Sometimes I have the honor of working on projects that can change lives

Recently, I’ve been especially fortunate to work with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to help end homelessness and to help support caregivers of wounded and ailing Veterans. This week, I also started working with Chris Cosgriff of the Officer Down Memorial Page to help redesign and enhance www.ODMP.org.

While home on winter break during his freshman year of college in 1996, Chris read an article in The Washington Post that set him on his life’s course. It was about a man about to be paroled after killing two police officers.  To Chris, the article seemed to glorify the killer and ignore the sacrifice of the officers.

When he got back to school, he used his very newly learned HTML programming skills to create a website that honors officers killed in the line of duty. One of the first officers Chris featured was Bryant Peney, killed in Ft. Lauderdale on January 6, 1996. Within a week, Ryan’s twin brother found the online memorial, and wrote to thank Chris. Chris knew then that he had found his life’s work.

Chris has been growing and improving the site ever since. In 2010, ODMP.org had 2.8 million unique visitors and 39 million page views. Newly fallen are often posted and honored within hours. The site has become such a trusted source that Chris just received a grant from the U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance to continue the work of providing real-time, line-of-duty, death notifications. In addition, the updated site will become a resource for survivors to learn about federal and state benefits (and when applicable, locality).

I encourage you to visit ODMP.org and become inspired to make a difference in your world.