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Diane Moore to receive local honor

Advocates executive director will be given Hazie Werner award

Jack Weinstein
Diane Moore, executive director of Advocates Building Peaceful Communities, will receive the Hazie Werner Award for Excellence at a reception at 5 p.m. Tuesday in the Mountain View foyer at The Steamboat Grand.
Jack Weinstein

If you go

What: Diane Moore named Hazie Werner Award for Excellence winner

When: 5 p.m. Tuesday

Where: Mountain View foyer at The Steamboat Grand

— Those who know her couldn’t imagine what Advocates Buil­­d­ing Peaceful Communities would be without Diane Moore.

They said the organization probably wouldn’t exist.

“I don’t think Advocates would even be here without Diane’s passion and leadership,” said Susan de Wardt, an Advocates volunteer for more than six years. “Without her dedication at the beginning, it wouldn’t be what it is.”



In 1983, Moore became the first executive director of the organization that provides services for victims of domestic abuse and sexual assault, and education for local students.

On Tuesday, Moore will receive the Hazie Werner Award for Excellence in a reception that begins at 5 p.m. in the Mountain View foyer at The Steamboat Grand. Steamboat Ski and Resort Corp. established the award in 1989 to recognize women who excel in their fields.



“Through all her community giving, activism and personal perseverance, Diane has exemplified Hazie Werner’s incredible dedication and community loyalty,” Ski Corp. President and CEO Chris Diamond said in a news release. “Diane embodies the spirit of giving back to your community and clearly has made Steamboat Springs a better place.”

Moore, 60, said she was incredibly honored to win an award named for the late Hazie Werner, a longtime Yampa Valley resident who gave so much during her life.

“She embodied lots of wonderful things about community, family and giving,” Moore said. “She was such a beautiful soul. Being honored in some small way, perhaps having some of those characteristics, is pretty humbling.”

Moore, a native of Lincoln, Neb., moved with her family to Steamboat Springs in 1981, after earning a bachelor’s degree in social work from Colorado State University and living in Denver. In 1983, she and six others started what was then called Advocates Against Battering and Abuse. She took the helm a few months later.

Moore said her background, which included social work in Denver, led her to think Advocates would be a way to serve the community.

For the first couple of years, the organization provided a 24-hour crisis hot line and response for victims of domestic abuse. Moore said her kitchen doubled as an office.

“In that time, it still wasn’t being acknowledged as a social issue,” she said of domestic abuse. “You didn’t see it in the newspapers or on TV.”

She said it wasn’t until years later that domestic violence became a big issue statewide and nationally.

In the early years, two or three confidential, private homes were used to provide women with safe shelter. Throughout the years, Advocates grew and expanded its services based on increasing needs in Routt County, Moore said.

In addition to services for victims of domestic violence and sexual assault, Advocates provides counseling, education to local students and community groups, workplace violence awareness programs, criminal justice advocacy, civil protection order assistance, supervised visitation, a Latino outreach program and more.

Last year, Moore said, Advocates provided services for nearly 300 men, women and children in the county. The organization has seven staff members and 12 to 14 trained volunteer advocates. It collaborates with local law enforcement, the district attorney’s office, the county department of human services and other organizations.

When they started Advocates 27 years ago, Moore said she had no idea what it would become. But Moore said she realized quickly that domestic violence and sexual assault were bigger issues than anyone realized.

Moore said the job became her passion. It was the work she was meant to do.

She said being recognized with the award is validation for her career, but helping others and making a difference is validation enough.

“It’s about them being happy,” Moore said. “Those are the moments, honestly, we as an agency are all about.”

Advocates Board President Alice Klauzer has known Moore since 1983. Klauzer said she was surprised it’s taken so long for Moore to be recognized with the Hazie Werner award.

“I couldn’t do that job,” Klauzer said. “She’s got the passion and the drive to do it because she believes in it so much. She’s helped a lot of people.

“She’s very, very good at what she does.”

— To reach Jack Weinstein, call 871-4203 or e-mail jweinstein@steamboatpilot.com


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