Cora "Mom" Green

Mom Green

Last night at their 9th annual Dinner Dance and Awards, Oakland Firefighters Random Acts honored Cora "Mom" Green with a Lifetime Achievement Award. Mom Green is one of those people that makes you feel better about humanity. She's been doing good with OF Random Acts for a long time. She's been doing good things for Oakland for a long time before that, 40 years all told. It was mayor Lionel Wilson that gave her the name "Mom", because she was a mom to everyone in Oakland. Cancer and age have slowed her down some, but she's still going. Lots of firefighters were there to thank mom for her service, and her daughter flew in from North Carolina to surprise her. I had the privilege of putting together a brief slideshow of photos of her helping people in the community and her with various firefighters, police and others she's worked with over the years.

There's a nice article in the Tribune about Mom. I heard that KTVU (Rita Williams of KTVU news was the MC) did a piece on her the other night, but I haven't seen it yet.

Also honored with a Community Hero award was the East Bay Boxing Association, which despite the name does a lot more for kids in East Oakland than teaching them to box. They have programs for gardening, food distribution, tutoring, leadership and more. Executive Director Liz Kendall was on hand to receive the ward.