Nonprofit
Mission Award for
Advocacy
Criteria
This
award recognizes advocacy as one of the most effective
and unique roles of nonprofit organizations. Nominated
organizations should:
- Implement
an effective advocacy strategy;
- Demonstrate
success in its advocacy efforts; and
- Have
a significant impact on the organization's constituency.
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Finalists
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Staff
and volunteers of MCN members only are eligible. You
will need your MCN member ID number when you vote.
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Healthy
Legacy
Healthy Legacy is a statewide
public health coalition dedicated to promoting a healthier
Minnesota. The coalition has 31 partner organizations including
service providers, advocacy groups, labor unions, faith
groups and educators, through which it serves over 1.2 million
Minnesotans. Their mission is Safe Products, Made Safely
and they are seeking to protect all Minnesotans from unnecessary
toxic exposure from cleaning supplies, children's toys,
food and beverage packaging, and more.

Healthy Legacy has three objectives:
responsible business, consumer education and protective
policies. The coalition is currently working with Minnesota
businesses, which will hopefully lead to a business-NGO
partnership to examine the economic and health value of
green chemistry in Minnesota. They continue to educate Minnesotans
about the adverse health effects of chemical exposure and
how they can protect themselves and their children. Healthy
Legacy is also committed to changing state and federal policies
to protect consumers from unnecessary toxic exposure.
In the past Legislative Session,
because of Healthy Legacy’s lobbying, Governor Pawlenty
signed into law the BPA Free Baby Products Bill (SF 247/HF
326), making Minnesota the first state in the nation and
the third government entity in the world to place restrictions
on the use of bisphenol A (BPA). BPA is a synthetic sex
hormone in polycarbonate plastic, which is used in baby
bottles, “sippy” cups and many other products.
At very low doses, the chemical can disrupt the hormone
system and has been linked to diabetes, reproductive disorders,
breast and prostate cancer, learning disabilities and more.
As a result, beginning January 1, 2011, Minnesotans will
be able to purchase baby bottles and “sippy cups”
without the fear that they may contain BPA.
Also as a result of the coalition’s
lobbying efforts, the governor signed into law the Toxic
Free Kids Act (SF 225/HF250), which gives authority to the
Minnesota Department of Health to produce a list of hazardous
chemicals used in children’s products and also sets
money aside to accomplish this.
Healthy Legacy has helped Minnesota
to lead the way in banning BPA from many products. While
93 percent of independently funded studies show BPA causes
harm, 0 percent of industry funded studies show that it
does. The industry also previously argued that the lack
of regulatory action by governments around the world demonstrated
the safety of the chemical. However, since Minnesota’s
ban, Chicago and Connecticut have also applied bans, and
the federal government is currently working on a bill that
would ban BPA in all food storage containers.
Healthy
Legacy Web site: www.healthylegacy.org
KOOTASCA
Community Action
KOOTASCA Community Action Circles
of Support of Itasca County is committed to eliminating
poverty in Minnesota, with special focus on the Grand Rapids
area. Their mission is to foster intentional relationships
across race and class lines so as to help people in poverty
get out of poverty, to change the community perception of
people living in poverty, and to address policies and systems
that make it hard for people to escape poverty. The Circles
of Support community consists of about 70 individuals including
working poor adults with children, adult volunteers and
staff, who meet together every week to create a safe community
to be able to support families in their journey out of poverty.
Dinner and childcare are provided at these meetings and
discussion topics include personal empowerment and fostering
the hope that they can change their lives.
Circles of Support is based
on the concept of community engagement, and bridging the
gap between those who are financially stable, and those
who aren’t. This is a community committed to empowering
people to help themselves, instead of only providing them
with services that may help them temporarily.

In order to participate, individuals
must be able to search for and obtain full time employment,
and not be facing an immediate crisis. Participants set
goals for themselves in areas of income and budgeting, academics
and training, and friends and meaning, and then work to
accomplish these goals with the support of the community.
Through these intentional relationships, Circles of Support
seeks to break down barriers and lead advocacy efforts to
eliminate policies and systems that make it hard to escape
poverty.
In September 2007, the Legislative
Commission to End Poverty, visited Circles of Support, where
members shared what it is like to live in poverty in Itasca
County. This meeting was the start of an 18 month process
to advocate for people in poverty and the work of Circles
of Support across Minnesota. In October 2008, Circles of
Support hosted a community advocacy meeting called Surviving
Poverty at School: How do you manage when you don't
have the resources at home to fit into a system of peers
that do? Many local school staff and administrators
attended to hear parents talk about how they feel the financial
pressures from school and how they help their children cope
with this difficult situation.
Circles of Support has gone
back to the roots of advocacy as they help people to advocate
for themselves. As a result of their work, many discussions
have opened up to examine what it is like to live in poverty
and also, an anonymous community member has donated up to
$40,000 for “Angel Grants” to help students
in need.
KOOTASCA
Community Action Web site: www.kootasca.org
National
Alliance on Mental Illness of Minnesota
The National Alliance on Mental
Illness of Minnesota (NAMI) is a nonprofit dedicated to
improving the lives of children and adults with mental illness,
as well as their family members. NAMI seeks to eliminate
the stigma of mental illness, effect positive changes in
the mental health system, and increase the public and professional
understanding of mental illness via education, support and
advocacy. They provide education classes so people can begin
to talk about mental illness, support groups so that people
with mental illnesses can help one another in this journey
and different opportunities to advocate and change the system
so that people may find hope.
Over the past five years, NAMI
has begun to advocate on behalf of people with mental illnesses
and also to encourage them to advocate for themselves. They
have taught members about the legislative process, assisted
their members in the voter registration process and encouraged
them to vote, educated state legislature candidates on issues
of importance to the mental health community, informed members
with weekly legislative updates and had members at the state
capitol every Thursday to lobby legislators on a variety
of issues.

As a result of their efforts,
several key bills for the mental illness community were
passed this session, including a bill that limits the use
of seclusion and restraints in the schools. As part of this
bill, students will no longer face being secluded or restrained
for minor issues or as part of their behavior plan, but
only in emergency situations by trained staff who will stop
their use when the threat is passed. While this issue has
already been raised on the national level, NAMI was able
to formulate a compromise between advocates and school boards,
leading to a significant improvement in Minnesota. NAMI
also played a significant role on issues related to county
redesign of human services and Maintenance of Effort to
guarantee that redesign of human services was not done with
the input of those who would be affected. Also, in these
difficult economic times, NAMI was crucial in sparing many
mental health services of funding cuts.
NAMI works on a variety of
issues that affect the mental illness community including
education, employment, housing, criminal justice and human
services. Their victory on the Maintenance of Effort issue
was a great accomplishment, and prevented almost a third
of the funding for mental health services from being lost.
National
Alliance on Mental Illness of Minnesota Web site: www.namihelps.org
Staff
and volunteers of MCN members only are eligible. You will
need your MCN member ID number when you vote.
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