CT Voices for
Children
First for Kids 2001
Celebration
December 5, 2001
The New Haven Lawn Club
193 Whitney Avenue
New Haven, Connecticut
5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.
Honoring citizens for
effective advocacy
and public leadership
on behalf of all of
Connecticut’s children,
youth and families
Connecticut Voices for Children
33 Whitney Avenue
New Haven, CT 06510
ABOUT CONNECTICUT VOICES FOR CHILDREN
Connecticut Voices for Children is a statewide nonprofit organization committed to promoting
leadership, policy change and investment on behalf of all of Connecticut’s children and youth.
We believe that all of Connecticut’s young people need to grow up healthy and safe, have
opportunities for successful learning from birth through adulthood, live free from the limiting
effects of poverty, prosper under the loving guidance of caring adults, and have the
opportunity to give something back to their communities along the way. Connecticut has the
capacity and resources to make this vision a reality for children living throughout the state,
from Greenwich to Putnam, Avon to New Haven, and Essex to Hartford.
CT Voices for Children works on a broad range of issues, including state tax & budget, family
economic security, children’s health and mental health, supports for grandparents raising their
grandchildren, technology and learning, early care and education, youth workforce
investment, and Connecticut’s income, digital, health and educational divides. Our research
and policy reports are widely cited by the media and other organizations and are all published
on our website, CT KidsLink — www.ctkidslink.org.
CT Voices also founded and supports the CT Child and Family Advocacy Network, the CT
Child and Family Research Partnership, and the CT Girls and Technology Network. We were
a founding partner in Camp Totokett, the widely-honored Greater New Haven area summer
experience for children living with HIV/AIDS. We celebrate accomplishment and service by
both young people and adults through our annual Youth Spirit Awards in April and our First for
Kids Awards in December. Our Young Policy Fellows program attracts talented college and
graduate students who desire a range of experiences in policy analysis and advocacy.
Our active communications program includes sending E-Notes, our electronic newsletter, to
2,000-plus residents of Connecticut and beyond. We provide general and targeted mailings on
a variety of topics, and we annually host a series of forums to bring Connecticut and national
leaders together on the kinds of issues identified above.
And because policy change is often possible only through legislation, CT Voices works closely
with our partner lobbying organization, Advocates for Connecticut’s Children and Youth, Inc.,
which mobilizes concerned citizens to work on these issues in the Connecticut General
Assembly each year.
CT VOICES FOR CHILDREN
3rd Annual First for Kids Ceremony
Welcome
ALBERT J. SOLNIT LEADERSHIP AWARD
Senator Kevin B. Sullivan
MEDIA AWARD
The Hartford Courant’s:
Dave Altimari
Dwight Blint
Susan Campbell
Beth Hamilton
Andrew Julien
Kathy Megan
Daryl Perch
Colin Poitras
Eric Weiss
CITIZEN ADVOCACY AWARD
Sheila Amdur
COMMUNITY ADVOCACY AWARDS
Reverend Bonita Grubbs
Marilyn Ondrasik
YOUTH MENTOR AWARDS
Michael Duggan
Will MacAdams
Richard Sugarman
Closing Remarks
ALBERT J. SOLNIT LEADERSHIP AWARD
Senator Kevin B. Sullivan
President Pro Tem
Theodore Roosevelt said, “Far and away the best prize that life
offers is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.”
Connecticut State Senator Kevin B. Sullivan lives by that
sentiment. Throughout his tenure as President Pro Tem of the
Connecticut State Senate, a position he has held since 1997, he
has championed the rights of children.
Elected to the Senate in 1986, he is also an effective advocate for mental health services,
sponsoring the state’s comprehensive parity reforms, and the most significant single
investment in community based mental health and supportive housing in Connecticut’s
history.
Senator Sullivan is nationally recognized for his leadership in school improvement, property
tax relief, and services for children and senior citizens. He is an active member of the
national Senate President’s Forum, and the State Legislative Leaders Foundation.
The senator also serves as a vice president and professor at his undergraduate alma mater,
Trinity College, where he oversees the institution’s major community renewal initiative.
A resident of West Hartford, and the city’s former mayor, he is an active member of the
Rotary Club, and serves on the Governor’s Council on Economic Competitiveness and
Technology, and the Connecticut-Israel Exchange Commission. During his term as mayor,
Senator Sullivan reorganized town government and passed the town’s first property tax cut
in years.
The senator is a graduate of the University of Connecticut Law School.
CT Voices for Children is proud to present this award for lifelong commitment to policy
leadership and excellence on behalf of children to Senator Sullivan.
MEDIA AWARD
Dave Altimari joined The Hartford Courant four years ago after
working for 12 years at the New Haven Register. He is currently an investigative reporter, and was part of a team that
received a national award for public service from the National
Alliance for the Mentally Ill for a series about restraint-related
deaths in psychiatric hospitals.
Dave is a graduate of the University of Dayton. His wife
Daniela is also a reporter at the paper.
Dwight Blint is a graduate of Nathaniel Hawthorne College and
started his career in journalism in Boston. He has been with
The Hartford Courant for over five years. An award-winning
reporter, Dwight recently received the Humanitarian Award from
Friends and Families Who Care, a prisoners’ rights advocacy
group. In 1999 and 1997, he was honored with the Charles
Dudley Warner Award from The Hartford Courant. In 1999, he
also received awards from the Connecticut Psychological
Association, the Regional Mental Health Board, and the
Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services. In
addition, Dwight was a member of the reporting team that won
the 1999 Pulitzer Prize in Breaking News for coverage of the
massacre at state lottery headquarters.
Susan Campbell, an award-winning journalist, was one of The
Hartford Courant’s reporters to receive the 1999 Pulitzer Prize.
She has also received national honors for essay and column
writing from the Sunday Magazine Editor’s Association, and the
American Association of Sunday and Features Editors.
In addition, Susan’s work has been recognized by the Connecticut chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists, and she
is the recipient of an Exceptional Merit Media Award from the
National Women’s Political Caucus and Radcliffe College.
Susan has a master’s degree in religious studies from the
Hartford Seminary.
MEDIA AWARD
Elizabeth Hamilton covers the state Department of Children and
Families, and the state Department of Mental Health and Addiction
Services for The Hartford Courant. She has also written about the
juvenile correctional facility in Middletown, and Connecticut Valley
Hospital. Prior to joining the Courant, Elizabeth worked for the
Danbury News-Times and Housatonic Valley Publishing Company.
Elizabeth is a graduate of the University of Connecticut. She is a
member of the Connecticut chapter of the Society of Professional
Journalists, which has awarded her writing in the categories of
Investigative Reporting, General Reporting Series, and Feature
Writing.
Andrew Julien has been an award-winning staff writer at The
Hartford Courant for more than 10 years, reporting on crime,
statewide labor issues and health care. He was a member of the
team that won the 1999 Pulitzer Prize.
Andrew, a graduate of Williams College, has received many other
awards for his work, including a first prize in the New England AP
Newspaper Association’s 2001 competition, and the Connecticut
Society of Professional Journalists’ Stephen Collins Public Service
Award. He is currently a media fellow with the Kaiser Family
Foundation, conducting research on the influence of social and
economic forces on children’s behavioral health.
Kathy Megan has spent much of the past 18 years at The
Hartford Courant writing about issues related to children: children
in state custody; children with mental retardation or other
disabilities; children with mental health problems; children reared
in poverty or wealth; and family issues. These are stories she
enjoys doing most, and she has won awards for her writing on
these topics.
Kathy has a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia
University, and is a graduate of Wesleyan University.
MEDIA AWARD
Daryl Perch has been an editorial writer at The Hartford Courant
since 1989, with a brief stint as special features editor of the
Courant’s Sunday Magazine, Northeast.
Her prior position was as a writer and editor at the Worcester
Telegram & Gazette. She is the recipient of the 2000 and 2001
awards for best editorial from the National Mental Health
Association, and was given the 1999 Allan B. Rogers Award for
best editorial in New England.
Daryl holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of
Connecticut, where she has taught journalism.
Colin Poitras has covered the town of Middletown for 11 years
and his beats include police and social services. His writing has
been recognized with several Gield Awards from The Hartford
Courant.
A Connecticut native, Colin was raised in Mystic and graduated
from the University of Connecticut. In his spare time, he enjoys
working with high-risk youth from two of Middletown’s larger
housing projects.
Eric M. Weiss reports on the legislature and state politics, and has
been with The Hartford Courant since 1997. He has also written
about Hartford City Hall, Connecticut Valley Hospital, and Long
Lane School, the state’s facility for juvenile offenders.
In 1999, Eric was named a Times Mirror Journalist of the Year,
and was a finalist in the 1998 Livingston Awards for Young
Journalists.
Before graduating with honors from the Columbia University
Graduate School of Journalism in 1995, Eric spent four years in
Washington as a legislative aide and press secretary for two
members of Congress.
CITIZEN ADVOCACY AWARD
Sheila Amdur
A lifetime commitment to a cause can spring from personal
experience. So it was for Sheila Amdur, whose 30-year
crusade to eradicate the stigma of mental illness began close to
home.
“People with mental illness were considered outcasts in
society,” says Sheila, the president of the National Alliance
for the Mentally Ill of Connecticut (NAMI-CT).“I knew from my
family’s experience that this was wrong, and I wanted to change the way people with mental
illness and their families were treated.”
Sheila’s commitment to change has made her a respected voice and leader in mental health,
addiction services and healthcare reform in Connecticut, and has earned her CT Voices’
award for Citizen Advocacy. “It is my passionate belief that the strength of democracy
depends upon principled advocacy,” she says. And throughout her exemplary career, she
has focused educational and advocacy efforts on mental health system changes at the state
and national levels, and helped expand services to citizens in need.
At NAMI-CT, an organization whose mission is “to eradicate mental illness and improve the
quality of life of those affected by these diseases,” Sheila has worked with a dynamic
membership and staff. Together, they have built a collaborative with other family organizations, particularly of families and caregivers of children with serious behavioral health disorders. Educational programs for families, providers, and the general public have also been
expanded, actualizing the organization’s goal of being a powerful “voice on mental illness.”
Prior to her 1999 appointment as president of NAMI-CT, Sheila was a behavioral health
organizational consultant. She currently serves on the board of the Connecticut
Community Mental Health Strategic Investment Fund, and chairs national NAMI’s State
Presidents’ Council.
Sheila, who lives in Mansfield Center, feels that her most significant accomplishment “is
helping to organize and establish comprehensive community mental health services in
Northeastern Connecticut. In addition, helping to organize families, consumers and
advocates across the age spectrum in a coalition called Keep the Promise has been very
rewarding. The coalition fights for better treatment, funding and delivery of mental health
services for children and adults.” Sheila serves as Keep the Promise co-chair.
Living her life by example, Sheila says, “We all must be advocates to be truly human.
It is the only way that tyranny, ignorance and discrimination are vanquished.”
COMMUNITY ADVOCACY AWARD
Marilyn Ondrasik
If imitation is the most sincere form of flattery, then Marilyn
Ondrasik, director of the Bridgeport Child Advocacy Coalition
(BCAC), has much to be proud of! BCAC’s reports and initiatives
on behalf of Bridgeport’s children are widely modeled by
organizations in Connecticut and around the country for their
cutting-edge information and recommendations.
Since coming to BCAC nine years ago, Marilyn has made it her mission to make a
difference for kids through advocacy, and the mobilization of community, city and state
resources. True to her vision, she has effectively achieved local policy and program
changes, and has successfully mobilized regional pressure for changes at the state level.
Founded in 1985, BCAC is a coalition of 76 member organizations committed to improving
the well-being of Bridgeport’s children through a program combining research, community
planning and education, and advocacy. Recognizing that cities do not have walls and
children’s needs do not have geographic boundaries, BCAC also works to increase awareness of regional interconnections and to develop solutions to meet the needs of all children.
Marilyn realized that parents are key stakeholders in a child’s success and she included
them in leadership roles within BCAC. There is now an active constituency of parents around
education issues in Bridgeport. She has also initiated programs for high-risk families with
young children, brought the Healthy Families child abuse prevention program to Bridgeport,
and produced the first nonpartisan guides to municipal elections, giving parents important
information when they go into the voting booth.
Marilyn has championed other issues she sees as key to child welfare. She developed a
first-ever job readiness training program for teens to help them get a summer job, which is
often the first step to full-time employment after graduation. She also worked with
legislators to fund youth centers and a city recreation department with evening programs that
serve 1,100 teens. And after years of reductions in city spending on education, BCAC won
an increase of $5.3 million in funding for the 2001-2002 school year.
Child advocates now meet with state legislators in Bridgeport and six surrounding towns to
communicate about legislation affecting children and families because of Marilyn’s efforts.
And she has trumpeted children’s health issues by opening a lead-safe house that provides
temporary housing to families of children with lead poisoning.
For her leadership ability, personal vision, and commitment to children, CT Voices salutes
Marilyn Ondrasik with an award for Community Advocacy.
COMMUNITY ADVOCACY AWARD
Reverend Bonita Grubbs
Over thirty years ago, a group of concerned Protestants and
Catholics came together to help a family left homeless by a
fire. New Haven’s Christian Community Action (CCA) grew
out of providing temporary shelter to those people in need,
and today helps about 1,000 people with emergency housing,
food, or fuel assistance each year.
The organization, a force for community building and social
change, also operates a “Welfare Justice Project” and serves
the community from three city sites.
Offering help, housing, and hope has been CCA’s mission since opening its doors to that
first family in 1967. At the organization’s helm since 1988 is Executive Director Reverend
Bonita Grubbs, a minister within the American Baptist Church. A crusader and voice for the
less fortunate, Rev. Grubbs is committed “to changing a system that promotes poverty and
injustice, and encouraging the poor’s efforts to attain self-sufficiency through counseling,
education and job training.”
“All people are entitled to a better quality of life,” she says, noting that advocacy on behalf of
affordable housing is one way to address poverty and homelessness. “If housing isn’t
available to the people who need it, then we must find out why the housing isn’t there and
what we can do about it.”
Reverend Grubbs, who holds an undergraduate degree in Sociology and Afro-American
Studies from Smith College, and master’s degrees in religion and public health from Yale
University, also makes volunteer service a priority. She is a member of the board of
directors of CT Voices for Children; the International Festival of Arts and Ideas; Dwight Hall
at Yale University; the Connecticut Center for School Change; and is on the Board of
Trustees of the Mercy Center in Madison. She is also a practicum instructor at the Yale
University Divinity School and is a columnist for the New Haven Register.
The most rewarding part of the Reverend’s many roles? “Knowing that we can make a
difference in the lives of human beings through the advocacy that we do,” she says.
For her unwavering commitment to making life better for others, CT Voices proudly presents
Reverend Bonita Grubbs with the Community Advocacy Award.
YOUTH MENTOR AWARD
Michael Duggan
Michael Duggan chose a career in social work “because I
grew up surrounded by family and friends who loved me and
believed in me, and I wanted to provide that same support to
other young adults.”
“The biggest challenge facing youth today is that few young
people have positive adults in their lives that believe in them,”
he says. “Many youth don’t think they can make it because no
adults have ever believed they could.”
Throughout his distinguished career, Michael has been true to his conviction to be a positive
force in young people’s lives. Since 1991, he has served as executive director of the Domus
Foundation in Stamford, an organization dedicated to the mission that “no child shall be
denied hope, love or a fair chance in life.” During his tenure, the organization has grown from
a single group home for ten boys, with a budget of $200,000, to include two residential
programs, a state charter school, a free summer day camp, a juvenile justice center, and a
training institute for people who work with youth. Domus now serves over 350 young people
and their families, and has a budget of almost $4 million.
Michael, who has a master’s degree in social work, considers this to be his most rewarding
career achievement. He hopes to expand services at Domus to include a residential
program for children ages six to twelve, a high school for young people not successful in
traditional schools, more after school programs, and a community-wide summer camp.
Volunteer activities fill Michael’s spare time, and he was recognized for his selflessness with
the 2001 Community Leader of the Year award from The Advocate. The Guilford resident
and father of four is president of the United Way Agency Executives Board, and the board of
directors of the Waterside School. He also serves on the Council of Churches and
Synagogues Board of Directors, and is a member of the Mayor’s Youth Advisory Board. In
addition, he coaches football and baseball, and teaches religion.
Volunteering is also a family affair. For twenty years, he and wife Karen have volunteered in
a life skills program that enriches the lives of developmentally disabled adults.
“I am tremendously grateful for all I have been given, and find it rewarding to give back to
others,” he says. “I would like to be remembered as a person who helped people to realize
their full potential.”
It is for this unwavering commitment to being a supportive role model to young people that
CT Voices honors Michael Duggan with the Youth Mentor Award.
YOUTH MENTOR AWARD
Will MacAdams
As a young person, involvement in theater helped Will
MacAdams find his “voice” and that life-changing experience
shaped his destiny. Today, Will helps other young people
discover their voices, too, as director of CityKids @ Safe Space
of New Haven, an arts-based youth development program that
teaches teens to make positive changes in their lives, their
communities, and the world.
“I knew that in my own life, when I felt voiceless, theater provided
me with a voice like nothing else could,” he says. So, while still a student at Yale, Will set a
course to spread the word, and created an arts program in a juvenile detention center.
“I saw that in the juvenile justice system young people lacked a voice in many ways,” he
says. “Creating an arts program would give them a voice, and in doing so, help them learn
about themselves and establish positive relationships on their own terms with the many
institutions and individuals affecting their lives.”
Through that experience, and his subsequent work, Will has witnessed firsthand the positive
things that happen when young people use creative expression as a tool to learn about
themselves and the world. Assumptions are challenged, communication skills improve, and
new skills like teamwork and conflict resolution are developed. The results can be liberating
and life changing as young actors “learn to step out of their own bodies and step into a role
of another person.”
Depending on the project, they also learn to communicate across lines of social division. A
production by CityKids @ Safe Space and the New Haven Police Academy brought together
young people and future police officers to create a play about racism and police-youth
relations. “The level of collaboration forced us all to challenge our assumptions, and to
break down stereotypes,” says Will.
Will acknowledges that his students teach him as much as he teaches them and offers this
observation. “Don’t be afraid to open your heart and truly listen to young people, even if they
challenge or offend you. We cannot have a healthy society unless adults and young people
can communicate beyond fear.”
An accomplished theater artist, Will has worked in South Africa, Indonesia, Europe and the
United States. He wrote and directed Waiting for Justice, produced at the Long Wharf
Theater in 2000. That year, he was also selected as a fellow for the Rockefeller Foundation’s
Next Generation Leadership program. For his work to empower Connecticut’s kids, Will now
adds CT Voices’ Youth Mentor Award to these accolades.
YOUTH MENTOR AWARD
Richard Sugarman
What do disadvantaged kids from inner city high schools have in
common with privileged prep school students? More than you
think, according to Richard Sugarman, founding president of the
Connecticut Youth Forum and the Connecticut Forum, non-profit
organizations which he says “build bridges among all people in
our community.”
For the past eight years, students from all walks of life have met monthly at high schools
throughout the state to discuss issues like race, school safety, drugs and boy-girl
relationships. And in the process of getting to know each other, they often discover more
similarities than differences.
The Connecticut Youth Forum is an outgrowth of the acclaimed Connecticut Forum, a bold
lecture series for adults that Richard started in 1992 with his wife Doris. Held four times a
year at Hartford’s Bushnell, top-notch speakers address a given theme. There are no
scripts, just lively exchanges between guests. The audience is comprised of paying patrons
and members of groups that receive free tickets – disabled veterans, neighborhood
organizations and others. For his work in bringing these diverse communities together,
Richard has received numerous awards, among them The Hartford Courant’s 2001 Tapestry
Award.
Richard’s devotion to frank dialogue and promoting diversity among adults through the
Forum programs led to the formation of a similar venue for teens. The Student Exchange
series was started in 1993, and was later renamed the Connecticut Youth Forum. About 150
teens from 50 participating high schools attend a typical Youth Forum meeting.
As the Connecticut Youth Forum continues to grow, Richard is thinking of expanding it to the
middle school level. “Every year, there are more issues and more students, and more need
to talk openly,” he says.
In addition to spearheading the Forums, Richard is chairman of the board of the Connecticut
Center for School Change, and is a partner in Ford Webb Associates, a national executive
recruiting firm. For many years, he was an investment adviser.
The father of three sons, Richard holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the
University of Miami, and a master’s degree from the University of Maryland. He has done
post-graduate work in family therapy and psychotherapy.
Richard’s commitment to fostering understanding and positive relationships among young
people has deservedly earned him CT Voices’ Youth Mentor Award.
CT VOICES FOR CHILDREN
2000 First for Kids Honorees
POLICY LEADERSHIP AWARD
Lt. Governor M. Jodi Rell
ALBERT J. SOLNIT LEADERSHIP AWARD
Senator Toni Harp
COMMUNITY ADVOCACY AWARD
Fernando Betancourt
CITIZEN ADVOCACY AWARDS
Eva Bunnell
Norma Schatz
VISION TO ACTION AWARDS
Paula Armbruster
Anne Calabresi
Henry Fernandez, III
Matthew Klein
Roslyn Meyer
Jerome Meyer
Founders of LEAP—Leadership, Education, and Athletics in Partnership, Inc.
CT VOICES FOUNDERS’ AWARD
Priscilla “Penny” Canny
1999 First for Kids Honorees
VOLUNTEERISM AWARD
Barbara Colley and Rev. Gary Smith, Camp Totokett
CITIZEN ADVOCACY AWARD
Marva and Willie Jones, Grandparents
MEDIA AWARD
Stephen Winters, Connecticut Post
A SPECIAL TRIBUTE TO
Albert J. Solnit, MD
ALBERT J. SOLNIT LEADERSHIP AWARD
Representative John Thompson