The New York Women’s Foundation is pleased to announce that Elizabeth Gaynes will join us as a Senior Fellow.
Liz recently stepped down as President and CEO of the Osborne Association, a grantee partner with a 90-year history of serving New Yorkers affected by the criminal legal system. During her four decades at the helm of Osborne, the organization grew from a staff of three to more than 300, working in 30 prisons, jails, and community sites offering alternatives to incarceration and reentry programs. The organization’s success reflects Liz’s experience and commitment. For more than a half-century, Liz has visited prisons and jails as a lawyer, a service provider, and a family member. More than 35 years ago, using her own experience of raising children whose father was incarcerated, she developed FamilyWorks, the first (and longest-running) comprehensive parenting program for fathers in a men’s state prison. Liz was also successful in convincing New York State to turn over a closed prison in the Bronx; the Fulton Community Reentry Center will open in 2023, providing transitional reentry housing for 140 people released from New York prisons.
Along with her daughter Emani Davis, Liz Gaynes was the first nominee from the Global North for the World’s Children’s Prize for the Rights of the Child, known in Sweden as the “Children’s Nobel,” and was recognized by the Obama White House as a Champion of Change for Children of Incarcerated Parents. Liz began her career as a defense attorney for the Attica Brothers following the 1971 Uprising, continued as a staff attorney at Prisoners Legal Services of New York, and was an Associate at the Pretrial Justice Institute.
Liz can be reached at egaynes@nywf.org.
