FIRN, a support organization for Howard County's immigrant community, honored three business and community leaders May 6 at its seventh annual American Success Awards.

The awards honor foreign-born individuals who live or work in Howard County and have made a significant contribution to either their ethnic or general communities. Award winners have distinguished themselves by either owning a successful Howard County business or achieving a high level of success in their profession, according to FIRN. Those honored this year were:

* The Rev. Young S. Song, senior pastor of the Church of the Philippi in Columbia;

* Lily Bengfort, founder of CenGen, a wireless and mobile communication technology service used in defense and transportation systems;

* Yifei Gan, a professor at Howard Community College.

Song, a native of Korea, founded the Church of Philippi in 1993 and it has grown from 30 members to over 1,000 today.

Bengfort, a native of Guyana, has implemented a range of start-ups, including a pest control business in the 1980s and CenGen in 2000.

Gan, a native of China, survived two years of hard labor in one of Mao's re-education camps in his youth and later went on to become an elementary school teacher and later a college professor in China, where he developed exchange programs with the U.S. Ultimately, he left China and became a professor at Howard Community College, where he teaches art.

The Howard County Chamber of Commerce also awarded Leena Shrestha, a native of Nepal, with an Emerging Success Award. Shrestha is president and founder of Pen Boutique Ltd., which specializes in fine writing instruments and has a store in Columbia.

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