Carolyn Wetzel, 68, health advocate

Carolyn Wetzel was a beacon for state legislators on issues related to the health of women and children.

State Rep. Mary Margaret Oliver (D-Decatur) said her guidance will be missed, particularly in the current economic climate.

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Compassion for the poor that Carolyn Wetzel had may have stemmed from her childhood surroundings.

“Carolyn Wetzel … really helped us in the General Assembly understand the significance of the decisions we were making,” she said. “She was an example for all of us in the way she cared about the people she served.”

Carolyn Hanna Wetzel, 68, of Avondale Estates died Sunday at Emory University Hospital after a five-month battle against lung cancer. The body was cremated. A memorial service will be 4 p.m. Saturday at Oakhurst Presbyterian Church in Decatur.

Mrs. Wetzel worked for many years in D@eKalb County’s WIC program, a federal nutrition program for low-income women, infants and children.

During the past decade, she served on the board of the Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies Coalition of Georgia, an advocacy organization.

She was known for having an uncanny ability to slice through complicated federal budgets and mandates when she worked with WIC.

“She also had the ability to read regulations and know what they actually meant,” said her longtime friend and co-worker, June Caldwell of Stone Mountain. “She knew what the feds wanted, and trust me, that’s an art. And boy, could she argue with them. She came out right 99 percent of the time.”

Pat Swan, a fellow board member of Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies, said Mrs. Wetzel worked as executive director of the organization for several years for no pay while the organization searched for a leader.

She has been described as a passionate, fearless but level-headed advocate for children’s issues, including the recent debate over Georgia’s PeachCare program. An infusion of federal dollars saved for another year that program which provides health insurance to children of working- class families.

Her daughter said Mrs. Wetzel’s compassion for the poor may have stemmed from her childhood surroundings in rural Georgia.

“She saw a lot of poverty,” said Sarah Wetzel Fishman of Tel Aviv, Israel. “She understood how it was to have to struggle to put food on the table.”

Mrs. Wetzel’s empathy for the people she championed rang clear in a comment she made to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution about some 2006 U.S. census data. A report showed that women on public assistance in Georgia gave birth at more than three times the rate of women not on public assistance.

“People who are not on public assistance often have goals that cause them to postpone pregnancy,” she was quoted as saying. “I would like us to have a world where every young woman had goals that would cause them to graduate from high school, so they had job skills before they became pregnant.”

Additional survivors include her husband, Ray Wetzel; a son, John Wetzel of Atlanta; and three grandchildren.