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2023 Citizen of the Year: Sherry Plunkett

Sherry Plunkett: 

Citizen of the Year

It’s difficult to frame the story of the Citizen of the Year without relying on quotations about service and giving back to your community.  The temptation is rich because there’s such a trove of wonderful quotes to pull from.  A favorite one of mine comes from William Penn: “I expect to pass through life but once. If therefore, there be any kindness I can show, or any good thing I can do to any fellow being, let me do it now, and not defer or neglect it, as I shall not pass this way again.”

Or “Life's most persistent and urgent question is: What are you doing for others?” a beautiful succinct quote from Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Each of those quotes at their core have a similar message of helping others and doing it now, and every day.  Here’s another one I heard recently that I loved “I think we’re all a part of our community, and we’re all a part of each other’s lives even if we don’t know each other.” That one, of course comes from Sherry Plunkett our 2023 Citizen of the Year. 

Sherry is a transplant, but in the way she treats others, and the way she connects community members, you would think her family grew up on these rocky shores for generations.  Sherry grew up in Hutchinson, Kansas but found her way to Maine thanks to a romantic relationship with a man.  NOT her relationship, thank you very much, but her sister had married a Navy man who got stationed in Brunswick, and when he had to ship out for six months, Sherry’s sister asked her to come out to help around the house.  Sherry planned on staying for six months- but that turned into a lifetime commitment. 

That permanent residence was the result of her own romantic relationship this time, as she met her husband Jon not long after coming to Brunswick and they got married eight months later.  They have raised two boys, Jeremy, now 32, and Ben, 31, and Sherry is so proud of both.

The boys actually play a key role in the events that shape Sherry’s path.  Once the boys turned school age, Sherry went back to work outside the home and helped open the Applebee’s in Brunswick, which led to a few other customer service jobs at local companies.  During this time though Sherry was an active volunteer in the schools and met a ton of kids from varying homes.  Sherry noted that some of these children needed help, and she thought maybe she could be the one to fill that role. 

By this time, professionally, Sherry had made her way to Coldwell Banker in a customer service/office administrator type role.  That’s where she met Sue Spann.  Sue worked on a sales team with her son Jeff and they worked closely with Sherry.  When Sue was ready to open up an office of her own, one of the pieces of advice she got was from Jeff…as Sue tells it, he said “Mom this is a great idea, but you can’t do it without Sherry, you need to take her with you.”  And in 2002 RE/MAX Riverside was born. 

Real estate became the industry that kept Sherry engaged.  After a career of changing jobs every 2-3 years out of boredom, Sherry hasn’t gotten bored in the last 21 years.  She runs the RE/MAX Riverside office with a firm but kind hand, where everyone works together, favoritism is not condoned in the office, and everyone understands there is a way to do business if you want to be an agent in that office- and with over 30 agents it’s clearly working well. 

RE/MAX Riverside also allowed Sherry to dive into volunteering more.  As a Mom, Sherry’s house would be the neighborhood house to gather at, where all the kids would come over to hang out with her boys.  As Sherry says “As my boys grew up, and their friends grew up in my house, it became apparent that there were things missing in different kids’ lives.  That drew me to Big Brothers Big Sisters of Bath/Brunswick from seeing how different upbringings can lead to different results.”

Sherry began on the BBBS Board in 2013 and ever since has been part of their fundraising events, helping with appeals, supporting the staff as they connect Bigs and Littles, and so much more.  Of course, Sherry is also the Chairperson of our Chamber’s Ambassador committee, she’s worked with the BDA on numerous events and sponsorships, and so much more. 

In fact, Sherry has been so involved with different non-profit experiences and fundraisers that when people have an idea for a fundraiser, they often reach out to Sherry for any suggestions she has. And without even intending to, Sherry became an expert on how to connect communities by just wanting to help wherever she could.

It reminds me of this other quote I heard: “We are touching some lives and they don’t know who we are, and they don’t need to know who we are.  We don’t need them to know who we are… but if we can help in any way, I think we need to.  Someone will benefit from your volunteering, and those things tend to circle back in communities.”  Of course, that quote is from Sherry too.

Congratulations to our 2023 Citizen of the Year Sherry Plunkett. 

You can see Sherry's profile video here! Many thanks to Sturdy Production for their incredible work on this series!