DMC Board Honors Cristin Brawner on the Eve of New Position

During its May 7, 2025, meeting, the Board of Directors passed a resolution of appreciation honoring Cristin Brawner’s many contributions to the David Mathews Center for Civic Life.

Brawner’s association with the DMC began in the 2008-09 academic year, when she was selected as its first Jean O’Connor-Snyder Intern at the University of Montevallo. She soon transitioned to a roll on the DMC staff and, in 2011, was selected as the new Executive Director. During her tenure, Brawner expanded the organization’s programing, staff capacity, and publications. She cultivated state and local partnerships and moderated hundreds of deliberative community forums.

After leaving her position in 2021, upon her family’s relocation to Nashville, Brawner continued to offer counsel and assistance to the DMC. She also remained active in community-engagement work, through her assistance to the Equitable Neighborhoods Initiative and other groups. In 2022, she founded the Southern Deliberative Democracy Network, a coalition of civic-minded scholars, practitioners, and community leaders dedicated to strengthening civic life in the South.

Brawner joined the DMC’s Board of Directors in 2024. Later that year, to ensure a smooth onboarding of a new Executive Director, she temporarily stepped away from the Board to serve as transition consultant. In that role, she continued the high caliber of community-engagement work characteristic of her career, including supporting the Center’s staff, launching a new initiative on affordable and accessible housing in the Montevallo region, and drafting the forthcoming 2025 Alabama Civic Health Index.

Passed by unanimous acclamation, the resolution thanked Brawner for her “faithful, untiring devotion to the mission of the David Mathews Center…for her commitment to civic engagement in the State of Alabama and beyond, and for her work to strengthen the crucial, ongoing causes of public education, the deliberative and democratic exchange of ideas, and the preservation of our democracy.”

On the same day the Board honored her contributions to the DMC, Brawner was publicly announced as the new Executive Director of the National Issues Forums Institute. A nonprofit, nonpartisan organization, NIFI promotes public deliberation on matters of public concern. The organization carries out its work by publishing issue guides and other materials that are used by community forum groups, and by encouraging collaboration among forum sponsors throughout the country.

Although coincidental, the overlapping timing of Brawner’s job announcement and her recognition by the DMC Board underscores a longstanding relationship. NIFI and the David Mathews Center have been partners in civic engagement for two decades, sharing ideas, resources, and a common mission to help citizens engage in deliberative decision making. One of the best examples of this connection comes from Brawner herself. While serving as a JOIP intern at the Mathews Center, she participated in her first National Issues Forum, which was on the topic of immigration. “That conversation changed the trajectory of my life,” Brawner wrote in a release announcing her new position. “Seeing people from different backgrounds come together to discuss tough issues with respect and empathy showed me the power of civic dialogue.”

Longtime DMC partner Dr. Mark Wilson, Director of the Caroline Marshall Draughon Center for the Arts & Humanities at Auburn University, was among the deliberative democracy practitioners quoted in the NIFI press release: “Cristin Brawner is a perfect choice to lead NIFI into its next chapter of work. As executive director of the David Mathews Center for Civic Life in Alabama, she worked diligently with community members around the state to develop the infrastructure and habits of deliberation and civic engagement, and now the national network and new partners will benefit from her commitment to that valuable work. Cristin is collaborative to her core, and the future for NIFI is bright!”

The DMC staff send heartfelt congratulations to Cristin on her new position. You can read the NIFI press release here.