Honorary members
From the ACBA constitution:
Any person who has served the Alameda County Beekeepers Association or beekeeping in general, long and faithfully, may be honored with an honorary membership by a two-thirds vote of members present. The name of a candidate for honorary membership must be presented at a meeting prior to voting.
In March 2025, the officers of the club nominated these beekeepers for honorary membership, to be voted on at the April meeting (listed in alphabetical order):
Norma Brooks
Norma Brooks has served as the chair of the county fair committee for many years, continues to serve on the board, and over time she’s been willing to take on many thankless tasks like providing refreshments at meetings, handling name tags, and more. She’s the personification of making a difference by volunteering long and faithfully. If you’ve attended the county fair and been impressed by both the educational aspect of it and the design over the years, a lot of that is because Norma made it happen (although she’d tell you it was often in partnership with Judy Kovacovich). But the club might not even be at the county fair without Norma’s hard work.
Catherine Edwards
Catherine Edwards is a past president of the Alameda County Beekeepers Association, and she’s been an incredible leadership mentor to past officers of the club. Her beekeeping experience goes far beyond that of a typical backyard beekeeper. She’s the owner of Richmond Gold Honey, and sells at farmer’s markets and the seasonal fairs. She is a wonderful writer who shares her knowledge on the website and on the Bee Talk group. She and Greg Mau did the club’s first queen grafting projects together. She’s even taken her hives to almonds once or twice. She’s also friends with Randy Oliver, and they’ve long shared processes and results. Catherine is a dedicated and much-loved fixture of the club.
Joan Houston
Joan Houston has consistently given her time and energy to encourage others in the club to become better beekeepers. Joan is generous, knowledgeable, tenacious, and funny; she’s posted literally hundreds of comments on the Bee Talk group sharing her sharing her many successes and occasional pitfalls, and it’s impossible to forget her post about being stung up the nose which prompted a hilarious thread of stories and pictures from other members. She’s an incredible example of someone always willing to share her knowledge and experience if it will help others, and we’re lucky to have someone with her deep bee wisdom in our club. She was a good friend of Hal Liske before he passed away, and she’s been an important part of the Livermore beekeeping community for many years.
Jerry Przybylski
Jerry Przybylski is an obvious candidate for this honor. He served the ACBA as vice president for five years, he coordinates the swarm list, he books most of our speakers, writes the monthly newsletter and the Beekeeper’s Corner column, and runs the audio and zoom systems for meetings. He even barbecues at the cookout. If you can think of something that happens here at the club, Jerry probably has a hand in it. But he’s not just someone working behind the scenes: he dispenses tons of thoughtful advice on the Bee Talk group, and he’s given many presentations to the club. His dedication to the club is incredible, and our group would not be the same if he hadn’t joined many years ago.
Phil Stob
Phil Stob created the beautiful pollinator garden at the club apiary. He’s the kind of person to see something that needs doing and simply do it. A good example of this is hosting the popular “newbee” group before recent meetings: he thought it should be done, so he’s doing it. Phil is also deeply committed to improving the state of beekeeping in Alameda County, encouraging people to use, breed and capture local bees with local genetics. Some say he knows more than anybody else about bait hives, which he speaks about to many local clubs. And the advanced beekeeping discussions he organizes with the Local Beekeeping Initiative are fantastic. His positive attitude and enthusiasm spreads to anything he’s involved in, and he’s a big part of the culture of the club.