Hon. Garry T. Ichikawa Recipient of the 2017 State Bar of California Family Law Judicial Officer of the Year Award

• Publication year: 2017
• Author: John Hodson

Hon. Garry T. Ichikawa Recipient of the 2017 State Bar of California Family Law Judicial Officer of the Year award

John Hodson

Hon. Garry T. Ichikawa

On Friday, August 18, 2017, FLEXCOM presented the State Bar's Family Law Judicial Office of the Year award to Hon. Garry T. Ichikawa at its reception during the Sections Convention. John Hodson presented the award to Judge Juhas. The following are her remarks made at the presentation.

Hon. Garry T. Ichikawa is one of family law's hometown heroes. He is in the third of five generations of his family that have lived and worked in the Fairfield area of Solano County. His grandparents immigrated from Japan to the Suisun Valley in the early 20^th century, and his parents returned there after time in a World War II relocation camp and military service. The Ichikawas were among the first persons of Japanese ancestry to be able to purchase land in Suisun Valley.

Judge Ichikawa likes to say that he was born with a shovel in one hand and a book in the other. He was raised on a fruit farm, working in the fields after school and summers. He graduated from Fairfield's Armijo High School in 1965, where he was Student Body President and a drum major. He then drove forty minutes west to attend "Cal" (UC Berkeley) until he graduated in 1969. After a stint in the U.S. Army, he drove forty minutes east to attend law school at UC Davis, graduating in 1976. From there it was back to Fairfield to practice law. He served as a Deputy Public Defender for a few years, entered private practice in 1979, and was practicing family law within two years. Two years after that, family law became his sole area of practice. He became the county's third Certified Family Law Specialist in 1985. He has spent virtually his entire adult life in pursuit of the loftiest goals of family law.

While in private practice, Judge Ichikawa served the profession and his community with equal fervor. On the community service side, he was elected to the Solano Community College Governing Board in 1983 and twice elected to the Fairfield City Council, serving two terms as Vice Mayor. On the legal side, he served four years with the State Bar's Family Law Advisory Commission, including a year as chair, and three years with the State Bar Board of Legal Specialization, where he was instrumental in writing and grading certification examinations for future family law specialists. He also served on the State Bar's Juvenile Justice Commission, which heralded the now-familiar...