Nan Grogan Orrock papers

Nan Grogan Orrock was born on November 8, 1943 in Abingdon, Virginia. She earned a B.A. in English from Mary Washington College of the University of Virginia. Her work experience spans the fields of philanthropy, civil rights, and union and community organizing. She is the mother of two grown sons. Her activism began as a young college student when she stepped into the streets with the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. She also worked with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in Atlanta and Mississippi and led a community civil rights project in Black Belt counties of her home state of Virginia in the mid 1960s.

After serving 10 terms in the State House of Representatives, Nan Orrock was elected by Atlanta voters to the State Senate in 2006, During her tenure in the House, she was the first woman elected to the position of House Majority Whip. She has also served as the Governor's Floor Leader, a committee chair, and a member of the Speaker's Policy Committee. Senator Orrock's legislative expertise includes health policy, women's issues, child/family policy, workplace issues, civil liberties, civil rights, and environmental issues. She is a founder of both the Georgia Legislative Women's Caucus and the Working Families Agenda Caucus. Orrock's successful legislative initiatives include passage of the Georgia Family Medical Leave Act, the Prescriptive Equity for Contraceptives Act, the Chlamydia Screening Act, Georgia Hate Crimes Act, and the Omnibus AIDS Statute. She has been named Public Health Legislator of the Year for her efforts. In 1996, Orrock worked with a legislative team to pass landmark legislation regulating landfills and has continued to monitor landfill issues and advocate for environmentally sound policy on air and water, solid waste, and nuclear waste.

Orrock is the Chair of the Labor and Workforce Development Committee of the National Conference of State Legislators. She is a founding member and Secretary of the National Labor Caucus of State Legislators. She is a member of the Bakery, Confectionery, and Tobacco Union and was employed at Nabisco for 17 years. She is the Chair of the Board of the Center for Policy Alternatives and serves as a Trustee of the Sapelo Foundation. She is currently the President of Women Legislators' Lobby (a position she has held since 1997), a national, non-partisan group of legislators, which works for balanced budgets, increased spending on families, education, health and child care, and a reduction in excessive and wasteful military spending.