May 4, 2001
Sandy Buchanan, Executive Director
Ohio Citizen Action
When I was twenty-one years old, in 1977, I came to Ohio Citizen Action (then Ohio Public Interest Campaign), as a summer intern. My first day on the job, I was greeted by the organization’s research director, Ed Kelly, who would be my boss. Ed had been one of the founders of the organization two years earlier, after helping lead the national movement against the Vietnam War.
A tall, handsome guy with a Prince Valiant haircut and New Jersey accent, Ed ushered me into his office and asked me if I’d like a cup of coffee. I was floored. At my former workplace, the women were expected to get the coffee for the men. And there, with that small kindness so typical of him, I learned my first lesson from Ed: that people in a workplace can treat each other with respect.
That summer, Ed, a librarian by training, taught me how to use the business section of the library and how to take my lengthy college prose and turn it into readable, bullet points. A brilliant thinker, Ed could see problems from all sides at once, and he taught me to ask questions before jumping to conclusions.
When I came back to Ohio Citizen Action after college, we all worked together to oppose plant closings and corporate tax breaks, and to push for a fair tax structure. Ed wrote pathbreaking research reports on the steel industry in Ohio, designed legislation, recruited allies, and drove hundreds of miles in his Chevette to gather petition signatures. A version of his model legislation requiring advance notice of plant closings, which did not pass in Ohio, became a federal law in 1989.
Ed moved back to Boston, where he had gone to college, to go to Harvard Law School in 1982. After graduation, he worked on urban redevelopment issues in Boston, and helped use the federal plant closing law to gain compensation for workers. He then put his talents to work as director of Massachusetts Citizen Action from 1993 to 1997. There, and later at other Boston-area organizations, he led campaigns on toxics, utility deregulation, and a host of local political issues. Ed also did legal work for Ohio Citizen Action during that time, where he taught me that the best way to win your case is to use only the facts the other side will admit.
Two years ago, at the age of 52, Ed learned he had cancer, which had already reached an advanced stage. By example, he then began to teach us all more lessons, with his determination to fight the disease. Though undergoing often-debilitating rounds of treatment, he continued to enjoy life, raising his son, helping and appreciating his family and friends, reading voraciously, and rooting for the Red Sox.
At Ed’s May 2 funeral in Boston, Father Robert Bullock said "Ed was more Greek than Irish in his friendships." He explained that the ancient Greeks had a highly developed concept of friendship, which included three necessary elements: first, that you enjoy each other’s company; second, that you are of benefit to each other, and third, that you work together for the common good.
The church was full of people for whom Ed was a friend in all three ways. May we all continue to learn from him.