Nan Grogan Orrock (born November 8, 1943) is an American politician serving as the Democratic State Senator in the

Georgia State Senate The Georgia State Senate is the upper house of the Georgia General Assembly, in the U.S. state of Georgia. Legal provisions The Georgia State Senate is the upper house of the Georgia General Assembly, with the lower house being the Georgia Ho ...

, representing Senate District 36 in eastern

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,715 ...

. Following the 2006 retirement of State Senator Sam Zamarripa, Orrock was a candidate for his district; in the Democratic primary held on July 18, 2006 Orrock defeated Grace Davis to win a seat in the State Senate since she has no Republican opponent for the general election. She was sworn into office in 2007. She was previously a member of the

Georgia House of Representatives The Georgia House of Representatives is the lower house of the Georgia General Assembly (the state legislature) of the U.S. state of Georgia. There are currently 180 elected members. Republicans have had a majority in the chamber since 2005. ...

from 1987, representing the 58th district. She was the Vice-Chair of the House Democratic Caucus and the former Majority Whip, the first woman to ever hold this role. Orrock was once a member of

American Legislative Exchange Council The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is a nonprofit organization of conservative state legislators and private sector representatives who draft and share model legislation for distribution among state governments in the United State ...

(ALEC), but has since been critical of their influence. Orrock founded both the Georgia Legislative Women's Caucus and the Working Families Agenda caucus. Her legislative successes 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 continually advocates for environmentally sound policies, and worked on passing monumental legislation surrounding regulation of landfills. Her activism began back in 1963 when she participated in the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Following this, she proceeded to work with

SNCC The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC, often pronounced ) was the principal channel of student commitment in the United States to the civil rights movement during the 1960s. Emerging in 1960 from the student-led sit-ins at segreg ...

in Georgia and Mississippi and lead civil rights projects in the Black Belt counties of her home state of Virginia. Orrock is the President of the Women Legislators’ Lobby, a national network of women state legislators launched by Women’s Action for New Directions WAND in 1991, and has been on staff with this organization since 1997.

References

External links

Profile
at the

Nan Orrock's senate campaign website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Orrock, Nan Democratic Party members of the Georgia House of Representatives Democratic Party Georgia (U.S. state) state senators Living people Politicians from Fredericksburg, Virginia Politicians from Atlanta University of Mary Washington alumni Women state legislators in Georgia (U.S. state) 1943 births 21st-century American politicians 21st-century American women politicians