau was appointed
agent-in-charge in Cincinnati, and in 1967 was designated
to lead the Training Program for agents. His new title of
Assistant Director made him one of the senior men in the Service.
The Secret Service wants its agents to have all the basic
skills of law enforcement, such as surveillance, weapons handling,
report writing, how to make an arrest, and such specialized
skills as mounting and dismounting a moving automobile. Drawing
on his old skills as a teacher, Lau developed courses for
the agents, using experienced agents as instructors, and sometimes
outside experts.
Lau recalls that in his early days, the Service operated on
very slim budgets, used old cars until they fell apart, and
agents lived on scanty per diem allowances when away from
their home bases. As the missions assigned to the Secret Service
expanded, so did its personnel and its budgets.
At times Lau himself was a guest lecturer at the FBI Academy,
the International Police Academy, and the Army Military Police
School, among others.
On the day of his retirement on September 25, 1979, the Secret
Service honored him with a Meritorious Service Award, and
one of his colleagues paid a warm written tribute: "Arnie
Lau has probably influenced the performance of more people
in the Secret Service than any other single individual. During
his 11 years as head of Secret Service Training he set standards
and established policies which will continue long into the
future, placing Secret Service employees among the best trained
law enforcement personnel anywhere."
Two years after his retirement, Arnie and Mary Lou Lau, attracted
by the University, excellent medical facilities and a mild
southern climate, moved to Chapel Hill. From their home they
traveled together, making up in part for the years when Mary
Lou could not join her husband on his official travels, enjoying
at times the leisurely life style of travel in a Recreational
Vehicle. Arnie and Mary Lou were active in church work, and
Arnie was a leader in the local Crime Stoppers organization,
which lends civilian assistance to the police in crime prevention.
When Carolina Meadows was still in the planning stage, they
attended a promotional presentation at the Hotel Europa in
Chapel Hill, and deposited a down payment toward a villa they
hoped to occupy when they were ready. In August 1999, they
moved to Carolina Meadows.
-- Bob Parker, Resident
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