Valerie Wiener, age 4, poses for her first portrait.

Valerie Wiener celebrates a UNLV basketball victory with Larry Johnson in 1990. She served as the media coach for the UNLV Runnin? Rebels, including the 1989-1990 season when the team won the national championship.

Senator Valerie Wiener (Retired) sponsored legislation in 2007 to create the Nevada Youth Legislature. Gathered for a special reunion are NYL Alumni with whom Senator Wiener maintains a mentor-mentee relationship. From left: Zhan Okuda-Lim, Grant Gabriel, Evan Gong, Rose Asaf, Mitchell Ragan, Senator Wiener, Miranda Rosen, and Tierra Patmavanu.

Longtime Las Vegas resident Valerie Wiener poses in her home.

During Senator Valerie Wiener?s eighth and final legislative session in 2011, she honors Jeanne Baret, her legislative assistant, on Jeanne?s 75th birthday. During that session, Senator Wiener served as the first female Assistant Majority Leader. Also celebrating Jeanne?s birthday is Brenda Erdoes, Legal Counsel for the Nevada Legislature.

Valerie Wiener is an accomplished state senator, business owner, president and founding member of the Public Service Institute of Nevada and the Valerie Wiener Foundation. She was born October 30, 1948 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Her service as senator for 16 years and her role as a public servant led her to become the first woman assistant majority leader of the state senate in Nevada. She graduated with a bachelor degree of Journalism at the University of Missouri/Columbia within the School of Journalism earning a Masters of Arts in Broadcast Journalism and a Master of Arts in Literature at the University of Illinois in Springfield while attending law school at McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento in the 1970s. Her generosity is also seen through scholarships and activities at the Louis Wiener Jr. Elementary School. In addition, Valerie is a professional speaker, consultant, and internationally published author. She is the recipients of many awards, such as: ?Women of Achievement Award? in Media; ?Healthy Schools Heroes?; ?Public Affairs Champion Award?; ?Legislator of the Year?, and the Nevada Secretary of State?s recipient of the ?Jean Ford Participatory Democracy Award.? She stays active through her commitment to the Nevada Senior Olympics for both Fitness and Weightlifting earning 17 gold medals from 1998 to 2007. In this interview, Wiener discusses her childhood and being raised in Las Vegas in the 1950s as well as the academic path that led her career into politics. She shares memorable insight into the life of her father, Louis Isaac Wiener, Jr., an accomplished attorney and business man who represented the infamous Benjamin ?Bugsy? Siegel during the construction and opening of the Flamingo Hotel and Casino in 1946. Throughout Wiener?s interview, she highlights the traditions of the small, but growing Las Vegas Jewish population in the 1960s. Among the people she recalls most vividly is her grandmother Kitty Wiener. Wiener also discusses her community service work and her life mantra of giving.

During a visit to Louis Wiener Jr. Elementary School, Valerie Wiener talks with students about friendship choices and promises to be their friend and support them each day. She is wearing a school shirt.