Bio
Stacy Bannerman, M.F.A., M.S., is the author of HOMEFRONT 911: How Families of Veterans Are Wounded by Our Wars (2015) and WHEN THE WAR CAME HOME: The Inside Story of Reservists and the Families They Leave Behind (2006). Stacy secured the first-ever U.S. House of Representatives Veterans Affairs hearing on how war impacts families of veterans and provided the keystone testimony. She has testified before several Congressional committees, and singlehandedly spearheaded state and national legislative campaigns for military family leave, resulting in the passage of Oregon’s H.B. 2744, and the introduction of the federal Military Family Leave Act of 2009. Ms. Bannerman authored OR H.B. 3391, and independently secured its unanimous passage, establishing the Military Family Task Force in Oregon, the first in the nation. At the request of the OR Department of Justice, she wrote the language identifying partners of combat veterans as an at-risk, underserved population under the STOP/VAWA 2014-2016 grant program implementation plan, the first time that demographic has been prioritized by a State DOJ. Stacy received the Patriotic Employer Award and the Above & Beyond Award from the Employer Support of the Guard & Reserve in 2009.
A Subject Matter Expert on post-9/11 families of veterans, Ms. Bannerman has served as an advisor on numerous service-connected legal cases and is credited for breaking the national silence on the frequency and severity of Veteran Intimate Partner Violence. She researched, developed, and delivered custom CEU courses on Veteran Intimate Partner Violence and post-9/11 military family mental health issues and interventions. She was the keynote speaker for the 2018 William James Conference on Military and Veterans Psychology. Bannerman was “Simply the best speaker I have ever heard on any subject,” according to the conference organizer. She was also the 2011 Tzedek Guest Lecturer at the University of Oregon’s Humanities Center, delivering keynote presentations in Eugene and Portland, OR, about The War at Home. She provided the plenary speech, “An Army of One,” at the 2010 Strengthening Guard Families National Conference in Tampa, FLA.
Stacy organized the groundbreaking statewide coalition calling upon the Oregon Public Employees Retirement System (PERS) to Divest from War. She was a charter Board member of Military Families Speak Out and served on the Steering Committee. She was the Executive Director of the Martin Luther King Jr. Outreach Center, and co-created and produced a multimedia human rights campaign that was nominated for a regional advertising award. She led the Heart2Heart Tour to Philadelphia’s Constitution Center and gave her Freedom Medal back to former President George W. Bush on Veterans Day, 2018. Ms. Bannerman has the distinction of being the first and only military family member to return a war award to an American President. https://popularresistance.org/military-family-member-returns-freedom-medal-to-george-w-bush/?fbclid=IwAR1A_GncboR1FFMTM4mYdTw_oNRWlhkbr9UxnVg2DBprRl0KfNFbJz7F944
A compelling speaker with a powerful message, Stacy has conducted over 700 multimedia interviews, including Army Times, Hardball with Chris Matthews, BBC, Deborah Norville on MSNBC, NBC Nightly News, The Connection on PBS/NOW, appeared in The Case for War: In Defense of Freedom, and a feature story in the Washington Post. Stacy received her M.S., Magna Cum Laude, from Minnesota State University, an M.F.A in Nonfiction from Pacific University, and a B.A. in International Relations. Stacy is a contributor to The Institute for Policy Study’s Foreign Policy In Focus. She has written dozens of articles with bylines at Salon, The San Francisco Chronicle, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Tacoma News Tribune, and many others.
Born and raised in North Dakota, Ms. Bannerman was the founding Executive Director of the nation's first Care Farm in Southern Oregon. She has created flagship programs for women veterans, caregivers of disabled veterans, and military families while serving as the founder and director of The Sanctuary for Veterans and Families and Veterans Program Manager at ColumbiaCare Services. She has also held adjunct faculty positions at several colleges and universities. Stacy resides in Virginia.
