Baltakis named Rotary Citizen of the Year 2013

She thought that she was going to the Eunice Rotary Club’s annual Christmas party to hear her husband give a speech.
But the only speech made that night was when Rotarian John Pucheu announced the club’s annual “Citizen of the Year” award recipient.
Donna Baltakis said that her heart raced and her body began to shake when it was announced that she was the 2013 Eunice Rotary Club’s “Citizen of the Year”.
“It’s just such an honor to be citizen of the year of somewhere where you’re not from,” said Baltakis. “It’s like the people have said, ‘We accept you, you’re one of us’. And I think that’s so important.”
John Pucheu said that Baltakis had many qualifying factors for the award.
“The main thing that she has done is that she has made Eunice a better place to live,”said Pucheu. “With her Keep America Beautiful work and her emphasis on cleaning up the city, she also works on the LSUE Performing Arts Committee and these are the two things that the Eunice Rotary Club focused on when we were talking about who would be the person to honor.”
Baltakis has been an active volunteer within the community since she and her husband, Tony, have been residents of Eunice now in their 17th year.
“I won’t stop,” said Baltakis as she accepted her award on Wednesday evening. “I’ve got some great ideas for next year for the ‘Great American Clean-Up’ and for the United Way– who is now recognizing that Eunice is a part of St. Landry Parish. We’re going to do some wonderful things.”
Baltakis said that she wanted to make Eunice a better place to live, not just for the children, but for the people who live here now.
“I wanted to make Eunice my home, you know, if we’re going to live here I want to become part of the community and try to do something significant,” said Baltakis. “I guess because my whole life because of growing up with Polio, and so many people helped me, my whole life has been giving back. Eunice is a wonderful community and we have so many things going for us.”
Baltakis said that when she first came to Eunice, things were different.
“I just felt that Eunice that people in Eunice didn’t have any pride,” said Baltakis. “People didn’t want to support Eunice businesses, something was just wrong. So I just wanted to do something. You hear about all of the bad things: the schools and the crime and the drugs. And that wears you down. We’ve got to think of the good things, you know, the nice things that are going on like with the people who are involved in clubs like the Eunice Community Choir. The churches are doing so much good work. And so I just wanted to get involved. If you live in a community you should support that community and be active in that community to make a difference.”
Baltakis is an “excellent choice” for the 2013 award, according to the 2012 winner, Ginny Moody.
“Donna is very involved in all aspects of the community and culture and education,” said Moody. “She’s very concerned with our city. She’s a driving force between the development of the ‘Keep Eunice Beautiful’ and she brought the organization ‘Keep America Beautiful’ to the attention of the city. And she put it all together so that anybody who lives her can see the difference that it’s making.”
Including Moody, four of the last five named Citizen of the Year honorees have been female with Jean McManus in 2008; Bill Thompson in 2009; Alma Reed in 2010; Robin Parker in 2011 and Ginny Moody in 2012.
“I think that it’s a great thing to see women finally stepping up. It’s good for kids to see that too. Kids can look at their moms and think on how great she is in doing what she does as mom– which can mean helping with carpooling kids to school, picking up kids after practice – and she could be “Citizen of the Year” one day too.”
Moody jokingly said that she and Baltakis will soon get together for lunch and compare their engraved plaques– which is, along with the recognition, the standard token of appreciation for all Eunice Rotary Club Citizen of the Year recipients.
However, for Donna Baltakis it was so much more.