Contact

First Amendment Foundation 
1 (850) 224-4555

When

Tuesday March 14, 2017 from 11:30 AM to 2:00 PM EDT

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Where

The Govenor's Club
202 S Adams Street
Tallahassee, Florida 32301 


 
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First Amendment Foundation's Annual

2017 Sunshine Luncheon 

2017 FAF Sunshine Luncheon

11:30 a.m. - Registration

11:45 a.m. - Sunshine Luncheon and Awards featuring Keynote Speaker, Jeff Klinkenberg

Florida's First Amendment Foundation Announces 2017 Sunshine Luncheon

Keynote Speaker:  Jeff Klinkenberg!

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What: Annual First Amendment Foundation Sunshine Luncheon & Awards Reception featuring Keynote Speaker, Jeff Klinkenberg!

When: Tuesday March 14th, 11:30am - 2pm

Where: Tallahassee Florida (Governor's Club: 202 S. Adams Street)

Tickets, Tables & Sponsorships:

  • Single Ticket: $125.00 - SOLD OUT
  • Table of 8: $950.00 - SOLD OUT
  • Table of 10: $1,200 - SOLD OUT

For sponsorship opportunities, please contact Rachel Gelbmann at (850) 224-4555, or rachel@floridafaf.org.

About Jeff Klinkenberg: "If Jeff Klinkenberg isn't careful, he might give journalism a good name,'' says the author Carl Hiaasen. "He has a rare eye for marvelous detail, and an affectionate ear for those small, wise, bittersweet voices that tell the true story."

Klinkenberg, who wrote about Florida culture for the Tampa Bay Times for almost four decades, is the author of the book collection of essays, Alligators in B-Flat, published by University Press of Florida. Previous anthologies, Pilgrim in the Land of Alligators, Seasons of Real Florida and Dispatches from the Land of Flowers, have been best sellers.

Born in 1949, Klinkenberg grew up in Miami and began exploring the Florida Keys and the Everglades as a small boy. He started working at The Miami News when he was 16 and became a journalism graduate of the University of Florida. He's in the UF Journalism College's Hall of Fame. He worked at the South's largest newspaper, the Tampa Bay Times, beginning in 1977. He retired in 2014.

In 2015, he won the national Society of Features Journalism's prestigious "Narrative Storytelling" award. In 2013, Klink's non-deadline work won the "Green Eyeshade Award" for southern journalism.  In 2010, Klink and photographer-videographer Maurice Rivenbark won the national Sigma Delta Chi Award for the online presentation of  his column "Real Florida." In 2007 and 2009, the American Association of Sunday Features Editors selected a body of Klink's work as the best in the nation. He is a two-time winner of the Paul Hansell Distiguished Journalism Award, highest honor in state journalism, given annually to the writer with the best body of work by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. He has been an adjunct instructor in the University of Florida's College of Journalism and was the first "Writer in Residence" for the University of South Florida's Florida Studies Graduate program. Esquire, Outside, Travel and Leisure, and Audubon are among the magazines that have published his stories.

Florida's First Amendment Foundation Announces Winners of its 2016 Sunshine Awards

February 9, 2017

The First Amendment Foundation is pleased to announce it has awarded The Honorable Scott Ellis, Clerk of Court for Brevard County, the 2016 Pete Weitzel/Friend of the First Amendment Award. The winner of the 2016 James C. Adkins/Sunshine Litigation Award is Mr. Curtis Lee of Jacksonville.

The nomination for the Pete Weitzel/Friend of the First Amendment Award was based on Mr. Ellis' commitment to ensuring compliance with Florida's public records law and his tenacious struggle to obtain records from the Economic Development Commission of the Space Coast.  The Pete Weitzel/Friend of the First Amendment Award was created to recognize the significant contribution made by Pete Weitzel, former managing editor of The Miami Herald, and founder and past president of the First Amendment Foundation, in the area of open government.  The Weitzel Award is given annually to someone in Florida who has made a significant contribution to the cause of furthering open government.  

Mr. Lee was nominated for the James C. Adkins/Sunshine Litigation Award for his role in Board of Trustees, Jacksonville Police & Fire Pension Fund v. Lee and his continuing commitment to ensuring that Florida government remains open and accessible to its people.  The James C. Adkins/Sunshine Litigation Award was created to recognize the importance and continuing value of Justice Adkins' open government opinions while on the Florida Supreme Court and is given to attorneys or citizens who have made a significant contribution to the cause of furthering open government through litigation.

We owe Mr. Ellis and Mr. Lee special thanks for all they have done for the public.  They set a standard that citizens and those in government should emulate. 

The awards will be presented at the Foundation's annual Sunshine Recognition luncheon on Tuesday, March 14, 2017, at the Governor's Club in Tallahassee during Florida's annual Sunshine Week celebrations.

The James C. Adkins/Sunshine Litigation Award was created to recognize the importance and continuing value of Justice Adkins' open government opinions while on the Florida Supreme Court and is given to attorneys or citizens who have made a significant contribution to the cause of furthering open government through litigation.

Past recipients of the award can be found on the Foundation's website, www.floridafaf.org. 

History of Sunshine Week: The Florida Society of Newspaper Editors launched Sunshine Sunday in 2002, in response to efforts by some Florida legislators to create scores of new exemptions to the state's public records law.

The following year, the idea of a national Sunshine Sunday was raised at an ASNE Freedom of Information summit. In the planning stages, it was decided that the initiative needed to be more than a single Sunday, and Sunshine Week was born. The first nationwide Sunshine Week took place March 13-19, 2005.

The First Amendment Foundation: Without your support, memberships, FAF Store purchases and other generous contributions, FAF would not be able to provide the critical services on which Floridians have come to rely. Without our hard work - and your help, Florida would be in a permanent state of SHADE. Let's work together to keep the sun shining in Tallahassee and all across the #SunshineState.  www.floridafaf.org

We're heading into a tough and uncertain legislative session, and every day, supporters just like you are joining our efforts to fight for open government. We hope we can count on your gift today to support a brighter 2017. We need you now more than ever.

Your ongoing support is critical to our mission of strengthening and defending Florida's long-standing Sunshine Laws. 

Without our hard work - and your help, Florida would be in a permanent state of SHADE. Let's work together to keep the sun shining in Tallahassee and all across the #SunshineState.