February Honorees

Richard Simpson is an Accountant II in our general accounting unit. He has only been here with us for 4 months, coming from the Department of Housing. During this short frame time, he has made a big impact. The general accounting unit was short staffed due to an internal promotion, and was behind in generating bills to other agencies. Richard came in ready and learned his functions quickly, and was able to get us caught up immediately. While he was doing this, he was also the primary reviewer of most processed invoices that we send to the Comptroller Office to pay. This is a very tedious job, that requires full attention to detail, and Richard has done a wonderful job catching things before they become larger issues. In the month of January, he processed over 300 receivables and released over 500 invoices. Thank you Richard for all you have done in clearing the backlog of receivables and making the fiscal team successful!

The Office of Energy and Sustainability (OES) has been working with Andra Shaw for over one year now on three complicated and intrusive projects that affected nearly every building in the Annapolis Capital Complex. These projects have required close coordination and cooperation on the part of her staff, the contractors and the project managers at OES. Andra has been proactive every step of the way to ensure that personnel associated with all three projects have had access to the buildings and their managers. She has now helped us through two legislative sessions, taking time from her busy schedule to ensure that our projects are able to move forward. Andra has provided her time and effort through some difficult situations while remaining poised and exhibiting tremendous grace under fire. Without her efforts and assistance, our projects would have been nearly impossible to complete, so for this reason, Andra has been Caught DGS.

On 2/21/2022 K9 Champ and his handler Lt. Barnes were requested by the Annapolis Police Dept. to respond to an address near Tyler Ave. for a double shooting. Once at the location Lt. Barnes deployed K9 Champ in attempts to locate either the firearm used, or the casings ejected during the shooting. After a brief search of the area Champ alerted on an area near a wood line where several spent semiautomatic shell casings were located. Lt. Barnes and Champ maintained scene security until the crime scene was secured after 11PM. Daily, Champ can be seen in Annapolis conducting sweeps of the Statehouse, Senate and House office buildings.  He continues to be one of MCP’s best ambassadors to the public and state employees.

On January 19, 2022 at approximately 1515 hrs, Maryland Capitol Police was made aware that there was a possible gas leak in the area of 6 St. Paul. The fire chief and BCFD wanted to ensure the safety of the employees by having them exit the building away from the Baltimore St exit in case the gas leak caused an explosion. Security Officer Pamela Wheeler was working at the MTA store and realized the S/O on the scene was new and needed help. From her many years of service S/O Wheeler contacted the building manager, Mike Rose, to make an announcement but was told there was no intercom system in the building. S/O Wheeler took to action by contacting the shift supervisor and also took initiative and went from floor to floor gathering the employees and escorting them to safety through the loading dock exit. After getting all building occupants out and to a safe location, BCFD and Hazmat were able to control the gas leak at 1754 hrs. At this time all state employees were allowed back into the facility. Security Officer Wheeler displayed great knowledge and leadership during this on site emergency. 

Damon Conway is being nominated for Caught Doing Good Service. Damon has been an integral part in Lease Management & Procurement Department primarily working on Parking, Intergovernmental, and Revenue Leases’ portfolio. Damon has demonstrated knowledge, professionalism, positive attitude, and excellent customer service skills with the agencies, as well as internal customers. Damon was recently praised by Ilona Ghine, the Deputy Chief Lease Management & Procurement and by Wendy Scott-Napier, the Assistant Secretary DGS, for his willingness to help and acting quickly to resolve a critical situation. On December 30^th, 2021 it came to the Deputy Chief’s attention that effective January 1, 2022 approximately 44 parking space at 601 N. Calvert street would no longer be available for the use of staff if there wasn’t an official Holdover document mailed out to the Landlord extending the term of the parking space use. When the situation was communicated with Damon, he immediately offered his help.  While the majority of the staff was on leave celebrating the Holidays, Damon stayed late drafting Holdover letters and making sure that the information included in the letters was accurate. In addition, when Damon realized that the mail would not be picked up after 4.30pm, he rushed to the nearest Post Office making sure that the Holdover letters are postmarked by 12/30/2021 and that they are on the way to the Landlord’s office. Damon is a team-player and we look forward to his continued success in the Office of Real Estate.