Laura Bray, executive director of Menomonee Valley Partners, Inc., and Ken Leinbach, executive director of the Urban Ecology Center will be honored with the Greater Milwaukee Foundation’s Frank Kirkpatrick award today at the Foundation’s annual meeting. The award recognizes individuals whose efforts lead to physical improvements in the community.
“The comprehensive effort and the level of partnership among private and public agencies are unprecedented in our community,” said Mick Hatch, partner at Foley & Lardner LLP, President of the Menomonee Valley Partners Board of Directors and past Frank Kirkpatrick Award recipient.
Bray leads Menomonee Valley Partners, a nonprofit organization that has been the driving force behind the revitalization of the Menomonee Valley. Since 2004, Bray has guided the transformation of the Valley, which is now recognized as a national model in economic development and environmental sustainability. Leinbach is the executive director of the Urban Ecology Center and a national leader in promoting community-based environmental education. Since 1998, Ken has developed the economically and environmentally sustainable community center, including the Neighborhood Environmental Education Project, the center’s award-winning urban education program. Bray and Leinbach have partnered their respective organizations to take on a comprehensive transformation in the Menomonee Valley. Together, they are heading Menomonee Valley – From the Ground Up, a collaborative effort of Menomonee Valley Partners, Urban Ecology Center, the State of Wisconsin and City of Milwaukee. The From the Ground Up effort is implementing $26 million in interconnected projects that weave the Menomonee Valley back into the community and add key assets essential to job accessibility, science education, public and environmental health and neighborhood vitality.
