FAMM President Wins National Award
3/30/06
Julie Stewart, founder and president of Families Against Mandatory Minimums (FAMM), is a recipient of the Citizen Activist Award! This nationally recognized award is presented every other year by the Los Angeles-based Gleitsman Foundation to two individuals who have challenged social injustice in the United States.
The Gleitsman Foundation established the Citizen Activist Award in 1989 to encourage individual commitment and leadership by recognizing the exceptional achievement of people who have initiated social change. The individuals are honored by the Foundation as leaders in efforts to change the way we live through their courage and persistence.
Julie Stewart is well chosen for this award. In 1991, after her brother was convicted of growing marijuana and given a five-year mandatory minimum sentence in federal prison, Julie quit her full-time job to start FAMM, a non-profit dedicated to fighting for just sentencing policies. With little more than a passion for justice and a belief it could be achieved, Julie built an organization that has led the way for sentencing reforms at the state and federal levels, resulting in fairer sentence for tens of thousands of individuals. At the same time, FAMM has shone a public spotlight on the harshness of mandatory minimum sentencing policies and has provided a much-needed ray of hope to the thousands of people behind bars in the United States.
The Citizen Activist Award will be presented in April at the Harvard Center for Public Leadership. The award is accompanied by a gift of $50,000 per awardee and a commemorative sculpture designed by Maya Lin, the creator of the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington, D.C.
The other 2006 Citizen Activist awardee is Mary Houghton of Shorebank, a microcredit lending institution.
For more information on the Gleitsman Foundation Citizen Activist Award, visit www.gleitsman.org.