Fair housing will lose one of its greatest champions this week when Karla Irvine retires.

Irvine has been on the battle lines challenging landlords and lawyers in court to enforce fair-housing laws and pushing for integrated neighborhoods.

She will step down as executive director of Housing Opportunities Made Equal, a nonprofit fair-housing agency, after 27 years.

"I am going to take some time this summer to be with my family,'' in Vermont, she said. "I plan to have a hip operation then come back to Cincinnati. This is my home and I will not abandon it. I still think racial discrimination is the biggest problem here.''

Irvine is regarded as an expert in fair housing for low-income people. She is kind and garners respect from friends as well as foes, but can quickly express her wrath when confronting racial injustice.

Even at 71, it is hard to think of Karla Irvine as retired since making Housing Opportunities Made Equal a national model for fighting housing discrimination.

She chased down discrimination by sending a staff of testers - blacks, whites, Asians or Hispanics who posed as renters or buyers. That was Housing Opportunities' way of documenting racial injustice. It worked, because Irvine brought many to the courtrooms for their racial practices.

An Apple for McGirr

Dale L. McGirr, vice president of finance at the University of Cincinnati, is the winner of the 2004 Apple Award.

McGirr is recognized for his efforts toward helping revitalize the university campus, the redevelopment of Cincinnati's Uptown area and the restorations of Findlay Market and the Cincinnati Observatory.

The award will be presented by the Architectural Foundation at 6:30 p.m. May 6 in the Hall of Mirrors in the Netherland Plaza Hotel, downtown.

For information, call 421-4469.

Step Dragons win

Students at W.E.B. DuBois Academy, West End, had a winning weekend.

The Step Dragons won first place in the Black Ice Entertainment Step Show of Champions in Knoxville, Tenn. Step dancing is a sequence of stomps, claps and body movements choreographed to a musical beat.

Students, all third-, fourth-, sixth- and eighth-graders, include the following: Jacori Nelson, Tonya Jackson, Wema Bowman, Dawnmonique Kendall, Darren Williams, Ketrell Amison, Letoyai Franklin, Latia Temple, Dayshawn Coleman, Devon Penn, Unique McQueen, Mikiel Kendall, Keniya Rogers, Jabril Abdul-Muhamin, Ayshlie Cooper and Fantazha Thomas.

They won trophies and a $500 award.

The team was coached by Deanna Patterson.

Also Kyle Smith, a seventh-grader at the academy, won first place in the third annual Mary E. Finley Memorial Essay and Speech Contest at the West End Library. The contest was sponsored by retired librarian George Ferguson. Kyle won $100.

Heritage Girls aid abused kids

American Heritage Girls are defining kindness through HUGS (Heritage United Giving Service).

The group held its first stuff-a-thon April 17 and filled 1,200 duffel bags with stuffed animals, toiletries, school supplies, small toys and books and a homemade blanket to be distributed to abused children in shelters.

"We had about 100 volunteers throughout the year, collecting items and putting together blankets,'' said Rebecca Hayes, HUGS program director. "There were about 60 volunteers in the stuff-a-thon, mostly American Heritage Girls, ages 5-18.''

Hayes said the duffel bags have been distributed to 10 county and private foster care agencies in Hamilton, Butler and Clermont counties in Ohio and in Northern Kentucky.

Often when children are removed from dangerous situations, they leave with the clothes on their backs, Hayes said.

American Heritage Girls is a faith-based scouting program started nine years ago in West Chester. Hayes said the group's mission is "building women of integrity through service to God, family, community and country.

"Community service is an integral part of each AHG troop's program,'' Hayes said. "AHG is now a national organization with over 3,000 members and troops in 22 states.''