Leadership Greater Huntsville Hall of Fame
The Leadership Greater Huntsville Hall of Fame recognizes exceptional individuals whose vision, service, and leadership have made a lasting impact on our community and on Leadership Greater Huntsville. This prestigious honor celebrates leaders who exemplify integrity, collaboration, and a steadfast commitment to improving the quality of life across North Alabama.
Hall of Fame inductees have demonstrated extraordinary leadership throughout their careers and communities while inspiring others to lead with purpose. Through their dedication to civic engagement, innovation, and service, these distinguished alumni have helped shape the future of our region and embody the mission and values of Leadership Greater Huntsville.
Each year, the Hall of Fame serves as an opportunity to honor these remarkable leaders, celebrate their accomplishments, and inspire the next generation of community changemakers.
Award Categories
- Distinguished Alumni Award
Honors an alumna/us who has demonstrated exceptional leadership and sustained community impact through professional achievement, civic engagement, and service. - Community Impact Award
Recognizes an alumna/us whose leadership has resulted in meaningful, measurable improvements in quality of life across Huntsville–Madison County. - Service & Stewardship Award
Honors an alumna/us who exemplifies servant leadership through consistent volunteerism, nonprofit involvement, and stewardship of community resources.
Julian Butler
Distinguished Alumni Award
Julian Butler received his undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Alabama, where he was president of the student body. He served as an assistant to U. S. Senator Lister Hill and to Congressman Carl Elliott and as law clerk to U. S. District Judge Seybourn H. Lynne.
Butler has been in the private practice of law in Huntsville since 1966. He is a partner in the statewide law firm of Dentons Sirote. Butler served as county attorney for Madison County for thirty-five years. He served as president of the National Association of County Civil Attorneys and as a special assistant attorney general for the State of Alabama.
Butler is listed in The Best Lawyers in America and Mid-South Super Lawyers. He is a member of the Huntsville-Madison County Bar Association, the Alabama State Bar, and the American Bar Association. He is a fellow of the Alabama Law Foundation. Butler was awarded the 2005 and the 2012 Community Service Awards by the Huntsville-Madison County Bar Association.
Butler was a founding member and the first chairman of the Center for Public Law and Service at the University of Alabama. He was a founding member and the second chairman of the Environmental Law Section of the Alabama State Bar. Butler previously served as president of the Arts Council (now Arts Huntsville), vice president of the General Joe Wheeler Home Foundation, and president of the Huntsville-Madison County Chapter of the University of Alabama Alumni Association. Butler twice served as chairman of the Creek District of the Boy Scouts of America. From 2017 to 2019, he served as chairman of the Huntsville-Madison County Bicentennial Committee.
Butler currently serves on the board of trustees of the Alabama Department of Archives and History, the board of directors of the Alabama Humanities Foundation, and the University of Alabama Library Leadership Board. He is vice president for Alabama of the Eleventh Circuit Historical Society and is a life member of the Council of the Alabama Law Institute. Active in political affairs on the local, state, and national levels, Butler has chaired statewide Democratic campaigns and has served as the attorney for the Alabama Democratic Party.
Butler was chairman of Class V of Leadership Huntsville-Madison County. An award given to a non-Leadership graduate who has contributed significantly to the success of Leadership Huntsville-Madison County is named in Butler’s honor. Butler was the first recipient of the award.
Butler received the 2018 Martin Luther King, Jr. Unity Award and was honored as a Pioneer by the Rosetta James Foundation. He is a senior member of the Carl A. Elliott Society at the University of Alabama.
Julian and his wife, Betty, have three children and five grandchildren.
Kathi Tew
Community Impact Award
Kathi Tew serves as Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer of the Baron Institute, a Huntsville-based nonprofit dedicated to enhancing public safety, advancing education, and supporting economic growth through innovative weather instrumentation. Central to its mission is the Baron Institute Alabama WeatherNet, a statewide network of more than 90 weather systems that delivers timely, accurate data to communities, emergency managers, and public safety partners—helping protect lives across Alabama.
In 2025, the Baron Institute opened its multimillion-dollar How We Know the Weather exhibit at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center, with Kathi serving as project manager. Featuring more than 30 interactive experiences and live NOAA data, this dynamic, hands-on exhibit immerses visitors in meteorology and the science behind weather forecasting. Reaching more than 650,000 visitors annually, it is designed to inspire the next generation of scientists, engineers, mathematicians, and problem-solvers.
Beyond her work with the Baron Institute, Kathi is deeply committed to strengthening the nonprofit community. She has chaired more than 60 fundraising events, helping raise millions of dollars for organizations serving the Greater Huntsville area. She has volunteered her services to more than 200 nonprofits, providing governance training, leading major bylaw and policy updates, offering financial guidance, developing innovative fundraising strategies, and mentoring nonprofit boards, leaders, and teams.
A proud graduate of Leadership Greater Huntsville’s Leadership 27 class, Kathi has remained actively involved with the organization since graduation, inspired by LGH’s lasting impact on her own leadership journey. She believes LGH does more than develop individual leaders—it deepens their understanding of Greater Huntsville, builds relationships across sectors, and inspires them to turn their knowledge and connections into meaningful action.
Kathi serves on numerous local and national nonprofit boards and is widely recognized for her ability to connect people, ideas, and resources to create meaningful and lasting impact. She and her husband, Norm, live in Madison, Alabama, and are blessed with two daughters and six granddaughters, all of whom live nearby.
Andrew Jennings
Service & Stewardship Award
Andrew Jennings is a founding partner and Chief Commercial Officer of Transcend, a Huntsville-based consultancy that since 2002 has helped organizations from $10 million to more than $1 billion in revenue strengthen performance, build leadership pipelines, and navigate complex change. A British-trained engineer with two master's degrees, Andrew spent more than two decades building businesses across Europe, the United States, and Asia—from industrial control systems and a North Sea oil rig, to running a French company's UK office, to developing the global sales network for a Huntsville biotechnology firm later acquired by Thermo Fisher Scientific—before making his home in the Tennessee Valley.
Today, Andrew advises senior leaders on culture transformation, succession, and change, drawing on an engineer's instinct for finding the root cause of a problem and the practical experience to turn it into a positive outcome. Under Andrew and his wife Laura's leadership, Transcend became Alabama's first Certified B Corporation in 2016—a designation that reflects the firm's commitment to its employees, its clients, and the broader community. The company is also certified as a Women's Business Enterprise and a Woman-Owned Small Business, and in 2025 was named Professional/Technical Services Business of the Year by the Huntsville/Madison County Chamber.
Andrew believes deeply in showing up for the community that shaped the business, and he stays actively engaged in the civic and business life of Greater Huntsville through organizations including Rotary, the Committee of 100, and Leadership Greater Huntsville. A proud graduate of LGH's Class 27, he credits the program with deepening his understanding of the region, building relationships across sectors, and turning knowledge and connection into meaningful action. He believes LGH does more than develop individual leaders—it helps them see the whole of Greater Huntsville and inspires them to put what they learn to work.
His work rests on a single conviction: that courage and purpose in the face of uncertainty is always a choice—and a leader's most consequential one. Andrew and his wife, Laura, make their home in Huntsville and are the proud parents of two daughters. In his spare time, he builds and rides motorcycles.
