Freedom to Marry Action Board of Directors
Anne Stanback | Chair
Anne Stanback was the founding Executive Director of Love Makes A Family (LMF), the lead organization that successfully fought for the freedom to marry in Connecticut. She has spent over 25 years working for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender civil rights. She served as the statewide Co-Director of the Connecticut Coalition for Lesbian and Gay Civil Rights during the passage of the state's nondiscrimination law in 1991, which prohibited discrimination in employment, housing, credit and public accommodations on the basis of sexual orientation.
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Julie Dorf | Treasurer
Julie Dorf has been a leader in the LGBT rights movement for over twenty years. Julie currently works as Senior Director for the Council for Global Equality, a coalition of twenty organizations working together for an inclusive U.S. foreign policy, which she co-founded in 2009. As an advocate, she works to promote the human rights of LGBT people through partnerships with the U.S. government, including Congress, the White House, USAID, and the State Department.
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Barbara Cox | Secretary
Barbara Cox is the Clara Shortridge Foltz Professor of Law at California Western School of Law in San Diego. She began teaching at California Western School of Law in 1987, after four years with a joint appointment in the Law School and the Women's Studies Department at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She served as Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at California Western from July 1997 through December 2001.
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Diane Abbitt
An attorney with expertise in the areas of administrative law, business law and strategic planning, Diane Abbitt has developed innovative cutting-edge approaches to protecting same-sex couples. Over the last thirty years, Ms. Abbitt has also been a community activist serving on the boards of the National Organization for Women, AIDS Project Los Angeles, the No on 6 campaign and the No on 64 campaign. She was a founding member of Equality California, a board on which she served as President and PAC Chair, and currently serves as Vice President of the board for the Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles. Professionally, she has assisted such companies as Mobil Exxon, Fujisawa Pharmaceuticals and Hyatt Development Company. Diane received her undergraduate degree from the University of California, Los Angeles, and her law degree from the University of San Fernando Valley, College of Law.
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Rob Coburn
Rob Coburn is the Chief Operating Officer of Cape Advisors, a leading real estate
development and hospitality management firm in the northeast U.S. He previously
served as Chief Operating Officer of Baker Brothers Investments and Director of Investor
Relations & Communications for Atticus Capital. From 2000 to 2004, Mr. Coburn
directed strategy and marketing for Magnet Communications following a decade in
corporate finance at JPMorgan/Chase.
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Geoff Kors
Geoff Kors has a long and distinguished record of service to the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community, starting in 1990 in San Francisco when he helped lead the nation's first successful campaign to pass a ballot measure to grant same-sex couples domestic partner rights. He also served as a partner in a LGBT civil rights law firm and prior to that, as Director of the ACLU of Illinois Gay and Lesbian Rights and AIDS and Civil Liberties projects. Most recently, Geoff served as Executive Director of Equality California from 2002 until 2011, building the largest and most successful statewide LGBT rights organization in the nation.
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Adam Press
Adam Press is an active investor, art collector and philanthropist. From 1992-2010 He served as Chairman & CEO of The St. John Companies, Inc. From 1989 to 1991, Mr. Press served as the Director of Equity Investments for the Thyssen-Bornemisza Group (TBG) in Monte Carlo and prior to this, worked in the New York corporate finance department of PaineWebber from 1986 to 1989. He holds a BA from Colorado College and an MBA from Columbia University. He serves as a member of the Board of Trustees of Colorado College and on the Board of Jewish Vocational Services of Los Angeles.
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Anne Stanback
Anne Stanback was the founding Executive Director of Love Makes A Family (LMF), the lead organization that successfully fought for the freedom to marry in Connecticut. She has spent over 25 years working for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender civil rights. She served as the statewide Co-Director of the Connecticut Coalition for Lesbian and Gay Civil Rights during the passage of the state's "gay rights law" in 1991, which prohibited discrimination in employment, housing, credit and public accommodations on the basis of sexual orientation.
Prior to her involvement with Love Makes a Family, Anne was the Executive Director of the Connecticut Women's Education and Legal Fund (CWEALF). She has also served as the Executive Director of the Connecticut affiliate of the National Abortion Rights Action League (CT NARAL) and as the Assistant Director of INFOLINE of South Central Connecticut where she worked on child care and maternal and child health issues.
Anne has received numerous awards for her work on behalf of women and the LGBT community. In 2006, she was inducted into the Connecticut Women's Hall of Fame for her work to advance the rights of women and the LGBT community.
Anne is actively involved with Immanuel Congregational Church (UCC) in Hartford where she serves as the church Moderator. She is a graduate of Davidson College in North Carolina and Yale Divinity School. She lives in Avon, Connecticut with her partner — now wife — of 29 years, Charlotte Kinlock.
Currently, Anne is working as a consultant for the Equality Federation on a national LGBT nondiscrimination project.
Julie Dorf
Julie Dorf has been a leader in the LGBT rights movement for over twenty years. Julie currently works as Senior Director for the Council for Global Equality, a coalition of twenty organizations working together for an inclusive U.S. foreign policy, which she co-founded in 2009. As an advocate, she works to promote the human rights of LGBT people through partnerships with the U.S. government, including Congress, the White House, USAID, and the State Department.
Julie also founded and directed the International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC) from 1990 to 2000, creating an organization that protects and advances the human rights of all people and communities subjected to discrimination or abuse on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity or HIV status. She has also worked in philanthropy, serving as the Director of Philanthropic Services for Horizons Foundation, a foundation serving the Bay Area's lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community; and an independent consultant for Open Society Institute, Global Fund for Women, Arcus Foundation, and Fenton Communications/J-Street Project. Julie currently serves on the board of directors or advisory boards of Rights Watch's LGBT Rights Program, IGLHRC, and PowerPAC.
She holds a B.A. from Wesleyan University in Russian and Soviet Studies. Julie has written, spoken, and advocated extensively on social justice issues ranging from reparations for gay victims of the Nazis, Jewish-Palestinian relations, and marriage equality. She lives in San Francisco with her partner Jenni Olson, and their two girls Hazel and Sylvie.
Barbara Cox
Barbara Cox is the Clara Shortridge Foltz Professor of Law at California Western School of Law in San Diego. She began teaching at California Western School of Law in 1987, after four years with a joint appointment in the Law School and the Women's Studies Department at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She served as Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at California Western from July 1997 through December 2001. She is the past chair of the Association of American Law Schools Section on Gay and Lesbian Legal Issues, is the past Chair of the A.A.L.S. Section on Women in Legal Education, and served on an AALS taskforce on the problems of preventing sexual orientation discrimination in religiously-affiliated law schools. From 1984-1987, she was co-chair of the Madison, WI, Taskforce on Alternative family rights which drafted the city's domestic partnership ordinance (one of the first in the nation), and she helped obtain domestic partner health insurance benefits at CWSL. She has authored briefs for national gay rights organizations on family law issues.
Barb has published numerous articles or book chapters on various issues concerning marriages, adoptions, and other legal relationships of same-sex couples and questions of interstate recognition and Full Faith and Credit by state courts, and has spoken on these topics across the country. She edited a book manuscript for Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund, analyzing choice-of-law issues for all fifty states concerning recognition of marriages by same-sex couples. She was a member of the San Diego steering committee for the No on Knight/Proposition 22 campaign.
Barb has been out as a lesbian since 1976. She and her partner had a private commitment ceremony in April 1992, and have been registered domestic partners in California since 1998. On July 18, 2003, Barb and her spouse were married at the Metropolitan Community Church in Windsor, Ontario, Canada. Their marriage is recognized in California but not in Wisconsin, where they live part of the year.
Diane Abbitt
An attorney with expertise in the areas of administrative law, business law and strategic planning, Diane Abbitt has developed innovative cutting-edge approaches to protecting same sex couples. Over the last thirty years, Ms. Abbitt has also been a community activist serving on the boards of the National Organization for Women, AIDS Project Los Angeles, the No on 6 campaign and the No on 64 campaign. She was a founding member of Equality California, a board on which she served as President and PAC Chair, and currently serves as Vice President of the board for the Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles. Professionally she has assisted such companies as Mobil Exxon, Fujisawa Pharmaceuticals and Hyatt Development Company. Diane received her undergraduate degree from the University of California, Los Angeles, and her law degree from the University of San Fernando Valley, College of Law.
Rob Coburn
Rob Coburn is the Chief Operating Officer of Cape Advisors, a leading real estate development and hospitality management firm in the northeast U.S. He previously served as Chief Operating Officer of Baker Brothers Investments and Director of Investor Relations & Communications for Atticus Capital. From 2000 to 2004, Mr. Coburn directed strategy and marketing for Magnet Communications following a decade in corporate finance at JPMorgan/Chase.
Mr. Coburn has been a longstanding Board Member of Musica Viva of New York, a classical music concert organization, as well as the Madoo Conservancy, a garden conservancy in eastern Long Island. He previously served as Treasurer and Trustee of the Unitarian Church of All Souls in Manhattan.
A native of greater Boston, an avid cook and gardener, and a proud uncle and godfather, Mr. Coburn lives with his fiancé, Averitt Buttry, in New York. He received his AB in Government from Harvard College and an MBA in Finance and Marketing from Wharton.
Geoff Kors
Geoff Kors has a long and distinguished record of service to the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community, starting in 1990 in San Francisco when he helped lead the nation's first successful campaign to pass a ballot measure to grant same-sex couples domestic partner rights. He also served as a partner in a LGBT civil rights law firm and prior to that, as Director of the ACLU of Illinois Gay and Lesbian Rights and AIDS and Civil Liberties projects. Most recently, Geoff served as Executive Director of Equality California from 2002 until 2011, building the largest and most successful statewide LGBT rights organization in the nation.
Under Geoff's leadership and strategic vision, California passed more than 70 pieces of LGBT rights legislation during his tenure at EQCA. In 2005, California became the first state to pass a marriage equality bill through both houses of its legislature. Geoff also played an active role in numerous lawsuits, including litigation preserving California's domestic partnership law and the lawsuit that resulted in same-sex couples briefly winning the freedom to Marry in California in 2008.
Geoff has received numerous awards from many organizations including: PFLAG; the Human Rights Campaign; the Harvey Milk LGBT Democratic Club; MCC; Transgender Law Center; Los Angeles and Palm Springs Pride; and the Gay Men's Chorus of Los Angeles. Geoff is a graduate of Union College and Stanford Law School.
Adam Press
Adam Press is an active investor, art collector and philanthropist. From 1992-2010 He served as Chairman & CEO of The St. John Companies, Inc. From 1989 to 1991, Mr. Press served as the Director of Equity Investments for the Thyssen-Bornemisza Group (TBG) in Monte Carlo and prior to this, worked in the New York corporate finance department of PaineWebber from 1986 to 1989. He holds a BA from Colorado College and an MBA from Columbia University. He serves as a member of the Board of Trustees of Colorado College and on the Board of Jewish Vocational Services of Los Angeles.