THE Press Association of Jamaica (PAJ) has paid tribute to veteran journalist Clare Forrester who died on Monday in Florida.

The PAJ described her as an exemplary professional, a dedicated member of the Association and a friend and mentor to many.

“We are really saddened by Clare’s passing,” said newly appointed PAJ President Dionne Jackson Miller. “She was one of those members that the Association has counted on over the years for unflagging dedication, and unwavering support. We want to extend our deepest condolences to her family as we share in their loss.”

“Clare’s passion for advancing the profession found expression not only in Jamaica, but the wider Caribbean, and she was instrumental in the formation of the Association of Caribbean Media Workers (ACM) of which she was a founding member and which she served as general secretary and consultant,” said the PAJ President.

Former PAJ President Desmond Richards, who worked closely with Forrester, also expressed his personal condolences to her family. “The profession has lost a veteran, a personality who will be irreplaceable. The profession is the poorer for her passing,” he said.

Forrester, 69, distinguished herself as a sports writer and covered many regional and international games, including the Olympic Games in Atlanta, Athens, Beijing and London 2012. She also covered the 1995 World Championships in Gothenburg, Sweden, in addition to several indoor track and field games and the World Junior Championships in 2005.

Forrester also wrote and co-authored several publications and articles on sports and health, including the sole authorised biography of sprinter Merlene Ottey and the 2011 commemorative publication on Jamaica’s annual sportsman and woman of the year awardees.

She also shared her perspective on a range of issues as a newspaper columnist and served as a member of the Board of Management for the Institute of Sports.

As part of her service to the PAJ, Forrester administered the National Press Awards for 12 continuous years. She was also an adjudicator with the annual Fair Play Journalism Awards.

Forrester was, for 20 years, the media and communication advisor with the Pan American Health Organisation, the regional office of the World Health Organisation.

She was a founding member, general secretary and consultant to the Association of Caribbean Media Workers, which in 2002 presented her with a distinguished service award for her contribution to the development of Caribbean journalism.

Yesterday, Information Minister Sandrea Falconer hailed Forrester as a “giant of Caribbean journalism and a lost treasure”.

Forrester, she said, was “a sterling example of journalistic excellence, fairness and rigour”.

“Her unflinching devotion to the highest standards of the noble profession was evidenced by her many years of administering the national journalism awards, the fact that she was an adjudicator of the annual Jamaica Broilers Fair Play Awards, as well as the fact that her very last journalistic endeavour was a media review column which assessed the work of her colleagues,” Falconer said.

— Jamaica Observer and CMC reports