Governor's Volunteer Awards - 2010 Winners
On September 23, 2010, we announced the winners of the 27th Annual Governor’s Volunteer Awards. The winners were honored at a ceremony that night in Austin with their invited guests and attendees of the Texas Nonprofit Summit. Former Under Secretary of State and dedicated Texan, Ambassador Karen P. Hughes served as the evening keynote speaker. Each winner received two roundtrip tickets courtesy of Southwest Airlines.
Social Innovator Award
The Last Organic Outpost
The Last Organic Outpost is an inner-city urban farm project using
regenerative agriculture to restore the fertility of unused land. This
urban farm is breaking new ground on many fronts.
The Outpost’s innovative approach is acquainting urban youths and their
elders with the age-old tradition of planting, harvesting and working
the soil while integrating agriculture and art in a fresh, new venue for
local artists that nourishes the soul as well as the body.
They have created an anchor for an urban farm belt, providing volunteer
opportunities and hyper-local, all natural produce for its
neighborhoods. This anchor offers a teaching environment where people
from all ages and walks of life learn together by doing.
Ultimately, this work has resulted in the establishment of a close-knit
community among a diverse and far-reaching population. Residents
volunteer in the garden and are paid in the fruits of their labor which
is creating a healthy way to supplement their diets.
Community Motivator
buildingcommunityWORKSHOP
The buildingcommunityWORKSHOP (bcWORKSHOP) is a Dallas based nonprofit architecture and community design/build center seeking to improve the livability and viability of communities through the practice of thoughtful design and making. They enrich the lives of citizens by bringing creative design thinking to low income areas of Dallas where resources are most scarce. bcWORKSHOP also emphasizes the value of service, whether it is donated skilled labor, general volunteer work or leading a group to pick up trash. They have hosted more than 800 volunteers on two initiative sites.
The bcWORKSHOP’s first step is to understand the social, economic and environmental issues facing a community. This is followed by state-of-the-art design and technology. Finally, work begins and lives are transformed through targeted communities and those that volunteer to support them.
The impact that bcWORKSHOP has made in the Fair Park and South Dallas communities is clear as you see their unique and thoughtful work throughout the neighborhoods. It is also evident that having a safe and healthy place to call home gives residents the tools they need to succeed in their community.
Ann Park
Ann Park is truly a community motivator in countless ways. She is described as an “inspiration to everyone she meets because of her giving spirit”. She participates in Meals-on-Wheels in several communities – including Longview, College Station and Irving. She was instrumental in the development of the interfaith network of Family Promise in Longview, Texas, recruiting local faith groups to serve as hosts to families in need by providing lodging and meals. Ann worked to secure a permanent Day Center where families could stay together in a safe and secure family environment as they worked toward affordable housing.
Ann later was instrumental in the development of the Family Promise of Bryan-College Station. Family Promise helps homeless families with children become self-sufficient by providing shelter in churches and assisting with job readiness, networking and case management. She was eventually selected as the president of the network and was the driving force behind the development of an interfaith network.
Ann has left her mark on multiple communities throughout Texas and her work, which has already served countless of people, will go on to serve many more.
Corporate Community Impact
Citi
Citi, a model corporate citizen, demonstrates the value of this award by bringing an unparalleled passion and commitment to improving the communities in which we all live and work. The economic empowerment of individuals and families is the driving force behind Citi’s involvement in the community.
Citi supports a unique program, the Self-Sufficiency Calculator, which is a budgeting and financial literacy tool that can be used to help women find greater financial stability. It is the next step in the effort to move people from poverty to self-sufficiency and asset building.
Now in its 11th year, Citi’s Deliver Dallas event, utilizes 800 volunteers in one day to deliver meals to the entire Dallas County area for the Visiting Nurse Association. Because of this program’s success, it has now been replicated in San Antonio for the past two years.
In addition to these daily acts of community service and selflessness, Citi hosts an annual Global Community Day, which provides employees from all over the world the opportunity to join together and volunteer in their community. Citi in Texas creates and supports volunteer events on this day in Dallas, Fort Worth, San Antonio, Wichita Falls, Midland, Odessa, Austin, Houston, and Bryan/College Station.
Community Collaborator Award
Center for Nonprofit Management – Dallas Blueprint for Leadership
Dallas Blueprint for Leadership (Blueprint) founders, Dr. Wright Lassiter and Calvin Smith, started the program as a United Way of Metropolitan Dallas effort in 1991. They found a huge void in the ethnic and cultural makeup of many of the organization’s member agencies. There was a need for diversity on nonprofit boards. Member agencies knew the value of diversity and Dallas Blueprint for Leadership became the answer.
The program sought out highly skilled professionals. These professionals had to have a strong affinity for public service and needed to be an ethnic minority. These professionals took part in an intense 40-hour training program. The training helped them grasp the responsibility of serving on a nonprofit board. Blueprint then matched the program’s graduates with nonprofit agencies that needed skilled people from diverse backgrounds. Since that first class, Blueprint has trained and matched over 350 ethnic minorities with boards of nonprofit agencies in Dallas and Collin counties.
Now operated by the Center for Nonprofit Management, Dallas Blueprint for Leadership exemplifies collaboration by seeking out and training individuals and pairing them with nonprofits that in turn receive the benefit of skilled, engaged and dedicated board membership.
Knowbility, Inc.
Knowbility's mission is to ensure barrier-free information technology,
supporting the independence of people with disabilities by promoting the
use and improving the availability of accessible information
technology. Knowbility provides unique services such as Accessibility
Consulting which provides accessibility assessments, implementation
services, and technical guidance to help corporations and organizations
meet federal requirements and other institutional mandates for
accessibility. In addition, they provide invaluable trainings for
software professionals and teachers, where they can learn more about how
to develop applications and activities that work for everyone including
people with disabilities.
AccessWorks, another of Knowbility’s remarkable programs, provides
Document Remediation and User Experience Testing services to meet web
accessibility goals and better serve customers with disabilities.
AccessWorkers are people with physical, cognitive and emotional
disabilities referred by veteran's groups and many others. Knowbility
utilizes a collaborative network that is uniquely qualified to provide
jobs delivering services for people with disabilities by people with
disabilities.
Together with business, civic, academic and government leaders,
Knowbility is building an online community that works for everyone.
First Lady’s Rising Star
Victoria Acker
At first glance, Victoria Acker is a normal 16 year old high school
student who attends Westlake Academy, an International Baccalaureate
School. At second glance you realize that Victoria is an astounding
young woman who embraces her school’s core goal to build inquirers,
thinkers, communicators, risk takers, principled, and caring young
adults.
Victoria’s nominator and her family have experienced firsthand the
compassion and dedication of this young woman as she helped mentor and
ultimately befriend a new classmate with a learning disability and
language barrier.
Among Miss Acker’s many activities and engagements you will find her
serving her community through the National Charity League, Girls Scouts
and the American Airlines Skyball event. She also developed a tutoring
program called Creating Academic Success for Christ Haven Children’s
Home. The program allows Victoria and her friends to tutor K-5th grade
students twice a week and even has a website to ease scheduling and
communication efforts.
At a young age Victoria Acker is truly setting an example for all Texans.
Governor’s Lonestar Achievement Award
William Sinkin
William Sinkin is a rare individual who has dedicated his life to
community activism and civic issues. He began his career in the retail
clothing business and later became engaged in civic movements, banking,
and community activities that promoted small businesses, especially
those involving women and minorities.
William Sinkin was born in San Antonio in 1913. He received a degree in
Business Administration in 1943 from the University of Texas and began
working in his father’s wholesale clothing manufacturing company. He
found opportunities to aid the community and in 1946, he co-founded
Goodwill Industries in San Antonio in an effort to aid those with
physical and mental challenges to find work. From 1949-1953 he was
Chairman of the Board of the San Antonio Housing Authority (SAHA).
During this time 2,500 new homes were built. Sinkin also worked to
increase the participation of minorities in local government agencies;
he hired the first woman Executive Director of SAHA.
In 1999 at the vibrant age of 86, William Sinkin founded Solar San
Antonio, a non-profit organization with the mission of creating
community outreach and education on the importance of renewable and
sustainable energy through the use of solar power. Now at the age of 98,
William continues to be an innovative, creative individual when it
comes to harnessing the power of the sun.
