Deborah J. Richardson

Executive Vice President National Center for Civil and Human Rights Deborah J. Richardson is currently serving the National Center for Civil and Human Rights as executive vice president leading fundraising and program development. Earlier in her career, she served as chief program officer at Women’s Funding Network in San Francisco, the CEO of The Atlanta Women’s Foundation, director of program development for Fulton County Juvenile Court, founding executive director of the Juvenile Justice Fund and managing director of the National Black Arts Festival.

Among her many awards are: The Community Leadership Award by Spelman College Board of Trustees, The Legacy Award by the Juvenile Justice Fund and The Grassroots Justice Award by the Georgia Justice Project.

Richardson is a nationally recognized leader on social justice for women and girls and an advocate against child sex trafficking. She is the co-author of "Ending Sex Trafficking of Children in Atlanta" and a national spokesperson for A Future. Not a Past. -- a campaign to stop the prostitution of our nation’s children.

Womenetics: Why do you think it’s important to be involved with civic activities?
Deborah J. Richardson: Shirley Chisholm said, “Service is the rent we pay for the privilege of living on this earth.”  The skills, talents, resources, privileges and freedoms that we enjoy were bestowed on us for a purpose: to leave the earth better than how we found it. It is only through our actions and those of other people of good will that we can be assured of this outcome.

The National Center for Civil and Human Rights will be a catalyst for inspiring civic action. By sharing Atlanta’s unique role in the American Civil Rights movement, how the strategies of this movement continues to inform human rights movements across the globe, it is our mission to inspire the next generation to continue to seek and protect human rights.

Womenetics: How do you see your role in mentoring women?
Richardson: At this stage in my life journey, it is all about mentoring the next generation. I was privileged that a number of women in this community mentored me along the way -- Mary Long and Rev. Joanna Adams are two of them. It is in their honor that I continue to do this work. I am very clear that my third act is to inspire the next generation of social change agents.

Womenetics: What kinds of programs have you designed for girls victimized by commercial sexual exploitation?
Richardson: Twelve years ago, very few were aware that girls were being sold by the hour on the streets of Atlanta. And if they were aware, there was the wrong thinking that these girls were making a choice -- that they were ‘prostitutes’ versus being ‘prostituted.’ There was little awareness, no laws, policies or services that addressed this issue.

Judge Nina Hickson, Commissioner Nancy Boxill, Susan May, Stephanie Davis and I developed a 3-prong strategy: public awareness; changing the law in Georgia so that pimping and pandering children for sex was a felony, not a misdemeanor; and raising $1 million to open Angela’s House, the first safe house for sexually exploited girls in the Southeast and only the second facility in the country. We accomplished all of this in just under 18 months.

In the past three years, I along with my partner change-agent, Kayrita Anderson, have been engaged in national efforts to end the sex trafficking of children using the same three strategies. I served as the convener of a national coalition of advocates who are working on both the state and federal levels on laws and policies that not only increase victim services but more importantly interrupt the demand. As long as it’s socially acceptable and easily accessible for traffickers to recruit young girls and predators to purchase them, we will always have to ‘address’ the issue.

After 12 years, I have no patience for continuing to put a band-aid on a gaping wound. It is time to end this. During my lifetime I have seen this country end our own racial apartheid, mothers mad enough to take on drunk driving and eliminate smoking in public places, to name a few. By shifting the public will, providing a groundswell of voices, we will provide politicians the mandate that they need to eliminate sex trafficking of children, especially over the Internet, through sites such as Backpage.com.

One can’t place ads and purchase crack cocaine online, so why do we allow children to be sold for sex online? If we make the risk and penalties too high, we will provide true protection for our children. No child should be at risk of being forced into sexual slavery through the anonymity of the Internet.

Womenetics: In 2010, you testified before the U.S. Congress Judiciary subcommittee? What was that like?
Richardson: My testifying before Congress was anticlimactic. It was at the end of a year of concentrated efforts of advocates across the U.S. to force Craigslist.com to close down its Adult Services site. At the height of our efforts, I, along with two other partners, was served with a cease and desist by Craigslist. That provided us, frankly, the fuel to really ratchet up our efforts.

Because of the groundswell of support we were garnering, the House Judiciary Committee called a hearing on the Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking Act. I was one of several experts who testified about the need for increased services for victims, training for law enforcement and the judiciary, along with the role that Craigslist.org played as a platform for child sex trafficking. It was during this hearing that Craigslist lawyers went on record saying that the site would be shut down.

Womenetics: Let’s talk a little more about you. What was your biggest setback, and how did you handle it?
Richardson: I would say becoming a single mom when my children were 9 and 12 years old. It is not as big a deal now as it was then, but it was not something that I had imagined. My parents were married over 40 years, so my assumption was that marriage really was a long-term commitment. My friends are what got me through it. They supported me and became the village for my children. Good girlfriends are worth their weight in gold!

Womenetics: Why do you think it’s important for women to be philanthropists?
Richardson: It is through philanthropy that we assure lasting social change. I am heartened to see the trend, sparked by the women’s funding movement, of women embracing philanthropy. Whether one contributes $5, $100 or $1 million, you are indeed a philanthropist. It is through our collective efforts that we can fund the change we seek.

Jan Jaben-Eilon was a founding staff writer of the Atlanta Business Chronicle. Since then, she has been the international editor of Advertising Age magazine and has written for such publications as The New York Times, International Herald Tribune, Washington Journalism Review, and Consumer Reports. She is the author of soon-to-be-published (There is) Life After Cancer. Jan and her husband have homes in Atlanta and Jerusalem.