Becket Fund’s 2001 Ebenezer Award goes to… Council bows to minutia of pressure and reduces Santa to an uninvited guest

The enormous (read sarcastically) public pressure mounted against the town council of Kensington was apparently insurmountable since two whole families made it known that their feelings would be hurt if Santa Claus participated in the tree lighting ceremony scheduled for Sunday the 2nd of December.  It was the usual custom for Santa to arrive on a fire truck and help to light the tree with the mayor of Kensington.

So, this year the council will receive Becket’s most undistinguished of honors, the Ebenezer Award.

Kevin Hasson, President of Becket Law, was appalled and noted that “Reducing Santa to an uninvited guest is certainly a shame.  He deserves better.  I do hope Kensington was extra good this year to make up for the slight.”

“Santa’s tough, though, I think he can handle it.  He’s had a lot of practice getting into places when the door’s not open to him,” continued Hasson.

The Ebenezer Award is a specially designed Christmas stocking filled with lumps of coal, and is given each year to the individual responsible for the silliest affront to the Christmas holiday.  Past recipients include Pittsburgh’s Sparkle, a silly-looking creature which was the centerpiece of Pittsburgh’s absurdly watered-down Christmas celebration, as well as Jim Johnson, the city manager in Eugene, Oregon.  Johnson won the award for issuing a five page single-spaced memo laying down the law on Christmas trees in Eugene: they were banned entirely from any “public space” in the city.

The Town Council of Kensington, Maryland will shortly receive their well-deserved lump of coal in the hope that any future silliness will be avoided.