Members of the Los Angeles County Commission...

Members of the Los Angeles County Commission on Aging have elected Diana R. Fortune of Rolling Hills Estates as commission president. The commission represents Los Angeles County’s elderly and senior population by overseeing community services and reporting concerns, needs and innovative programs to the Board of Supervisors. Fortune was appointed three years ago by County Supervisor Deane Dana.

William Ward is the new regional director of Pacific Southwest Region Y’s Men International. Ward is a member of the Gardena Valley Y’s Men and chief volunteer of the Gardena/Carson YMCA. He is active with the First United Methodist Church of Gardena and is a teacher at President Avenue School in Harbor City. Serving with Ward in his regional cabinet are Orville Benjamin of San Pedro, Donna Ward and George Hasegawa of Torrance.

Dr. Jerome Ettinger has been elected to a third one-year term as chairman of the board of directors for the Research and Education Institute at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in Torrance. Ettinger, of Ladera Heights, will continue as president of the medical center’s Professional Staff Assn. He is on the board at Centinela Hospital Medical Center and is a member of the staff at Daniel Freeman Memorial and Daniel Freeman Marina Hospitals. A surgeon, Ettinger is past president of the Los Angeles County Medical Assn., District 15.

Lawndale resident Andy Jones, an American Indian who has worked extensively with youth from Arizona reservations, has earned Transamerica Foundation’s 1990 Volunteer of the Year Award. Jones was selected from 40 nominees at 10 Transamerica Corp. subsidiaries nationwide. A member of the Tohono O’odham nation (The People of the Desert), he has volunteered with numerous organizations and now works more than 10 hours a week at the Los Angeles Job Corps in downtown Los Angeles, helping American Indian students become acclimated to an urban environment. He also works with the United Urban Indian Food Program, a Los Angeles community agency that distributes meals twice a week and delivers food to the elderly and handicapped. He has named that agency as the recipient of the $5,000 that accompanies his award.

Hawthorne High School honor students Soo Im and Rupam Soni were among 450 students nationwide honored at The American Academy of Achievement “Salute to Excellence Weekend,” held recently in Chicago. The two students were selected to represent Hawthorne Plaza and the Hahn Co. shopping center management firm at the academy’s 29th annual event.

Im, class valedictorian, has maintained a 4.0 grade-point average and has been involved in a variety of campus extracurricular activities. She was selected as 1989 representative to Girls State in Sacramento and is an accomplished pianist and artist.

Soni, class salutatorian, maintained a 3.97 grade-point average, served as National Honor Society president, editor of the school yearbook and president of the California Scholarship Society. She is a participant in many school activities and organizations and is involved in several community charity groups.

Richard Heredia has been named president of the Carson-Dominguez Business Council. Heredia is an executive with Kellogg Supply Inc. of Carson, a manufacturer of soil amendments and fertilizers.

Janet Baszile of Palos Verdes Estates, founder and first president of the Palos Verdes Multi-Cultural Committee, has been elected to the board of directors of the International Visitors Council of Los Angeles. Baszile is vice president of Baszile Metals in Los Angeles, an aluminum-distribution company with offices in Seattle and Kansas City. Members of the visitors council are local volunteer citizen diplomats called upon to host about 1,000 Los Angeles visitors each year.