An Aspen Sister Cities Friend and Exemplary Citizen Diplomat.
“Pat was so integral to both Aspen Sister Cities and to Sister Cities International. I’d like to say how much we will all miss her knowledge and passion and her always willing to help. I called her on many occasions and valued her advice”. Jill Sheeley, Aspen Sister Cities President.
Letter from Carlo Capua- Sister Cities International- Chair, Board of Directors
It is with great sadness and profound sorrow to share that our own Pat Fallin, SCI board member and longtime volunteer, passed away yesterday after a long-term battle with leukemia. She was surrounded by family and loved ones.
If you knew Pat, you know she was a hard-working, selfless, and get-down-to-business kind of volunteer. So much so, that even her closest SCI friends were unaware she was sick. Just last week Pat was texting me with ideas on how to grow our Pacific Islands partnerships. When it came to Sister Cities, she never had an “off” button. She was always laser focused on advocating for our mission.
I’ve spoken with several of her closest Sister Cities friends today, and we all agree it was serendipity that she was able to join us in person in Fort Worth two weeks ago. Our lasting memory will be seeing her in her element (see photo below) – at a Sister Cities conference working to advance our mission of peace through people. Pat’s leadership with our State Representatives is legendary, and she has been the driving force behind our remarkable, and unprecedented, growth in membership over the past 18 months.
We are in direct communication with her family and will update you as soon as we receive details related to a memorial service and any opportunities for contributions made in her memory.
From the Aspen, Colorado Hall of Fame
Pat Finley Fallin, a native of Oklahoma, first saw Aspen in 1970 as she, her husband and son Brooks arrived to begin a new chapter in their lives. Four years later, daughter Ashley joined the family.
Pat grew up in rural northeastern Oklahoma at the base of the Ozark Mountains. She attended The Hockaday School in Dallas, Texas, and college at the University of Oklahoma. She married Dick Fallin in Tulsa and they moved to Chicago.
After four years in Chicago, they moved to Aspen where Dick worked for Sam Caudill and later Fritz Benedict before opening his own office. Pat worked for the Aspen Ski Corp for 10 years, then left to work in Dick’s office, later opening her own card and stationery store – Just Paper.
Pat was active in the community soon after arriving. She joined the League of Women Voters where she met other community activists that led her to other community organizations, projects and causes. She was elected Pitkin County Democratic Party Chair where she became involved with Colorado politics and campaigns.
She was appointed to the Colorado Commission on Women by Gov. Dick Lamm. As her children grew and entered the school system, she became involved in their schools and activities, first serving on the board of the Aspen Community School and then of the Aspen School District where she served on the Accountability, Program Planning and District Evaluation Committees. She was appointed to the Aspen Planning and Zoning Commission where she served for four years before leaving to campaign for the Aspen City Council. As a member of the Aspen City Council she served as the Mayor Pro Tem.
As a Council member she was the representative to the Aspen Snowmass Council for the Arts, Northwest Council of Governments and the Colorado Municipal League. During this time, Aspen began the Sister Cities Program, which Pat embraced. After leaving the Council, she became affiliated with the Aspen Sister Cities committee, and from there was elected to the Board of Directors of the Sister Cities International, in which she was very active until her final days.
She became interested in the Arts in Aspen while serving as the City Council representative to the Aspen Snowmass Council for the Arts and served on the Board of Directors of the Aspen Art Museum. At Aspen Theatre in the Park (now Theatre Aspen), she served as president and was instrumental in establishing a permanent home for the ATIP in the Rio Grande Park with a new tent.
She was a member of the Board of Directors of the Aspen Snowmass Council for the Arts, serving as president, and guided the organization through the name change to the Red Brick Council for the Arts and the addition of the new Conference Room and additional gallery space to the west side of the building. The list of organizations that Pat has served goes on, including the Wheeler Opera House Advisory Board, Wheeler Associates, Colorado Mountain College–Aspen Advisory Board, City of Aspen Open Space Committee, Aspen Civic Master Plan Advisory Group, and many other City of Aspen advisory groups and ad hoc committees. Pat then moved to Basalt and, not one to stay still, she dove headfirst into the Basalt community.
She was appointed to the Basalt Regional Library District Board of Directors and was elected vice president and later president. During her tenure, she helped to pass the bond election for the new 20,000-square-foot library by a large majority. She was involved in the design and building of the new library, a project for which she is very proud. While living in Basalt, she also served on the Basalt Open Space and Trails Committee.
After 41 years in Aspen, Pat made another change in her life and moved to California to be near her children and her grandchildren, Laker and Fallin Brady. Of course, she immediately found new organizations and once again is active in volunteer commitments.
More from a Sister Cities International perspective (courtesy of Fred Blanton)
Pat served another entire chapter of her life in California, making her home in Solvang, and again serving SCI as one of the California State Representatives. In fact, she did this so well that most folks today probably best associate Pat with California and probably don’t know much about her previous and incredibly full life in Colorado.
And then more recently, Pat made yet another change in her life and moved back “home” to Tulsa, Oklahoma, where she’s been serving SCI again as the new Oklahoma State Representative.
Pat is surely the only SCI stalwart who has very effectively served as SCI State Representative for 3 different states!
During Pat’s time in Aspen, she also found the time to serve as Sister Cities International’s State Coordinator (now called Representative) for the State of Colorado. Reading all of the above, it’s now hard to think back on Pat’s dedication to Sister Cities while doing all of the amazing things she accomplished during her time in Aspen. But she obviously found the time and energy, and that was one of the amazing and unique qualities about Pat – when she was working with us, she made us feel like we were the most important thing to her. We had her undivided attention, and she had ours.
Pat ran and won a seat on the SCI Board of Directors in 2004 and served two full terms on our term-limited Board. I ran for the Board in 2005, and faithfully served with her, and we became fast friends. Pat, along with several of her other contemporaries like Kathleen Roche-Tansey and Kay Sargent, quickly became my mentors, and served as my very best role models as I was learning my way through our organization. Pat had a wealth of knowledge and experience, and she never held back sharing all of it. And everything Pat shared was relevant and impactful. Some of Pat’s best skills were dealing with people, and anticipating people’s actions and behaviors, and this enabled her to be highly effective when serving with such a diverse group as all of us on the SCI Board and its various committees. And Pat was so passionate about Membership that she has been our Membership Chair off and on over the past 20 years and was again serving in this role up until yesterday.
The world has lost one heck of a citizen diplomat. Please keep Pat’s family in your prayers.
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