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Two Berkeleyans Win Big in Bay Area Contests: Singer Angela Arnold and Environmentalist Mark Liolios

Tuesday September 21, 2010 - 03:22:00 PM
Mark Liolios with volunteers at Aquatic Park
Friends of Five Creeks
Mark Liolios with volunteers at Aquatic Park
Soprano Angela Arnold
Soprano Angela Arnold


Soprano Angela Arnold of Berkeley has won the competition to sing the National Anthem at Opera at the Ballpark, San Francisco Opera’s free simulcast of Verdi’s Aida, Friday, September 24, 8pm at AT&T Park in San Francisco. Angela is the Circulation and Stacks Supervisor at UC Berkeley's Hargrove Music Library and a professional soloist – you can hear her with the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra Chorale! You can see her winning video here. .  

And Mark Liolios, head of Berkeley's Aquatic Park EGRET program, has been named one of five Cox Conserves Heroes for San Francisco Bay in 2010. The award, from the Trust for Public Land in cooperation with Cox Communications, brings the "heroes" $1,250 for their favorite nonprofit.  

An online vote, underway now at http://www.coxconservesheroes.com/san-francisco-bay-area-ca/2010-finalists.aspx, will give the winner's favorite nonprofit a total of $5000. Mark chose Berkeley Partners for Parks, fiscal sponsor for more than 20 local citizens groups including Berkeley Path Wanderers, Friends of Five Creeks, and Every Kid 2 Swim). 

He’s worked for more than a decade to restore habitat for birds and people in the lagoons just east of the I-880 freeway, built by the WPA during the Great Depression. Besides bringing hundreds of volunteers to suppress weeds and unearth historic features like waterside seating terraces, he has worked to educate citizens and Berkeley officials about the importance of the lagoons for egrets, herons, shorebirds, and other species.  

Richmond readers might prefer to vote for Bruce Bayaert instead, of course. In 1999, Bruce founded the Trails for Richmond Action Committee (TRAC) with its mission of completing the San Francisco Bay Trail in Richmond. Due largely to Bruce’s ongoing efforts, Richmond will have over 28 miles of Bay Trail built by the end of 2010. His choice:San Francisco Bay Trail Project.