CANTON -- SUNY Canton students and faculty are organizing a memorial in remembrance of September 11th that will feature a speaker who spent time in New York City and assisted in the recovery efforts for nearly a year.

The college's Criminal Justice Student Association (CJSA) will present the ceremony beginning at 8 a.m. Sept. 12 at the Roselle Plaza, adjacent to the Miller Campus Center. The event is free and open to the community. Parking will be available in Parking Lot 13.

The memorial's theme will be patriotism and recovery. The keynote speaker is New York State Trooper Robert M. Parcell, who was assigned to Ground Zero as a dog handler and spent a year in New York City assisting with recovery efforts.

Among the other distinguished guests will be Assemblymember Addie J. Russell and Canton Mayor Charlotte Ramsay.

All fire stations and EMS personnel in St. Lawrence County have been invited to the event. The Canton and Potsdam fire departments will provide ladder trucks from which a huge American flag will fly.

Several SUNY Canton faculty members and employees will be taking part in the service. The color guard will feature SUNY Canton University Police Officers Brian J. Perry and Byron Davis. Susan E. Buckley, department chair of the criminal justice, law enforcement leadership and criminal investigation programs, and Robert L. Edwards, professor of criminal investigation, will lay the wreath. William J. Fassinger, associate professor of criminal investigation, also played an integral role in the organization of the ceremony.

While SUNY Canton did not lose any alumni in the attacks that they are aware of, several took part in the recovery efforts, including Brigadier General Fergal Foley, a 1980 graduate. He served as the Department of Defense Chief of Staff and Acting Commander for the Joint Task Force Operation World Trade Center from Sept. 11 through Sept. 29, 2001.