The Press Club of Long Island presented equine journalist Diana De Rosa with their prestigious Phil Spahn award at their annual awards dinner on Thursday, June 7th. The Phil Spahn award is presented to a PCLI member who has demonstrated outstanding service to journalism, PCLI or to the community.  For the past three years De Rosa has been on the Board of the PCLI working diligently behind the scenes.

In her acceptance speech De Rosa commented, “Like many of you I am a journalist who lives on Long Island but unlike many of you most of what I report on is not on Long Island. In fact, this year I will be covering my 7th Olympic Games.”

De Rosa, who has had to sideline all her travels for the past month in order to care for her dad, continued noting, “Recently my dad had brain surgery – the result of a fall. It has demanded a lot of our time and energy as me and my siblings get through this rough time that won’t have a happy ending. Yet, I have not resented one second of sacrifice. Matter of fact, I value this time spent with him and the lessons I’ve learned. I feel when you believe in a person or organization it’s easy to give of your time and energy.”

In the past month the PCLI Awards dinner was the only event De Rosa did not cancel and the reasons were explained in the remaining part of her acceptance speech.

“The Press Club of Long Island is an organization I really believe in. The Board meets every month to see what we can do to educate our members or inspire others to become members. Everyone on the Board gives of their time and energy to support you in this ever evolving media world we are trying to keep pace with. We do it without resentment for a good cause.

“I’d like to dedicate this trophy to all of you who inspire me to do more for you, to my fellow Board members for being as energized as I am to do what we can for YOU, to our president Dominick for thinking outside the box and always encouraging us to do more, to my former boss the late Christopher Reeve for believing that nothing is impossible and to my dad, who showed me through his own work ethic what it means to dedicate yourself to a good cause. I thank you from the bottom of my heart for honoring me with this award.”

For more details and to see photos of this year’s annual awards dinner visit the Press Club of Long Island web site at www.pcli.org.