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Open Your Eyes

 




What makes good journalism? What makes a local blog valuable? What makes a social media post trustworthy?


Sources. High quality sources, reliable sources, and a variety of sources that provide perspective and depth.


Here is the one source at the heart of a story about The Source. Here she is: active in the community, and not hard to find.





Erika Strauss Chavarria, founder and Executive Director of 

Columbia Community Care. 




Now I’m going to tell you something that will blow your mind:


The Sun didn’t interview her for their original article.*

The Merriweather Post didn’t reach out to her, either.


Why would anyone write a piece about the most aspirational project of Columbia Community Care and not want to talk to the founder and director?


Did they think she’s not intelligent enough to know what’s going on with her own project?


Did they assume she’s dishonest? A scammer?


Did they just decide that she was…irrelevant?


Who does that? Could it possibly be someone who has already made up their mind and is willing to exclude the one source who can challenge their assumptions?


This is how you know that the so-called scandal about the Source is not about truth, or ethics, or political corruption. 


Open your eyes.


The idea for the Source took shape in Ms. Chavarria’s mind back when she was a teacher at Wilde Lake High School. It has continued to evolve through her work with the community she has built in Howard County since the beginning of the pandemic lockdown. Throughout these years Ms. Chavarria has continued to move forward, make connections, deepen the skills she would need to make her dream a reality.


This is the person that no one interviewed:


  • 2026 Daily Record’s Top 100 Women
  • 2025 Daily Record’s Most Admired CEOs
  • 2024 STAND Partnership Award
  • 2024 Just Living Advocacy CommUNITY Hands of Hope Award
  • 2023 Baltimore Banner Emerging Leaders Award
  • 2023 Daily Record Maryland’s Top 100 Women
  • 2023 Fox45 News Champion of Courage Honoree
  • 2022 Howard County Sunrise Distinction Education Hero Award
  • 2021 Women’s Giving Circle (S)heros Recognition
  • 2020 Casey and Pebble Willis Making a Difference Award 
  • 2020 Leadership Council Award from the Community Foundation of Howard County
  • 2020 Baltimore Sun Women to Watch
  • 2020 Howard County Human Rights Commission Human Rights Award
  • 2020 Howard County NSBE Jr. “Educator Making a Difference” Award
  • 2017 National Education Association Social Justice Activist of the Year Award Nominee


This is the community that no one wants to talk about: Columbia Community Care.



  • Recognized as the 2026 Howard County Chamber of Commerce Community Impact Awardee
  • Best Volunteer Organization in Howard County from 2020 to 2022 with honorable mentions in 2023, 2024, and 2025
  • Howard County Rise to the Challenge Award, 2022


Anyone who suggests that these people are not relevant to the story is actually trying to erase them from the story. In so doing they also erase all the people they have lifted up since 2020 and all those they are planning to help through The Source initiative.


For six years Howard County and the surrounding area have bestowed grateful honors upon Columbia Community Care but suddenly it’s election season and they can’t even get interviewed for a story about their own work. 


Open your eyes. Right now the folks who are spinning rumours to influence an election may very well manage to poison the well against a much-needed, transformative community recreation center. The futures of the most vulnerable young people in our community are at stake. It’s that simple: this is the story. 


If someone tries to tell you that’s not what this story is about - - - tell them to open their eyes. And if they have questions, tell them to go to the source.




Village Green/Town² Comments 



*Only after the Sun ran a story based on anonymous sources did they try to talk to Ms. Chavarria for a “reaction.”




Comments

  1. Julia A. McCreadyMay 25, 2026 at 4:17 AM

    Please do not submit comments here. This function will be disabled shortly. Use the link above instead. Thanks!

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