VaCAP has learned our friend and supporter, Ken Harney has passed away.
Ken was a supporter of appraisers and an advocate for consumers. He has helped educate the consumer on industry concerns and always shared the perspective of the appraiser. Our hearts our sadden by this great loss. Please keep his family and friends in your thoughts and prayers.
In honor of Ken, we ask each of you to follow the wishes of his family and “pay it forward” by donating blood as described in the email from his family below.
His obituary can be found here.
Dear Friends
On behalf of Ken and our entire family, I want to thank you all for the kind and loving messages you sent to Ken before his death early this morning. There is great sadness when someone has a terminal illness, but hearing how loved he was by friends and family was very special to Ken and our family.
Instead of eulogies he would not hear, while in hospice Ken had a chance to learn how many of you cared for him and your relationship with him. These last few years have drawn our four children and all of you closer to us than ever. We are grateful for your constant concern and support. Thank you for all your kind words and prayers.
We were all with him this morning when Ken passed away from Acute Myeloid Leukemia. We will be having a private family service at a later date—our emotions are too raw for a service right now.
In lieu of flowers, we would like to ask that you do something unusual—donate blood. Throughout Ken’s illness, he received countless blood transfusions from total strangers who donated their blood to help sustain him. Though his form of leukemia is rare, there are so many people with blood diseases requiring transfusions. We feel that there is no better way to “pay it forward” than to help return the kindness by donating blood in his memory. And if blood donation is not possible, we would ask that you find another way to make another person’s life a little better. Through more than four decades of writing his weekly column for the Washington Post, Ken worked to help and improve the lives of his readers. Help us preserve his legacy by paying it forward.
Again, thank you for all your many kindnesses and loving words.
Sincerely,
Andy, Alex, Brendan, Tim and Phurbu
So sorry to learn of your loss. Ken’s articles were well written and topical. We real estate appraisers appreciated his open-mindless and objectivity. He will be missed by many.