GLSS dedication honors Lique

LYNN – The late Vincent Lique would have been thrilled to see the renovations that transformed and expanded the senior center he once ran, but there is one change his widow said he could have done without.”I suspect he might shy away from the name thing,” his widow, Kathy, said Thursday as she helped dedicate Greater Lynn Senior Service’s Silsbee Street center named in honor of the man who served as its executive director for 24 years.During that time, Lique shepherded GLSS’s growth from a 40-employee agency running on a $2 million budget into a $40 million agency with 600 workers providing meals, transportation and other services to seniors.His stewardship led GLSS’ board of directors to purchase the Silsbee Street building, then launch the expansion that was still largely a vision when he died on March 30, 2006.”Anyone who knew Vince knew he was determined to see this building become a reality and to see the vitality of people who come here, enjoy themselves and enrich their lives,” Mayor Edward Clancy Jr. said.The renovation increased the size of the building so that GLSS could move offices in three other locations around Lynn into Silsbee Street.”This project was Vince’s vision,” said GLSS Board of Directors President Paul Crowley.GLSS workers still remember Lique by keeping photographs of him in their work cubicles and supporting the Lique Living Legacy Fund he established with his wife.GLSS Executive Director Ronald Airey recalled Thursday how Lique took time to talk to him about Airey’s autistic son.”He was not only my boss but a mentor and a friend,” Airey said.Kathy Lique urged her husband’s friends and co-workers Thursday to look inside themselves for the qualities they admired in Lique and “pass them onto others.”