Norm Andrzejewski spent a career working as an administrator for the state Health Department, but he made his name leading a Central New York nonprofit dedicated to helping victims of devastating storms and other disasters.
And he gained further recognition by founding the annual Syracuse Crawfish Festival, which brought the tasty mudbugs of Louisiana to Central New York as a way to raise money for his storm relief and other philanthropic efforts.
Andrzejewski died Sunday at age 82, his grand-daughter Kristin Andrzejewski said today. He had been battling stomach cancer for the past year, she said. Calling hours will be 1 to 4 p.m. Oct. 14 at Maurer Funeral Home in Liverpool. More details will be coming in an obituary this week.
Norm Andrzejewski founded the group Operation Southern Comfort in 2005, after Hurricane Katrina devasted the New Orleans area and other parts of the Gulf Coast. Andrzejewski and his family had briefly lived in New Orleans years before, and based on the relationships he made, he recruited a group of volunteers to head South to help rebuild homes.
In the first few years after Katrina, Andrzejewski and his crews made 50 trips and helped rebuild nearly 200 houses — some repaired, some built from scratch.
The Crawfish Fest started in Syracuse’s Hanover Square in 2008, initially as a fundraiser for Operation Southern Comfort. It featured food, music and other entertainment. It’s been held in Clinton Square and the Inner Harbor in Syracuse, with the most recent event held in Clinton Square last May.
In 2012, the nonprofit group changed its name to Operation Northern Comfort and began offering aid to those in need closer to home, including Central New York.
Locally, projects included things like Desks4Kids, which provided more than 1,100 desks, built by volunteers, to students in the Syracuse city schools and other districts. See current projects.
For his work starting and leading the nonprofit, Andrzejewski was named a 2009 Post-Standard…
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