Several UNMC faculty and employees were honored as “Hometown Heroes” recently by Mayor Mike Fahey, for their roles in helping to bring conventions to Qwest Center Omaha, raising the city’s profile and helping to pay the facility’s debt.
The six UNMC representatives were among 37 people honored at the Dec. 19 luncheon for helping to recruit 28 conventions or events to Omaha between 2004 and 2007. In all, those conventions and events are expected to have an economic impact of more than $44.4 million for the Omaha area.
Honorees from UNMC included:
- Roxanna Jokela, director of the Rural Health Education Network office, for the National Area Health Education Center Organization Bi-Annual Conference, June 2006;
- Dan Moser, associate director for Information Technology Services, for the 2004 Association of Information Technology Professionals National Collegiate Conference;
- Horacio Plotkin, M.D., assistant professor of pediatrics and a bone disease specialist in the Munroe-Meyer Institute, for the 2006 national conference for the Osteogenesis Imperfecta Foundation;
- Brenda Ram, planning coordinator for the Center for Continuing Education, Shyamal Roy, Ph.D., professor of obstetrics and gynecology, and Jorge Rodriguez-Sierra, Ph.D., professor of genetics, cell biology and anatomy, for the 2006 annual meeting of the Society for the Study of Reproduction. Dr. Roy chairs the conference’s Local Arrangements Committee, of which Dr. Rodriguez-Sierra and Ram are members.