Volunteer Honored for Aid to Survivors

Tomidan Jordan of Costa Mesa was named the Outstanding Volunteer of the Year by the Orange County Sexual Assault Network for his hundreds of volunteer hours and commitment to survivors of rape, according to Marie J. Moore, executive director.

The group also honored the Laguna Beach Police Department, Hoag Hospital in Newport Beach and Western Medical Center-Santa Ana for their professional services to rape victims.

Others who received awards were Christine Leon, director of the Irvine rape prevention program; Dianne Klein, columnist for The Times Orange County, and Harry Mersmann, the network’s director of education.

Laura Gauley, 10, the current Miss Petite of Southern California, was selected first runner-up in the national finals of Miss Petite Dance USA in Baltimore. She is the daughter of Marsha and Dave Gauley of Irvine. She is a sixth-grade pupil at Turtle Rock Elementary School.

Santa Ana resident Erin A. Herdeg has been named president of the Orange County Chapter of Women in Communications Inc., a professional communications organization founded in 1909. It has 10,500 members in 180 professional and campus chapters nationwide.

“Women continue to play an ever-increasing and dynamic role in the Southern California business climate,” said Herdeg, adding that her organization “can influence that climate to the benefit of both men and women.”

Herdeg is a partner of the Herdeg-Kociela Group, a marketing communications agency in Santa Ana. She attended UCLA.

Los Alamitos resident Christopher Brophy, 19, was named Junior Male Model of the Year at the recent International Modeling and Talent Assn. convention in New York City. Jocelyn Nery, 14, of Orange, won first place in the Commercial/Print photo category.

Dana Point lawyer Mari Frank has been named president of the Orange County Chapter of the International Society for Professionals in Dispute Resolution, a group that aims to resolve legal disputes quickly without litigation.

Frank, who lives in Laguna Niguel, said members include judges, lawyers, mediators, arbitrators and other professionals.

Frank is a member of the State Bar standing committee on legal services to middle income people and was recently appointed as an adjunct professor at Western State University College of Law in Fullerton.

Ricky T. Brandon, 18, of Huntington Beach will be honored at 7 tonight at a Court of Honor and given his Boy Scout Eagle Rank. Brandon gathered and catalogued the names and blood types of church members and entered that information in a computer. The event will be at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Huntington Beach.

.

Yvonne Gilon, 13, who attended the recent National Aeronautics and Space Administration space camp in Huntsville, Ala., was named San Juan Capistrano’s first honorary Ambassador of Goodwill.

Yvonne, a Marco F. Forster Junior High School graduate who will attend Capistrano Valley High in the fall, was selected by the Society of Women Engineers and NASA based on her scholastic achievements and on projects she submitted for the camp science fair.

Yvonne also has received the Presidential Academic Fitness Award and earned a first-place award in a “Say No to Drugs” essay contest. She plans to be an astronaut.

Driver Rodrigo Rubalcava of Santa Ana has been named Star of the Year by Durham Transportation, a school bus transportation contractor in Santa Ana. Rubalcava was selected over 150 other drivers, and in November he will compete against 26 others in a corporate contest for the state of California.

Submit items to Three Cheers, The Times, c/o Herbert J. Vida, 1375 Sunflower Ave., Costa Mesa, Calif., 92626