Former Superior resident earns Elks honors

A former Superior resident and 1968 University of Wisconsin-Superior graduate is the recipient of the 2011–2012 California-Hawaii Elks Association (CHEA) special citation for exceptional performance in public relations activity. CHEA Public Relations Chairman Andy Costello presented the award, which honored Hal Mattson as the leading public relations chairman of the 174 Lodges making up the California-Hawaii Elks Association. The prestigious award is presented to the public relations chairman generating the greatest amount of publicity and the highest number of articles published for the year. In presenting the award, association chairman Costello said, “Hal agreed to devote a little of his limited spare time to help with the Mission Viejo Lodge’s publicity program. He not only helped, but he shattered every publicity record for the lodge, for the district and for the entire California-Hawaii Association. The members of the Elks Lodge can be proud of his outstanding accomplishment.”

Since his year as exalted ruler (lodge president) in 2007-2008, Mattson has served as lodge parliamentarian, mediator, was a member of the Lodge House Committee, participated in the third grade dictionary distributions, volunteered for numerous charitable events and has been an active member of the Lodge’s Past Exalted Rulers (PER) Association. He was named Lodge Citizen of the Year in 2010-2011 and Officer of the Year on 2005-2006. He is currently serving as the Elks training chairman for the Orange Coast District’s 10 lodges and lodge publicity. When he is not busy with all of that, Hal can be found in the kitchen of the Elks Lodge as crew chief of the second Friday night cooking crew.

Above all his other accomplishments, Mattson’s outstanding work in publicizing the benevolent work of the Mission Viejo/Saddleback Valley Elks Lodge have played a significant role in elevating the local Elks Lodge to a position of respect and honor in the Saddleback Valley community.

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