Distinguished Service Award for Rick Rosendall

Presented by former GLAA President Jeff Coudriet

GLAA 28th Anniversary Reception
Charles Sumner School
Thursday, April 22, 1999

Passionate, yet practical, thoughtful, but yet never at a loss for words, Rick Rosendall is a confirmed Secular Humanist who can scale the lofty heights of both Moral Relativism and Moral Absolutism with equal abandon. Sometimes at the same time. Sometimes, "The Movement" demands both. A President of the Gay And Lesbian Activists Alliance must realise these fine distinctions, and Rick certainly did. And having a sense of humor helps too.

There is a rather passe expression — "Knowledge is Power". Rick played a central role in designing and implementing GLAA's extremely informative web site. If you have never been there you should visit it at www.glaa.org. It is the central clearing house for information on all things pertaining to lesbian and gay civil rights in Washington. Not only a chronicle of GLAA's activities and achievements, it is a constantly changing guide to what really is happening and an incredible resource to us all.

Rick also had the very thankless task of being involved in the long effort with the NAACP Task Force, the ACLU, and many others, to bring a Civilian Complaint Review Board back to the District of Columbia, an effort which is not yet fully realized I might add. Hopefully this event tonight will be so inspiring to the powers-that-be that our new Mayor will actually get around to appointing people to serve on the new Board sometime soon. But tonight is a night for merriment, so I won't go there.

The beauty of Rick's involvement in an effort such as this is an opportunity for us all to pause and reflect upon just how fortunate, not to mention smart we all are, to live in a city where it is routinely possible for people of all stripes, gay and straight, black, white, and otherwise, young and old, to come together in a coalition to push for something which will benefit us all. Rick has continued a great lesbian and gay community tradition which frankly the rest of the city could learn from--the simple act of working together with people who are not necessarily exactly like you. I will throw caution to the wind and I will not be...what's the word I'm looking for...stingy? no...miserly? no...parsimonious? no...anyhow....in my praise of such everyday acts of simple decency and knowing how to do what's right. So presenting this award to Rick tonight is but one special reminder of the continued importance of embracing diversity and leading by example.

There are many other fine and notable things I could say about Rick, but knowing that his remarks are seldom brief I will end here.

Please join me in presenting a Distinquished Service Award to Rick Rosendall.