Honoring the San Pablo Koshland Civic Unity Fellows

On Tuesday, June 21st, The San Francisco Foundation celebrated 15 leaders of the San Pablo community of Contra Costa County and presented them with the 2011 Daniel E. Koshland Civic Unity Awards.

We honor these leaders for their bold spirit, innovation, and perseverance to improve the quality of life within the San Pablo community. They have accepted the most daunting neighborhood problems, such as youth violence and poverty, as their personal challenge, and work tirelessly, often on a voluntary basis, to find solutions.

The Awards launch a $300,000, five-year initiative in the San Pablo community to promote collaboration among diverse communities to resolve neighborhood problems. The Koshland Community Fellows, along with their neighborhood colleagues, will distribute annual funds through 2016. The initiative will focus on leadership development, promoting civic unity, and celebrating unsung heroes.

Congratulations to the 2011 Koshland Community Fellows:

• Humberto Alvarez
• Joseph Camacho
  
• Gladys Garza
  
• LaZena Jones
  
• Khammany Mathavongsy
  
• Mayra Padilla
  
• Lisa Raffel
  
• Maria Resendiz
  
• Alexina Rojas
  
• Gonzalo Rucobo
  
• James Solis
  
• Nancy Thome
  
• Robert Turner
  
• Norma Valdez-Jimenez
  
• Meuy Yong Saephan
  

The Daniel E. Koshland Civic Unity Awards were established in 1982 by The San Francisco Foundation as a memorial to one of its founders and major benefactors, Daniel E. Koshland, a businessman and philanthropist who committed himself to making the Bay Area a better place in which to live. For more information about the awards, please visit our Koshland Program page.

Click here for a photo gallery from the celebration.