Biographies

2006 Public Policy Leadership Award Honorees

Senator Martha Escutia 

Sen. Martha Escutia has devoted more than 14 years to public service and is being recognized for ensuring that California’s diverse populations have access to culturally and linguistically competent health care and for her attention to the health of young people. She championed a bill to mandate commercial health plans provide language services — specifically, oral interpretation and translated documents to those who need them. Throughout her legislative career, she has consistently advocated for universal health care for children. She has also successfully advanced bills to address childhood obesity and protect children from unhealthy levels of air contaminants. Sen. Escutia established the Children's Environmental Health Protection Act and was responsible for California initiating an environmental health tracking network.

Attorney General Bill Lockyer

Attorney General Lockyer, who has spent 30 years in public service, is being recognized for his leadership in addressing violence against youth as a public health issue — going beyond enforcement and looking deeper at the root causes of the problem. Attorney General Lockyer’s efforts have included: promoting gang prevention and offering after-school programs for youth; breaking the cycle of violence by reducing children’s exposure to domestic violence; offering mediation services for communities in conflict; and emphasizing the important role of the California Attorney General’s Crime and Violence Prevention Center to bring law enforcement and communities together to work on solutions. During his tenure as attorney general, he also stressed actions to reduce youth access to tobacco and maintained one of the nation’s most aggressive tobacco control enforcements.

Senator Jackie Speier

Sen. Jackie Speier has worked for more than 25 years in public service. She is being recognized for her efforts to expand health care coverage and prevent injury and death caused by violence — especially among youth. Speier advocated for job-based health care coverage and wrote the law to help Medicare-eligible seniors and the disabled save on their medication purchases with the Prescription Drug Discount Bill. She advanced the legislation that created the Office of Women’s Health to coordinate state services and serve as a clearinghouse for information on women’s health data and programs. As a young woman, she was left to die as a victim of gun violence. Sen. Speier used that terrifying experience to fuel her efforts to advance landmark gun control legislation — a strategy that has a solid track record for reducing violence against youth.