Posted by Jennifer Bennerotte
The Rotary Club of Edina will present the 2019 Chrysanne Manoles Women In Leadership Award at its May 23 meeting. The award is given out each year to a deserving female leader in the community. The award is named after Rotary Club of Edina's first female member, Chrysanne Manoles. The Rotary Club of Edina presented Lexi Reed Holtum with its 2018 Chrysanne Manoles Women In Leadership Award. She will speak at the May 23 meeting.
 
Reflecting society in 1905, the Rotary organization was limited to male members and remained so officially until 1989, when the Council on Legislation, Rotary’s parliament, voted to eliminate the male-only provision, opening up membership to qualified women across the world. However, the forward-thinking Rotary Club of Edina welcomed its first female member, Chrysanne Manoles, a year earlier in 1988. Manoles continues to be active in Rotary.
 
In Manoles’ honor and to celebrate the work of women in the community, the Rotary Club of Edina established an annual women’s leadership award in 2008. Previous winners include Dr. Laurel Wills, Ann Byrne, Donna Tilsner, Katey Taylor, Kim Foote, Kris Marshall and Lauren Morse-Wendt.
 
The Rotary Club of Edina presented Lexi Reed Holtum with its 2018 Chrysanne Manoles Women In Leadership Award. She will speak at the May 23 meeting.
 
For years, Lexi Reed Holtum’s work has helped her process the grief she experienced after her fiancé died of an opioid overdose in 2011. In the months after his death, she became the Executive Director of the Steve Rummler Hope Network. From small-town auditoriums to the Washington Monument, Reed Holtum has talked to doctors, lawyers, therapists and politicians. She’s worked with families and friends who have experienced the impact of the opioid epidemic firsthand, and she’s brought them all together to advocate for safe opioid prescribing practices, effective addiction treatment and overdose prevention.

Reed Holtum has testified before the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the FBI. She has helped develop opioid prescribing guidelines and enact laws that can save the lives of people who have overdosed.
 
For more information about the Chrysanne Manoles Women In Leadership Award, contact club Past President Jennifer Bennerotte, 612-201-3467 or jbennerotte@EdinaRotary.org.