The California Park & Recreation Society (CPRS) announced at its annual conference held virtually this month that Ed and Sandy Burr were recipients of the organization\u2019s 2020 Champion of the Community Service Award of Excellence. The award honors individuals or organizations who have contributed significant effort to influence and improve the quality of their community through parks and recreation. This statewide award recognizes the contributions of those who volunteer and\/or provide support and services that furthers the mission and quality delivery of park and recreation services, programs and facilities.<\/p>\n
As a prominent business family in La Mesa, the Burrs have made many personal and financial commitments to La Mesa and surrounding communities. After entering the waste collection industry in 1954 as the owner\/operator of a single truck, they developed EDCO and its sister company Burrtec Waste Industries into one of the largest family-owned and operated waste collection and recycling firms in the United States. EDCO\u2019s commitment to the environment is displayed by investment in Southern California\u2019s newest co-mingled recycling facility and a new state-of-the-art anaerobic digestion plant for post-consumer food and green waste; in addition to operating a near zero-waste Renewable Natural Gas (RNG) powered collection fleet. The Burr\u2019s and EDCO\u2019s commitment to the communities in which they serve is evident through generous donations to community programs and capital projects to improve quality of life of citizens.<\/p>\n
The Burrs have been long known for their community involvement and support of various organizations across the San Diego region. Under Ed\u2019s leadership as a founding board member, the La Mesa Park & Recreation Foundation (LMPRF) was established in 1999 to facilitate quality projects and programs that provide activities to strengthen community and family bonds and foster pride in La Mesa parks. The Foundation granted more than $1 million towards their first capital project, the development of the 23-acre joint use sports complex located on the grounds of Parkway Middle School, now known as the Junior Seau Sports Complex. Over the past 20 years Foundation projects have included the \u201cIt\u2019s Child Play\u201d campaign that raised funds to replace aging playgrounds in five City of La Mesa parks. Because of the Burr\u2019s generous support to the Foundation the new playground at Vista La Mesa Park included an EDCO recycling truck as the tot lot in their honor.<\/p>\n
As part of the Boys and Girls Club of East County Foundation\u2019s capital campaign, the Burr\u2019s generously donated to the construction of both a Teen Center at Highwood Park (2004) and a new Clubhouse on school property at La Mesa Arts Academy (2013), joint projects with the Boys and Girls Club of East County, the City of La Mesa, the La Mesa-Spring Valley School District, and the LMPRF.<\/p>\n
Mr. Burr serves on the board of directors for the Challenge Center, a not-for-profit facility that provides rehabilitation and physical therapy. The Burrs were also co-chairs of a recent Sharp Grossmont Hospital capital campaign and donated $5 million toward its new heart care facility, now named the Burr Heart & Vascular Center, in recognition of their generous gift \u2014 the largest in the hospital\u2019s history.<\/p>\n
\u201cEDCO and the Burrs are financial sponsors of every special event held by the City and the Foundation, in addition to generously giving to many other organizations in the San Diego region and other communities where their business operates\u201d said La Mesa\u2019s Director of Community Services Sue Richardson. \u201cIt is with great pleasure that the City of La Mesa recognizes Ed and Sandy Burr as champions of the community.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Burrs are honored in Downtown La Mesa\u2019s Walk of Fame and Ed is a lifetime honorary member of the La Mesa Rotary.<\/p>\n
To learn more about the La Mesa Park and Recreation Foundation visit lamesaparks.org. CPRS is a membership organization with just over 4,000 members representing the 535 local parks and recreation agencies throughout the state. The mission of CPRS is to advance the profession and its members through education, networking, resources, and advocacy. Learn more at www.cprs.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The California Park & Recreation Society (CPRS) announced at its annual conference held virtually this month that Ed and Sandy Burr were recipients of the organization\u2019s 2020 Champion of the Community Service Award of Excellence. The award honors individuals or organizations who have contributed significant effort to influence and improve the quality of their community […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":227472,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11548","_seopress_titles_title":"Burrs recognized for commitment to parks","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11548,11551,11550],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-227471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-la-mesa-courier","category-news","category-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/227471","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=227471"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/227471\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/227472"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=227471"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=227471"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=227471"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}