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Jean B. Cryor dedicated her life to public service, but in her spare time she liked to sit on a bench in Glen Hills Local Park near her home in Potomac and watch her three grandchildren play.

Several months after her death, the Montgomery County Planning Board approved the dedication of the Glen Hills Local Park, 12511 Circle Drive, in memory of the late Planning Board Commissioner, three-term state legislator, and former editor and publisher of The Gazette.

"It's a park that has always meant something to us," said Cryor's daughter, Deirdre Cryor, 43, of Denver, Colo. "There was even a point sitting on a bench at that park where my mother said, ‘I would love one day to have something named for me.'"

After her mother died of cancer at age 70 in November, Deirdre Cryor approached Planning Board Chairman Royce Hanson to discuss dedicating the park in her mother's honor.

"We miss Commissioner Cryor very dearly," Hanson said at Thursday's Planning Board meeting. "This would be a fitting memorial for her."

Details on a dedication plaque are being worked out, but Deirdre Cryor said her family would like a park bench to be part of the tribute. Jean Cryor has three daughters.

"My mother really worked hard to protect and maintain the beauty that is Montgomery County," said Deirdre Cryor, whose family plans to gather in the park for the dedication in July. "We are and deeply touched for the county to remember my mother this way."