Estela Ortega honored with Lynn Allen Award at NPI’s 2019 Spring Fundraising Gala

This evening, at our eleventh Spring Fundrais­ing Gala in Ren­ton, we induct­ed our fifth Lynn Allen Award Hon­oree: El Cen­tro de la Raza­’s Estela Orte­ga.

Named for our late sis­ter Lynn Allen, a found­ing board­mem­ber of the North­west Pro­gres­sive Insti­tute, these awards rec­og­nize peo­ple who have made indis­pens­able con­tri­bu­tions to pro­gres­sive caus­es for a decade or more.

We lost Lynn to ovar­i­an can­cer in 2011, but her spir­it has remained with us. (And so have her pub­lished works, pre­served by NPI at Rebuild­ing Democracy.)

Lynn emphat­i­cal­ly believed in the impor­tant work of orga­niz­ing rur­al com­mu­ni­ties and act­ing on issues of con­cern to peo­ple liv­ing far away from our big cities and urban areas. She preached and prac­ticed the pol­i­tics of inclusion.

As com­mu­ni­ca­tions direc­tor of the Insti­tute for Washington’s Future, she trav­eled reg­u­lar­ly to Washington’s rur­al coun­ties and small towns, cham­pi­oning sus­tain­able busi­ness and agri­cul­tur­al practices.

A skilled facil­i­ta­tor and gift­ed lis­ten­er, Lynn under­stood the impor­tance of and need for effec­tive activism. Not a day goes by when we don’t miss her.

We estab­lished the Lynn Allen Awards as part of our con­tin­u­ing effort to ensure that Lynn’s good works will be remem­bered and her lega­cy appreciated.

Each year, we hon­or two out­stand­ing indi­vid­u­als with a Lynn Allen Award.

In 2017, we pre­sent­ed the very first Lynn Allen Awards to Joni Earl and Paul Lawrence. Last year, Major Gen­er­al Paul Eaton (Retired) and Alex Hen­drick­son became our third and fourth hon­orees. Tonight, Estela Orte­ga joined their ranks.

Este­la’s award com­men­da­tion is as follows:

Build­ing com­mu­ni­ty has been the cause of Estela Ortega’s life. In her ear­ly twen­ties, she made a con­scious deci­sion to become an orga­niz­er for social jus­tice with her hus­band and leg­endary advo­cate Rober­to Maes­tas. For over four decades, she has worked to take care of the beloved com­mu­ni­ty through El Cen­tro de la Raza (The Cen­ter For Peo­ple Of All Races), a com­mu­ni­ty action agency based in Bea­con Hill. Under Estela’s lead­er­ship, El Cen­tro has cham­pi­oned tran­sit ori­ent­ed devel­op­ment, build­ing over one hun­dred homes for peo­ple with lim­it­ed means next to its his­toric build­ing on Six­teenth Avenue South in Seat­tle. Estela’s con­tri­bu­tions to caus­es like edu­ca­tion, afford­able hous­ing, youth engage­ment, and pub­lic health have enriched our region and shown what can be accom­plished with vision­ary lead­er­ship and perseverance.

Este­la’s oth­er hon­ors include:

• Lati­na Sym­po­sium’s Manos Unidas Award (2019)
• Seat­tle Sea­hawks’ His­pan­ic Her­itage Lead­er­ship Award (2018)
• NEA’s George I. Sanchez Memo­r­i­al Award (2016)

Con­grat­u­la­tions, Estela, and thank you for your tremen­dous ser­vice to our move­ment. Your con­tri­bu­tions tru­ly have been indispensable.