DATE: Saturday, November 22, 1997           TAG: 9711220370

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA 

SOURCE: BY JEFFREY S. HAMPTON, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: SUNBURY                           LENGTH:  105 lines

WORKING MIRACLES HUMANITARIAN WORKS MIRACLES FOR A LIFE OF GIVING, A GATES WOMAN IS RECEIVING AN AWARD.

Chenay Costen's path to a $25,000 award for humanitarian service began when she was a little girl who risked a spanking and a brother's revenge to buy ice cream for a needy friend.

Costen, 42, grew up on a small farm in Gates County, where poverty often was an expected way of life. Her family was well-off enough that her mother could give her 6 cents every day to buy ice cream at school.

She had a friend, though, who never had money for ice cream. Costen began taking six pennies each day from her own piggy bank to buy her friend ice cream. When her piggy bank was empty, she went to her brother's piggy bank. Costen used a trick she learned from ``I Love Lucy'' and replaced the pennies with washers to make the bank look and feel full.

Despite the danger of being punished by her parents, or enraging her brother for stealing, she could not bear to see her friend without ice cream. Finally, she was caught and punished, and no longer had access to six daily pennies. She cried - not over the punishment, but for her friend.

Then she got the idea to buy a twin Popsicle instead of her usual ice cream cup. She split the Popsicle, and both girls were happy.

Ever since, Costen has been an advocate for the less fortunate.

``Ms. Costen has dedicated her life to changing the lives of the under-educated, powerless and neglected segment of the population in her home county and the surrounding ones,'' wrote Carolyn McKecuen, who investigated the nomination of Costen for the Nancy Susan Reynolds Award. The awards have been called the Nobel Prizes of North Carolina, according to the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation.

The Nancy Susan Reynolds Awards are given to three North Carolinians annually for exceptional public service. Heirs of Reynolds started the foundation in 1932. This is the 12th year the foundation has given money to the ``unsung heroes'' in the name of Nancy Susan Reynolds, a sister of Z. Smith Reynolds.

Each of the recipients gets $5,000 personally and $20,000 to donate to their favorite charity. Costen will donate hers to United Family Support Services, the organization she founded and through which she has done most of her community service.

Shortly after Costen graduated from Elizabeth City State University in 1977, she began work as an assistant teacher at a day-care center in Gates County. At the time, there were only six day-care centers in northeastern North Carolina, Costen said.

Costen quickly worked her way up to director of the day-care center, and that was just the beginning. She realized the need for more day-care centers and helped start the Rural Day-care Association.

She and her group lobbied the General Assembly to award counties money for day care based on population and poverty levels.

When the state based its grants strictly on population, Gates County received $8,000 a year, Costen said. After the change, Gates County received $114,000 annually. From 1977 to 1987, the number of day-care centers in the region grew from six to 65, she said.

After working in day care for a few years, Costen realized the parents of the children needed as much help as the children.

She founded United Family Support Services, and is still its executive director.

With a staff of four, she takes on just about any problem that comes her way. Much of her work involves leading people to the right places to get help, whether it be from the government or a private source.

Her relationships with such offices as the Department of Social Services sometimes have been strained as she has insisted on getting help for people.

``Sometimes they only want to do what they want to do,'' Costen said. Yet, recently, she worked with government agencies including DSS to solve the major problems of a young mother.

Two months ago, a 20-year-old woman with two children came to her office crying. She had no job and no place to live. Typically, Costen took on the situation personally.

She got her a job through the Summer Youth Program. She found a trailer for the young mother to rent for $300 a month. The Economic Improvement Council office in Edenton at first refused to help with the woman's rent because two years before, she had abruptly left an apartment financed by EIC.

Costen discovered that the woman had left because she had been raped. She pleaded her case before EIC, and officials relented. Still, there was the problem of the first month's rent. The owner of the trailer agreed to cut it to $150.

Costen approached some churches, the Salvation Army and Open Door, a organization that helps the poor in Perquimans County. She collected the $150 needed.

``All within a week's time, we were able to get her a job and a home,'' Costen said. ``She had been sleeping in a park in Hertford. I could have told her we couldn't take her case, and she'd be back out the door. But we're here to help people with problems.''

According to McKeceun's report to the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation, Costen has a list of accomplishments:

She created an affordable home-ownership program for low-income people.

She created high-quality, affordable child-care services with 48 slots and 27 full-time workers.

She created a crime-prevention program for children.

She created a training program for child-care workers.

The other two North Carolinians receiving awards were the Rev. Harrison T. Simons, rector of two Episcopal churches in Oxford, and Mother Mary Benignus Hoban, founder and president of Holy Angels, a nursery for severely disabled children in Belmont. ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo

DREW C. WILSON/The Virginian-Pilot

Chenay Costen is the recipient of a Nancy Susan Reynolds Award,

which is given by the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation. She was

photographed Friday at the Family Support Services building in

Perquimans County.

Send Suggestions or Comments to webmaster@scholar.lib.vt.edu