[Page S1901]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        REMEMBERING KEVIN CRONIN

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, some people come to Congress to check a 
box, collect a credential, and then head to where the big bucks are: 
lobbying firms. For others, working as a Capitol Hill staffer is part 
of a lifetime of public service.
  Kevin Cronin was one of the latter types. He believed in public 
service, and I consider myself lucky that Kevin chose to work for me. 
It was during my years in the House of Representatives. Kevin was my 
lead staffer on the House Budget Committee. He was hard-working, 
clever, and smart as a whip.
  Sadly, Kevin passed away earlier this month in Cleveland, OH, the 
place where he grew up and where he first learned about politics and 
public service.
  Kevin was the middle son in a family of proud Irish American 
Democrats. Both of his parents were involved in the civil rights 
movement during the 1960s and 70s. His mom also was quite active in the 
women's movement.
  John Glenn, the astronaut hero turned U.S. Senator, was a family 
friend. So was ``Battling Bella'' Abzug. Kevin's father worked for Carl 
Stokes, the first Black mayor of Cleveland. His mother worked on 
campaigns for Jane Campbell, Cleveland's first woman mayor, and Mary 
Boyle, the first woman commissioner for Cuyahoga County.
  Kevin received his own introduction to shoe-leather politics when he 
was in middle school. He and his two brothers would knock on doors 
seeking to turn out the vote in elections.
  Kevin was also an avid tennis player in the National Junior Tennis 
League, a program founded by Arthur Ashe that used tennis to teach city 
kids important life skills.
  He graduated from Columbia University with a double major in 
political science and fine arts and earned a law degree from the 
University of Wisconsin. After that, he came to Washington. He served 
as a congressional aide for a decade and worked for some giants, 
including John Conyers, chair of the House Budget Committee, and the 
late Senator Dianne Feinstein of California.
  He was a whiz with budget details and parliamentary rules. He 
understood how to turn good ideas into good laws. Somehow, he always 
found time to encourage and teach younger staffers, including a Capitol 
Hill newbie named Pat Souders, who is now my chief of staff.
  But Kevin's real passion was grassroots organizing, so he moved back 
to Cleveland and poured himself into civic campaigns and causes. He 
worked as a pro bono attorney for a group called Bike Cleveland that 
pushed successfully for new bike lanes to connect Cleveland and its 
suburbs. He also offered legal guidance to environmental groups working 
to expand the use of renewable energy sources, including harnessing the 
great wind power potential of Lake Erie.
  He helped to preserve Cleveland's history, especially the city's 
links to the abolitionist and civil rights movements. He worked to 
raise awareness for the Cozad-Bates House, a stop on the Underground 
Railroad. He also was working to raise support to save Jesse Owens' 
childhood home and turn it into a museum.
  His main job for 15 years was working as an ad litem attorney in the 
Cleveland City Courts, representing children who had been removed from 
their family homes and, very often, had suffered neglect and trauma. It 
was difficult, heart-rending work, but he did it because he believed 
the children needed someone on their side.
  Kevin was diagnosed with severe aplastic anemia 15 years ago. It is a 
condition, similar to leukemia, in which one's body cannot produce 
enough white blood cells to protect against infection. He was able to 
lead a full life for years, thanks in part to an NIH clinical trial for 
a drug that kept his illness in check. But a few months ago, the drug 
stopped working. Kevin was 61 years old.
  I want to offer my condolences to his brothers Kiely and Rob and 
their families, to Kevin's friends, and to the countless people whose 
lives he touched and enriched, from Capitol Hill to Cleveland and far 
beyond. He was a good man, and he will be missed.

                          ____________________