Awards, Aug 03, 2006

The following awards have been presented for work in advocacy, fund raising, nonprofit leadership, philanthropy, and other areas.

American Indians. Ecotrust (Portland, Ore.) has presented its 2006 Buffett Award for Indigenous Leadership to Guujaaw (Haida), an artist, traditional-medicine practitioner, and negotiator who has worked for more than three decades to advance the cultural, environmental, and social interests of the Haida Nation. He currently resides in Skidegate, Haida Gwaii, in Canada’s province of British Columbia. This $25,000 award recognizes an American Indian leader working in conservation or community development in the region stretching from Alaska to California.

Education fund raising. The Council for Advancement and Support of Education (Washington) recently presented its 2006 Distinguished Service Awards. The CASE Lifetime Achievement Award went to Robert Forman, executive director emeritus, Alumni Association of the U. of Michigan (Ann Arbor), for his 28-year tenure at the alumni association and for his other achievements, including serving as chair of the CASE board and as founding president of the Council of Alumni Association Executives. The James L. Fisher Award for Distinguished Service to Education went to Claudio X. González Guajardo, co-founder and president of Unete Foundation and of the Televisa Foundation (Mexico City), for his work to promote high-quality education in Mexico. The Ernest T. Stewart Award for Alumni Volunteer Involvement went to Rosemary Deniken Blankley, a 1957 graduate of Arcadia U. (Glenside, Pa.) for her nearly 50 years of volunteerism at the institution, and to E. John Rosenwald Jr., who received his undergraduate degree from Dartmouth College (Hanover, N.H.) in 1952 and an M.B.A. one year later from Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business, for his gifts of time and money to his alma mater. The Frank L. Ashmore Award for Service to CASE and the Advancement Profession went to Mary Kay Murphy, associate vice president for institutional advancement at the Morehouse School of Medicine (Atlanta), for her contributions to the field, which have spanned more than 40 years.

Foundation leadership. The Southeastern Council of Foundations (Atlanta) has announced its 2006 class of Hull Fellows. The program helps young and new foundation staff and board members develop leadership skills. The fellows:

— Betty Alonso of the Dade Community Foundation (Miami)

— Michael Scott Close of the Springs Close Foundation (Fort Mill, S.C.)

— Louisa Glenn D’Antignac of the Wilbur & Hilda Glenn Family Foundation (Atlanta)

— Erin Drury of the Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta

— Gregory Vincent Gerhard of the May P. & Francis L. Abreau Charitable Trust & R.J. Taylor Foundation (Atlanta)

— Hazle Hamilton of the Community Foundation of Central Georgia (Macon)

— Conaway Bernard Haskins III of the Cameron Foundation (Petersburg, Va.)

— Linwood B. Hollowell III of the Duke Endowment (Charlotte, N.C.)

— DiShonda C. Hughes of the Atlanta Women’s Foundation

— Wanda Y. Jenkins of the Community Foundation of the Chattahoochee Valley (Columbus, Ga.)

— Anita Johnson of the Cannon Foundation (Concord, N.C.)

— Felecia Jones of the Black Belt Community Foundation (Selma, Ala.)

— Racquel Lee-Sin of Washington Mutual (Miami)

— Jan Ross of the Huey and Angelina Wilson Foundation (Baton Rouge, La.)

— Virginia T. Self of the Self Family Foundation (Greenwood, S.C.)

— Askeshia Singleton of the Rapides Foundation (Alexandria, La.)

— Katrina Spigner of the Sisters of Charity Foundation of South Carolina (Columbia)

— Edgar G. Villanueva of the Kate B. Reynolds Charitable Trust (Winston-Salem, N.C.)

— Erika Williams of the Annie E. Casey Foundation-Atlanta Civic Site

— Lisa B. Williams of the R. Howard Dobbs Jr. Foundation (Atlanta)

Health. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (Princeton, N.J.) has announced the 10 recipients of awards through its 2006 Community Health Leadership Program. Following are the winners, who will each receive $120,000 — $115,000 to enhance their organization and $5,000 for personal use:

— Elisabeth Arenales, health-care policy director, Colorado Center on Law and Policy (Denver), who successfully sued the state in 2004 and won a court order to restore services for seriously ill people when a state-run computer-screening system failed.

— Sharon Baskerville, executive director, D.C. Primary Care Association (Washington), whose organization helps bring primary- and specialty-care facilities and doctors into underserved neighborhoods and administers the $145-million Medical Homes D.C. Initiative.

— Yolette Bonnet, chief executive officer, Comprehensive AIDS Program of Palm Beach County (West Palm Beach, Fla.), whose group serves nearly 3,000 HIV/AIDS patients annually and will soon break ground on a community health center that will be the first nonprofit, federally qualified health center in Palm Beach County.

— Gregg Croteau, executive director, United Teen Equality Center (Lowell, Mass.), whose programs actively involve young people in grass-roots organizing, gang mediations, and the use of American Indian “peace circles” to help broker truces between rival gangs.

— Monty Fakhouri, director of public health and youth services, Arab American and Chaldean Council (Detroit), who works to ensure that Arab-Americans, blacks, and poor residents of metropolitan Detroit have access to culturally appropriate health care and prevention services.

— Annie Maxwell, director, Stars and Volunteer Services, Center for the Visually Impaired (Atlanta), who, despite being blind since birth, operates a comprehensive program that provides visually impaired children with after-school projects, athletic programs, field trips, mentoring opportunities, and other activities.

— Brent Moss, district court judge, Seventh Idaho Judicial District (Rexburg, Idaho), who in 2002 created a special court for defendants with severe mental illnesses that combines regular hearings, frequent drug tests, and an assertive regimen of treatment for participants, and has proven successful in reducing both jail and hospital time.

— Kristy Nichols, director, Bureau of Primary Care and Rural Health (Baton Rouge, La.), who worked with other state officials in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina to get doctors, nurses, medicine, and supplies to numerous Louisiana clinics and shelters and helped local residents create detailed recovery plans so that scarce federal resources got to the state’s hardest-hit parishes.

— Michael Rodolico, executive director, Health Access Washoe County (Reno, Nev.), who opened the area’s first dental clinic, women’s-health program, and pediatric mental-health clinic, as well as a free clinic for homeless people and a service for treating and managing patients with diabetes.

— Bev Tittle-Baker, president and chief executive officer, Community Asset and Resource Enterprise (CARE) Partnership (Mesa, Ariz.), whose services include a holistic youth-development program that includes a pediatric and family-planning clinic with on-site prenatal care; an emergency food pantry; a clothing bank; and a holiday-assistance program.