A disabled Capital Region resident has received a state award for his work at the Center for Disability Services Mail Center in Albany.
Brian Malone had been working at a Guilderland convenience store and a local chapter of an organization that serves people with disabilities for more than 20 years before losing both jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The 50-year-old’s father, Larry Malone, says the family decided to take Brian out of work for fear of him getting sick.
Larry says unemployment hit Brian particularly hard.
“And this is a very happy, optimistic, wonderful person who has always looked on the bright side of life and has never complained about anything, and when he was out of work, he was just sad,” Larry said.
Each morning, Larry would ask his son how he was doing.
“And his answer was always the same, I want a job, I have to get to work, I need to work and it was just torture for Brian and for his family,” Larry said.
But that changed in the winter of 2022, when Malone began working in the mailroom for the Center for Disability Services in Albany.
Brian’s primary job in the mailroom is packaging state benefit notices together before they are mailed. He works four hours every week day.
“There was an event and I won an award – employee of the year,” Malone said.
On Wednesday, he was recognized for his work in the mail center. Brian received an Employee of the Year Award from New York State Industries for the Disabled or NYSID.
The non-profit organization employs thousands of disabled people throughout the state. In 2024, NYSID employed nearly 5,000 people with disabilities.
Alex Demitraszek, assistant director of operations of the mail center, says Brian was deserving of the award.
“I’ve never met someone who just so consistently has such a good work ethic,” Demitraszek said.
He says Brian is always looking for more to do.
“The minute he doesn’t have work, he is always asking for more work, trying to find something else to do, asking to be taught something else to do, so he can always stay productive,” Demitraszek said.
Outside of work, Brian enjoys cooking pizza for his family – specifically potato onion pizza.
“Every night I make dinner for my family,” Brian said.
He also enjoys traveling.
“Sometimes, we go to Disney World, Disney Cruise, we went to Disney’s Private Island, Spain, Rome and this year we are going to Universal Studios in Orlando,” Brian said.
He says he was excited to win the award but Demitraszek says all of the resulting attention may be beginning to annoy Brian.
“With some of the media attention that he’s been getting, he like almost gets mad that he’s got to take time to talk to the media because he just wants to be at work and doing his job, and he feels like he’s slacking a little bit by getting interviewed by the media. But no, he's a worker. It sounds simple but its rare to find and its really important for our culture here and its also, really important for him,” Demitraszek said.
