What a beautiful and comfortable venue for such an event. As the committee chair I would like to extend the thanks of our committee, the Chamber and this evening’s assembled guests to our hosts and fellow Chamber members, The Country Day School. Thank you for partnering with us on this event. Everyone we’ve worked with has been so gracious and helpful. It has made our job so much easier. Thanks as well to our trio of musicians who have provided some beautiful music for us, as well as the wonderful dancers from York Dance Academy.

I would like to recognize and thank the wonderful work done last year by Marion Tripp and that BAA committee. They did a great job revitalizing our town’s interest in these awards and this year’s committee has worked very hard to continue that momentum and I think they have been very successful.

I’d also like to recognize and thank the BAA committee members. Robin Taylor-Smith, Marion Howell, Peter Dickens, Nicole Williams, Anne Stolte, and the Chamber staff, Michael Keith, Judy Marshall, Nancy Eveleigh Browne and Caroline Rusnell. We had a very short time frame to work within, and everyone went above and beyond. My personal thanks to all of you.

A special thanks goes out to all of our restaurant and catering partners who have helped make this evening so special. Especially because of the times, we wanted to engage with, and promote as many aspects of our wonderful business community in Aurora as possible. Each of our food station participants stepped up in a big way and has really outdone themselves. Thank you.

And our sponsors for this evening and these awards. A huge thank you for supporting this event and thus, our members and their businesses. This event would not have been possible without you. Thank you!

I had a math teacher in high school who told me that practice doesn’t make perfect, but rather perfect practice makes perfect. I’d contend that it is the same thing with recognition. What is important is not just the recognition, but how relevant and meaningful it is. Over time our local businesses have changed and so too must our awards and recognition.

As a consequence, we will be striking a working group to build on what’s been accomplished in the last couple of years of the BAA and take the opportunity to get input from members, past recipients and future recipients on how we can update and change our process and award categories to make them even better. So stay tuned and if you want to get involved in that process, please let us know.

Barbara Dawson
Chair, BAA Committee