Pat Cervelli
I worked as a medical social worker for the Visiting Nurse Assn. for 17 years until I retired in 2009. Before that I worked for the Mother Lode Women’s Center for 10 years, first as the domestic violence program coordinator charged with opening the shelter for battered women, and later as the sexual assault program coordinator. I began that job soon after moving to Tuolumne County from New York City in 1979. I have been married for 36 years to Bruno, a retired nurse and I have a daughter, Bridget, who is 32.

I was part of the Tuolumne County Citizens for Peace from its inception in 2003 until it disbanded in 2008. I got involved with the MLK Committee in 2003. I was on the first board of the Sierra AIDS Council from 1989-1995 or so. Things were quiet for me before that as I raised my daughter.

I was a 1960-70s activist in New York City and in Oakland. I started out as a community organizer in NYC against urban renewal [aka “urban removal” since many low income homes were destroyed for Columbia U. and other commercial ventures], an anti-VietnamWar activist, and an activist with Women’s Liberation both in NYC and later in Oakland. My real work was political activism at that point and my jobs were as a social worker for the NYC Dept. of Welfare and later in a Brooklyn shelter for battered women.

It is now [2016] 13 years that I have been on the Motherlode MLK Committee. It has been a wonderful experience for me and I so enjoy working with everyone.

Pat Cervelli

Vonna Breeze-Martin
Vonna retired from Columbia College, where she taught Spanish and oversaw the English as a Second Language program. Her lifelong interest in the Spanish language and Mexican culture along with her deep concern about inequities and social injustice have guided her on a career path through the development and administration of an early ethnic studies institute at Utah’s Weber State University, followed by nearly two decades in the War on Poverty through community action agencies in Santa Barbara and Napa, where groundbreaking programs were developed in such areas as domestic violence, farmworker health, bilingual community advocacy, senior services, and early childhood programs including Head Start. In Tuolumne County, she is honored to participate in the Motherlode Martin Luther King, Jr. Committee, and proud of her contribution to the community through her teaching and through her work at Tuolumne County Behavioral Health, where she wrote and oversaw the original Y.E.S. program grant from the Henry J. Kaiser Foundation, addressing teen suicide and substance abuse prevention.

She currently serves as Secretary to the Motherlode Martin Luther King, Jr. Committee.

Lorena Arellano…
Dennis Brown…
Diane Magid
Diane Magid “HATS”
Educator – 35 years college professor of Psychology & Art
Artist and Writer
Business Owner, Property Management
Passionate Devotee of Our Beloved Community
Roya Mahmoudi…
Steve Ralston
Steve Ralston was born in San Francisco and received his B.A. and JD from U.C. Berkeley. In 1964, he went to the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc, in New York. He was on the legal team that defended demonstrators in Alabama and that brought the lawsuit that allowed the Selma to Montgomery March to take place in 1965. He handled cases involving employment and housing discrimination, voting rights, school desegregation, jury discrimination, and capital punishment.

In 2002, he returned to the Bay Area. He now lives in Mi Wuk Village with his wife and continues to work on civil rights cases. He volunteers at Railtown 1897 State Park in Jamestown, where he indulges his life-long love of and fascination with steam locomotives. In March, 2015, he returned to Selma and participated in the commemorative march led by President Obama.

Chris Montesano

To let you know a bit about myself, I worked with Dorothy Day co-founder of the Catholic Worker Movement at the founding house in New York City in 1969-70. I was one of the founders of Martin DePorres House in San Francisco in 1971. The Catholic Worker Movement has houses of hospitality that provide food, shelter and clothing to the poor and farming communities whose goal is in Peter Maurin’s words “to begin to build a new society in the shell of the old.”

Along with Joan and a few others from the Martin De Porres House in San Francisco founded a Catholic Worker Farm in Sheep Ranch in 1976. At this farm we have done various kinds of hospitality over our 37 year history. This hospitality has varied from battered women, troubled youth, personswith alcohol and drug abuse in our early years to a 20 years of running a summer program for developmentally delayed adults to 20 years of doing retreats for persons with HIV/AIDS as well as raising our family here at the Farm. Currently as well as doing the HIV/AIDSretreats we also have been developing a organic Biointensive mini farm working towards environmentally sustainable agriculture.

I also have been a board member of Nevada Desert Experience, which operates protests at the Nevada Nuclear Test Sight. The Catholic Worker is an anarchist-pacifist movement ( Anarchist in the school of Kropotkin-people coming together to work for the common good rather than mandated by the State). The Catholic Worker has been involved in peace and social justice work since its inception in 1933 and was an early supporter of Dr Martin Luther King. I met Fr Roy at a protest in DC hosted by Nevada Desert Experience and School of the Americas a number of years ago, but do not know him personally. I hope that this helps you know a bit about me and I am honored to help with this event.

Thanks, Chris Montesano

Kathleen Malloy
Kathleen Malloy has lived in Tuolumne County for over 29 years. Always an active community volunteer she has worked with environmental, historical and educational organizations, as well as programs empowering individuals. She holds a Master in Divinity degree from the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, (Starr King School for the Ministry) and currently works as a substance abuse counselor at Sierra Conservation Center in Jamestown.

A strong believer in the power of individuals to create positive social change, she has been working on the Motherlode Martin Luther King Jr. Committee for over 10 years.

She lives in Big Oak Flat with her husband Michael. They have 2 sons, 2 cats, a dog and acres of poison oak.

Teri Olsson…
Pat Iwata…
David Winslow
David Winslow has been in the Sonora community since 1997 when he moved here with his, then, young family to teach history at Sonora High School. He has attended Tulane University in New Orleans, Hangzhou University in China and Taipei Normal school in Taiwan, but his degrees are from California State University, Fresno. He grew up in agricultural towns of the southern central valley and studied Chinese, economics and Anthropology in college. He is a proud member of the Baha’i Faith and loves working to better the community. He has found the Mother Lode Martin Luther King Jr. committee an excellent opportunity for pursuing this passion.