NYAPRS Board of Directors Announce 2020 Award Winners
The NYAPRS Board of Directors is very pleased to proudly honor the work and careers of an extraordinary group of leaders and champions with this year’s NYAPRS 2020 Awards. Please join this year’s online Awards Ceremony on October 1 between 11:30-12:30 pm as a part of this year’s NYAPRS Virtual Annual Conference. Register today at https://tinyurl.com/y5s5935p.
FRANCES OLIVERO ADVOCACY AWARD
The Frances Olivero Advocacy Award is presented to an individual who has demonstrated inspiring community leadership and advocacy on behalf of New Yorkers with psychiatric disabilities.
JENNIFER PARRISH
For almost two decades, Jennifer Parrish has worked tirelessly in support of landmark criminal justice reforms on behalf of our community. She serves as the Director of Criminal Justice Advocacy at the Mental Health Project of the Urban Justice Center and as a member of the Jails Action Coalition and the Campaign for Alternatives to Isolated Confinement.
Jennifer played a key role in helping to secure passage of NYS legislation that restricted the use of solitary confinement for people with mental health conditions (the 2008 SHU Exclusion Law) and is currently at the center of efforts to win passage of the Humane Alternatives to Long-Term (HALT) Solitary Confinement Act that would ban it entirely for our community.
BRENDAN NUGENT LEADERSHIP AWARD
The Brendan Nugent Leadership Award is presented to an inspiring peer leader in promoting and advocating for the empowerment of people with psychiatric disabilities in New York State.
AMANDA SAAKE
Amanda Saake has worked to advance high quality, person-centered services and supports throughout her career, in roles ranging from community service provider and training and technical assistance expert.
Since taking over as director at the Office of Consumer Affairs at the New York State Office of Mental Health in July 2019, “Amanda has led by example, treating everyone with whom she interacts with dignity and respect, advocating for recovery-based, trauma-informed and person-centered services at every corner and refusing to accept anything that does not meet those standards. Amanda fearlessly shares her own unique story of resilience and points out injustice whenever and wherever she sees it.”
RITA CRONISE
Rita Cronise’s belief that “peer support can transform the world” has been at the heart of her life’s work, which currently involves serving as distance faculty for Rutgers University in the Academy of Peer Services and the Rutgers University Undergraduate Certificate Program in Peer Support.
Rita has worked on a local level, state level, national level, in multiple settings, to tirelessly advance the values and practices of the peer movement. She has done this with deep conviction, a strong spirit of collaboration, and extraordinary technical skills and competencies.
“Rita doesn’t just believe in our principles, or that they should just be incorporated in services, she actualizes our principles even within system planning and implementation efforts.”
MARTY SMITH MEMORIAL AWARD
The Marty Smith Memorial Award is presented to a uniquely inspired and dedicated individual or organization that has made exemplary contributions to the advancement of best practices in service to New Yorkers with psychiatric disabilities.
FEDERATION OF ORGANIZATIONS
Federation of Organizations is a highly respected community organization that has afforded thousands of New Yorkers with the hope and support that has enabled them to recover and thrive in their home communities. Since 1977, it has provided a broad array of exemplary care coordination, housing, clinical treatment, employment, peer advocacy, and other rehabilitative services across Long Island and New York City.
Most notably, Federation encourages openness and candor amongst the people and the staff they support and “listens and responds with an open mind and compassionate approach. Federation is a great place to work as a peer and a great place to receive services because of their core values of respect and equality for all.”
LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARDS
The Lifetime Achievement Award is presented to an individual who has a long record of exemplary contributions to the recovery, rehabilitation and rights of New Yorkers with psychiatric disabilities.
BILL ANTHONY
The NYAPRS Board is recognizing the extraordinary life’s work of Bill Anthony who passed away last July 15. Bill played an historic role in the transformation of mental health systems around the world, fundamentally raising the bar for what people could expect both for themselves and from service providers and public policy makers. He was the premiere pioneer in the field of psychiatric rehabilitation and was a major supporter of the emergence of the recovery vision.
Bill’s inspirational leadership and work has been widely recognized and honored, including as a recipient of the Distinguished Service Award from the President of the United States for his efforts “…in promoting the dignity, equality, independence and employment of people with disabilities.”
Bill and his team from the Boston University Center for Psychiatric Rehabilitation came to New York in the 1990’s and revolutionized how services were conceived and delivered, ultimately leading to the creation of the PROS rehabilitation model that is an essential component of local service systems across our state.
GEORGE EBERT
Since the early 1970s, George Ebert has been a pioneering national figure in the anti-psychiatry and psychiatric survivors’ movements. Radicalized by three periods of involuntary incarceration, George and his wife Mary Ann founded the Mental Patients Liberation Alliance in 1972, a self-help, mutual support, human rights, and advocacy organization that created drop-in centers in three cities in Central New York (Oswego, Ithaca, Syracuse) through membership donations and with volunteer staff.
The Alliance quickly gained nationwide recognition as one of the first human rights organizations of people who had been labeled “mentally ill”. Under George’s leadership, it developed the first Peer Advocacy Training in New York State.
Throughout his life and work, George has consistently spoken out against all forms of coercive treatment, including involuntary electroconvulsive therapy and medication.
“Over the past 4 decades, George has served as our conscience, ever challenging our level of commitment to advancing human rights and dignity and opposition to coercive dehumanizing practices and policies.”
CLIFF ZUCKER
Cliff recently retired after 3 decades of historic advocacy on behalf of the mental health and broader disability community, both as the founding Executive Director of Disability Advocates Inc. and as General Counsel for Disability Rights New York (DRNY). He played a leading role in several landmark disability rights cases that mandated the community integration of thousands of individuals diagnosed with mental illnesses from nursing and adult homes in New York State. He also led successful legal efforts to ban egregious prison practices and advance appropriate mental health treatment for prisoners with major mental health conditions in New York State.
“In his retirement, Cliff leaves behind a groundbreaking legacy of legal victories that has fundamentally advanced the dignity, choice and freedom of thousands of New Yorkers.”
JASON BRODY FAITH & FELLOWSHIP AWARD
The Jason Brody Award is presented to an individual who has been an extraordinary source of kindness, caring and devotion to people within their mental health community.
JULIE BURROUGHS ERDMAN
Julie Erdman has a long history of community organizing, activism and service in support of human rights, choice, recovery, employment and education. She provided recovery and peer support in a variety of settings and in 2011, founded Creative Explorations, “a network of artists, writers, photographers, musicians, and other craftsmen who seek to self heal and build connections through artistic expression.”
For many years, she played a critically important role on the NYAPRS Board of Directors, bringing a strong sense of commitment and candor that has been invaluable to our efforts. During that time, she helped fill buses to Albany and Washington DC to ensure our voice is heard across New York and the nation.
“Julie has a unique ability to always see people’s potential and to support them to advance their hope, recovery and self and system advocacy.”
In her own words: “I want to live in a world where people try to make sense of complexity; where the universal human experiences of joy and suffering connect those who differ in age, gender and cultural background; where the wisdom gained from personal history prevents us from repeating it. I will not stand down. I will fight for peace.”
QUINCY BOYKIN MEMORIAL AWARD
The Quincy Boykin award is presented to a person in heartfelt recognition of your inspiring contributions to the recovery, empowerment, integration and inclusion of all New Yorkers with psychiatric disabilities.
DR. DEBORAH WILCOX
Dr. Wilcox is a longtime and very active member of the NYAPRS Cultural Competence Committee who was the recipient of the 2014 Multicultural Award of Distinction from the Psychiatric Rehabilitation Association (PRA), for her outstanding contribution to the field of psychiatric rehabilitation. Her work has centered around incorporating multicultural best practices within prime organizations and institutions such as mental health, integrated health care agencies, hospitals, schools, faith-based and community-based organizations. “Dr. Wilcox’s work has played a critical role in building communities of wellness by bringing people together across their cultural differences to work through challenges that exist within their organizations and communities.”
PUBLIC EDUCATION AWARD
The Public Education/Media Award is presented to an individual who has demonstrated extraordinary public education efforts that advance the needs of and/or that highlight the accomplishments of New Yorkers with psychiatric disabilities.
DAN CLARK
Dan Clark has been reporting on New York state government and politics for the last six years out of the state Capitol in Albany. New York. Previously he reported for the national political fact-checking publication PolitiFact, the Buffalo News, the statewide political television show Capital Tonight, the New York Law Journal and currently serves as the Host and Producer of New York Now, the state’s Emmy-winning, in-depth public affairs program.
“In the last few years, Dan has shone a bright light on New York’s need to implement criminal justice reforms including the Humane Alternatives to Long-Term (HALT) Solitary Confinement Act, as well as the crisis in funding for our essential community mental health services and our dedicated workforce”
PUBLIC POLICY LEADERSHIP AWARD
The Public Policy Leadership Award is presented to an individual who has demonstrated outstanding public leadership on behalf of New Yorkers with psychiatric disabilities.
CONGRESSMAN PAUL TONKO
Congressman Paul D. Tonko has been a longtime and exemplary champion for our community, both as a six-term member of the U.S. House of Representatives who has sponsored groundbreaking legislation to re-start Medicaid 30 days before prison and jail discharges, oppose forced treatment measures and worked to support improved funding for our community mental health workforce, and as a leading member of the NYS Assembly for 25 years, where he sponsored and led the fight to win mental health parity in NY via the passage of Timothy’s Law.
“Throughout his long career in public service, we have always been able to count on Paul’s great dedication, courage, heart and unflagging commitment to our values, our community and our workforce.”