The Austin Bar Foundation held its annual gala on January 28, honoring six Austin lawyers and judges for their professional excellence and service to the community. Four of the 2021 honorees are Texas Law alumni.
Betty Blackwell ’80 and Judge Tim Sulak ’78 were each recipients of a Distinguished Lawyer Award, Judge Aurora Martinez Jones ’07 received the Joseph C. Parker Jr. Diversity Award, and the David Walter Community Excellence Award was presented to Adam Loewy ’03.
“It’s always amazing to see the way our alumni are changing the world,” said Liz Hilton ’90, the Law School’s Executive Director of Alumni Relations & Development. “And it’s especially inspiring when we see those positive changes manifest in our hometown!”
This year’s gala, the 18th, helped to raise funds for the charitable arm of the Austin Bar Association. Though the ceremony was forced online by the pandemic, attendees found the mood as festive and joyous as ever.
Designed with a theme of “celebrating our diversity and illustrating the idea that despite our differences, we are all connected and all part of the human race,” the evening supported a variety of local projects, including the Veterans Assistance Programs, the Self-Represented Litigant Project at the Travis County Law Library and Self-Help Center, Austin Adoption Day, the CANLAW Clinic, the Justice Mack Kidd Fund, the Diversity Fellowship Program, and the LGBT Law Student Scholarship.
We are pleased to share below the wonderful videos made in tribute to the Distinguished Lawyer Award winners, and encourage those who wish to know more about the foundation’s efforts and events to visit the Austin Bar Foundation’s online home.