Her involvement with the Sept. 11 memorial began with a phone call from John Whitehead, a close family friend.

Whitehead, who is the chairperson of the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, asked Berry to participate in the family advisory council, a branch of the corporation that was formed in January 2002.

“The first months that I participated in these meetings, I felt like more of an observer of how the drama of this was unfolding,” says Berry.

As time progressed, however, Berry became more and more interested in the incredible impact of the Sept. 11 attacks and how important the reconstruction of lower Manhattan was to so many different constituents. She began to take on a more active role in the council meetings, and started receiving requests to serve on smaller, more specialized committees.

At one point, two special committees were formed—one charged with writing the mission statement for the Sept. 11 memorial and the other with drafting bullet points of elements that would be absolutely essentially to the design. Berry was selected to serve on the latter committee.

In addition to working on this committee, Berry toured various national memorials as part of another group. Then, last summer she was asked to represent the families of Sept. 11 victims on the design selection jury.

Berry says that she was at first hesitant to accept this responsibility, citing her concern over the ability of one person to represent the interests of all of the families of the victims. But ultimately Berry says she realized that it was crucial to have such a person on the jury.

“It occurred to me that I am not representing the families, but I am among the families,” Berry says. “I realized how important it was to have a family member on the jury.”

The jury began weeding through 5,200 different designs last August before narrowing the field to eight finalists who were then asked to construct actual models of their design. The entire process was anonymous, and the jurors met with various interested parties throughout the process to solicit their opinions.

“It had to meet many needs as there are many stakeholders and constituents,” says Berry. “You can’t forget the people who are down there, and you want it to be a place where people feel comfortable to contemplate.”

The jury came to its final decision in January, selecting “Reflecting Absence,” the design of an Israeli-born architect, Michael Arad.

Berry says that she has no reservations about the winning design and that the final decision was the product of a long and involved process.

“It was a consensus,” Berry says. “Nobody could have chosen this design at the beginning. It is part of the process.”

While the design for the memorial has been selected, Berry’s involvement in the planning and construction of the site is far from complete. At the present time she is helping to choose a design for a cultural space on the site, currently dubbed the “Freedom Center.”

Berry describes the plan for the Freedom Center as “a world class institution that promotes the concept of freedom and is international in its focus.”