LEHA awards two educational scholarships per year in order to encourage outstanding students in the environmental health field. Two scholarships of $1000.00 each are awarded, one to an undergraduate and one to a graduate student. Students may be nominated by any LEHA member in good standing, or any official of an accredited university or college offering a degree program in Environmental Health.

This year, we received scholarship applications from several well deserving individuals, however, because the applicants did not meet the scholarship requirements, the scholarships were not awarded.

Susan L. Welch, RS, CIH, CSP is the recipient of the 2001 Outstanding Registered Sanitarian Award Susan received a B.A. degree in Spanish/Microbiology as well as a B.F.A. in Graphic Arts and a MSPH in Environmental Health Science from Tulane School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine.

Susan began her career as a Communicable Disease Investigator the Louisiana Dept. of Health. For 10 years, she worked at Tulane performing health and safety and sanitarian duties at the Office of Environmental Health and Safety, the Medical Center and University Hospital and Clinic, School of Public Health, and the Tulane Primate Center. Four of those years, she was Manager of The Tulane Occupational Health and Safety Services. Presently, is on the adjunct faculty of the Tulane School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, lecturing in environmental health courses and teaching the Principles of Industrial Hygiene Course.

She also worked for Texaco Corporation as an Area Coordinator in the Environmental Health and Safety/IH Division, and later began a consulting career in environmental health and industrial hygiene, which has taken her from Louisiana to Alaska, South America and Central America performing her industrial hygiene, safety and Sanitarian activities.

Susan holds Sanitarian License # 786; National Registration through NEHA (R.S. # 83179.); and is a Certified Safety Professional and Certified Industrial Hygienist.

She has served for many years as Secretary and Editor of the LEHA newsletter and the Constitution and By-Laws committee; participated in NEHA as a national member; having attended many Annual Educational Conferences where she gave platform presentations for the Institutional Environmental Health Section.

Susan is a member of the Louisiana Environmental Health Association; the American Industrial Hygiene Association; the National Environmental Health Association; and the Deep South Chapter of the American Industrial Hygiene Association.

Roger W. Gingles is the recipient of the 2001 Outstanding Environmental Professional Award. He is married and has two children.

Roger has played a key role in drafting and promulgating numerous environmental regulations which have directly enhanced public health and the natural environment in our state. Key accomplishments have included the LDEQ Regulatory Development Procedure (1989), Louisiana Solid Waste Regulations (1993), the Louisiana Subtitle D Application allowing Louisiana to become the first state in EPA Region 6 to have an approved municipal solid waste landfill program (1993), the LDEQ Risk/Cost/Benefit Analysis Guidance Document (1996), the LDEQ Laboratory Accreditation Rule (1997), and the Louisiana Voluntary Remediation Regulations (expected). He is currently active in the Brownfields issues.

Roger represented LDEQ on the Louisiana Comparative Risk Project task force (1990-91), Solid Waste Regulations citizens advisory committee (1990-93), the USEPA/ASTSWMO Industrial Solid Waste Steering Committee and Task Force (1994-95), and was the liaison for the Office of Solid and Hazardous Waste to the 1993 legislative session.

A past president of LEHA, Roger was an active Board Member for many years and served many offices in LEHA. During his presidency, LEHA celebrated its 50th anniversary with numerous special activities at the annual conference, including a recognition ceremony for all past presidents. Roger continues active involvement in LEHA and is currently serving on the Board of Directors. In 2001, Roger was the editor of the LEHA newsletter, and currently works on the committee.

James D. Miller, M.T. ASCP, CHMM, CPM is a recipient of the 2001 Presidential Citation. James is married and has three children.

He has done an outstanding job this year creating an access database that is now fully automated to maintain and track: finances, membership status, the Board of Directors positions and length of service for historical purposes; sponsorship and scholarship information, and many other items. He has also developed queries and specialized reports of his own design, and those requested by Board members throughout the year. Many nights and weekends were spent perfecting this database.

James helped Marian Aguillard design the conference brochure cover, and he designed the workshop, conference, and speaker certificates, and name tags. He purchased the conference folders, stamps for mail outs, plaques, and other associated items; printed all of the certificates and name tags, and assembled all of the speaker plaques and the name tags, complete with ribbons; and was responsible to obtain equipment for the conference.

All of this was done while collecting the mail, and performing normal treasury duties of depositing the money collected, tracking and maintaining the finances, and entering pertinent information to track membership, workshop, conference, and sponsorship funds.

Marian U. Aguillard, P.E. is a recipient of the 2001 Presidential Citation.

Marian is married and has three children and four grandchildren. She has done an outstanding job this year coordinating the annual educational conference. Marian was organized from the start, developing her team, a working budget, and working out the details to bring the conference to a new location, St. Francisville. No detail was left unthought of or undone, down to the hospitality room, speakers plaques, and volunteer gifts.

Marian enhanced the effectiveness of sponsorship solicitations from industry by personally creating, editing, and publishing greater amounts of literature sent to potential benefactors. In addition, she was the first to seek and obtain agency authority (LDEQ) to underwrite the conference as a Benefactor.

Marian was also successful in engaging participation from legislators, some by speaking and others by attendance. The presence of the legislators at the conference was beneficial to educate representatives of our state by enhancing LEHA's presence, and by networking with members of the Louisiana Legislature.

Marian has been a very dear friend to the President and the organization, and was been a source of encouragement to the President during her term.