Rick Garcia, director of public policy for Equality Illinois, and founding board member Art Johnston will receive the inaugural Community Leadership Award from the ISBA Committee on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity.

They will be honored June 17, during the ISBA Annual Meeting at The Abbey on Lake Geneva, for “significant dedication toward eliminating discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity, and fostering understanding of legal issues of concern to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons.”

Garcia, Johnston and Equality Illinois are being recognized primarily for more than 20 years of persistent effort in lobbying the Illinois legislature to pass basic civil rights measures that bar discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Equality Illinois (formerly the Illinois Federation for Human Rights) spearheaded, funded and coordinated the efforts by Garcia and Johnston to secure amendments to the Illinois Human Rights Act.

Legislation was first introduced in 1976 but wasn't passed by the Illinois House until 1993. The Illinois Senate enacted the amendments in January 2005.

As a result, Illinois is now one of only six states that have expressly included gender identity in the definition of sexual orientation (775 ILCS 5/1-102, effective Jan. 1, 2006).

Timely relevance of presenting the ISBA award to Garcia and Johnston “is to further give it public face,” said Chicago attorney Richard A. Wilson in his nomination letter.

“The amendment is now under attack on several levels in the legislature,” he observed, “most notably in attempts to enact exceptions to its reach.”