Dec. 28, 2001 – Ties between the Virgin Islands and Washington, D.C., got a bit stronger recently when the organization Regional Addiction Prevention Inc. named a facility in the nation's capital after a part-time St. Thomas resident whose husband has family on St. Thomas and St. Croix.
Yetta Galiber, Washington born but married for 56 years to Dr. Flavius Galiber, a St. Thomas native, said she was delighted with the honor. "What a joy it is to know someone would do something like this," she said in a telephone call from Washington. "But I'm humbled," she added.
The facility, called The Galiber House, provides housing, counseling and support services for women afflicted with HIV/AIDS and their children.
Galiber, now 75 and retired, for many years chaired the board of Regional Addiction Prevention. She also was executive director of the Protection and Advocacy Center for Persons With Disabilities in Washington, operated under a federally mandated program. "We worked cooperatively," she said of her involvement with the two agencies, noting that some of her own efforts focused on women with HIV/AIDS and their children.
She was one of 10 persons named Washingtonians of the Year in 1974 – in the company of nationally syndicated columnist William Raspberry and Sen. Thomas Eagleton.
She also has served as executive director of the Washington-based Information Center for Handicapped Children. In a history of the National Association of Protection and Advocacy Systems written to mark its 10th anniversary, "A Decade of Progress in Advocacy for People With Disabilities," Galiber was among a handful of people singled out for special mention. She "championed the rights of majority group members to advocacy services and … pioneered in a series of minority outreach grants from the Office of Civil Rights," it states.
Delegate Donna Christian Christensen said in a news release that she was proud of Galiber's distinguished career as a volunteer and of the honor bestowed on her at the Galiber House dedication ceremonies on Dec. 19.
Galiber, who has four children, 12 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren, said she and her husband spend six months of the year at their St. Thomas condominium and the other six months in Washington.