FAzA in the News
FAzA Wins 2009 Award of Excellence
from Museum Association of Arizona
At the 2009 annual meeting of the Museum Association of Arizona (MAA), held in May in Bisbee, the Friends of Arizona Archives won the Association's prestigious Award of Excellence. FAzA President Doug Kupel (right below), along with his predecessor Vince Murray, accepted the award on behalf of FAzA from Tom Wilson (left below), immediate past president of MAA.
The award was in recognition of FAzA's decade-long campaign to obtain funding for the new Arizona State Archives building. The culmination of this campaign came in 2009, when the archives building was formally dedicated. FAzA was honored for advancing the cause of archival education, preservation, and training.
In accepting the award, Kupel stated, "We are grateful to the MAA for this honor and hope that this is the start of many collaborative relationships among all groups working to preserve Arizona's history, arts, and culture."
Text of MAA Award of Excellence Citation
From its inception in 1997, Friends of Arizona Archives championed the need for a new state archives building. Its organizers were a group of concerned citizens who felt that the public needed to know about the inadequate facilities that housed Arizona’s archives and who wanted to improve the preservation and protection of and access to our most important state historical records.
FAzA has spent over a decade continuously lobbying politicians, informing the public about the archives, and providing educational and professional opportunities for Arizona’s archival community. Its efforts finally paid off when the state-of-the-art Polly Rosenbaum Archives and History Building was dedicated in January 2009. Alas, FAzA wasn’t able to celebrate for long before it had to begin lobbying for support to keep the brand-new building open when state budget cuts threatened to close it to public access.
FAzA has long been a leader in Arizona in public education and the training of archivists. It has truly achieved excellence in the field of archival preservation and education, and, due in large part to its efforts, the irreplaceable records of Arizona are safe and protected for many years to come.
The Friends of Arizona Archives is an ideal and worthy candidate for the 2009 MAA Award of Excellence.