READFIELD — The American Civil Liberties Union of Maine will honor Readfield attorney Sara Gagne-Holmes with the 2015 Justice Louis Scolnik Award on Thursday, April 30, at the Harraseeket Inn in Freeport.
“Although I’m receiving the award, which is a huge honor, I am really a proxy for my friends and former colleagues at Maine Equal Justice Partners to whom this award truly belongs,” Gagne-Holmes said. “During my tenure as executive director of Maine Equal Justice Partners, we partnered with the ACLU on two cases in the last five years. Maine Equal Justice Partners represents people with low income in the courts, Legislature and in front of administrative agencies. Maine Equal Justice Partners’ mission is to improve lives and find solutions to poverty.”
She was the executive director of Maine Equal Justice Partners for eight years, from 2006 to 2014.
In late September, Gagne-Holmes became a senior program associate for the John T. Gorman Foundation, whose mission is to advance ideas and opportunities that can improve the lives of disadvantaged people in Maine, she said.
“To achieve the greatest impact, the foundation has a special interest in strengthening families and helping communities provide them with the supports and opportunities they need to thrive,” she said.
“The ACLU of Maine has been fortunate to work with Sara and her colleagues on several cases aimed at securing the rights of all people in Maine,” Executive Director Alison Beyea said in a news release. “She truly represents the undeniable intersection of economic justice and civil liberties.”
The Scolnik Award was established in 1989 to honor members of the legal community who have demonstrated an outstanding commitment to the protection of civil liberties, according the release. The award is named for former Maine Supreme Court Justice Louis Scolnik, a co-founder and the first president of the Maine Civil Liberties Union, now the ACLU of Maine.
Gagne-Holmes was born and raised in Sanford. She was the salutatorian of the Class of 1987 at Sanford High School.
She graduated from Bowdoin College in 1991 and received a law degree from the University of Maine School of Law in 2001.
She headed west to work and travel and she and her husband, Will, came back to Maine in 1995. The couple moved to Augusta to join her sister and husband in planning for opening and running the Vickery Cafe in Augusta. They owned and operated it from 1995 until 2003.
“Will and I ran the cafe together for three years before I went to law school and Will continued to run the cafe until we sold it in 2003, at which time Will went to law school,” Gagne-Holmes said.
He works for the Maine Department of Labor.
During her legal career, Gagne-Holmes served as deputy legal counsel in the Office of Gov. John Baldacci and as senior policy and legal adviser to the Governor’s Office of Health Finance and Policy. She also served one term on the Board of the Maine State Bar Association and is the recent past chairwoman of the Maine Health Access Foundation. She remains a board member of that foundation.
“I believe strongly that all people are created equal and that we need to ensure all people have fair treatment and access to justice,” Gagne-Holmes said. “I believe in public policies that promote equality and opportunity with regard to education, work and basic services that will enable the fulfillment of everyone’s potential.”
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