KOCE’s Jo Caines Honored for Embracing Opportunity

Calling her a “woman of tremendous opportunity,” business consultant Betsy Sanders presented Jo Caines with the Amelia Earhart Award last week at a gala luncheon sponsored by the Women’s Opportunities Center at UC Irvine.

The award is given annually to a person whose leadership and commitment to the Orange County community enhance the lives of women.

Since coming to the county in 1963, Caines, community relations director for KOCE-TV Channel 50, has helped found the Orange County Fair Housing Commission and served on the Orange County Grand Jury. She has been an active member of more than 60 community organizations including the United Way and the Orange County Urban League.

No wonder she knew most of the 577 guests, mostly women, at the event held at the Sutton Place Hotel in Newport Beach. “I look around and see that I know you,” said Caines, who oversees 250 volunteers at KOCE. “For the 32 years I have served, I have been supported by many fantastic women.

“You can be proud of the many doors you have opened and the opportunities you have provided.”

Privately, Caines, who is black, said it wasn’t easy “in the early days” of her residency in Orange County.

“When my husband, Ken, and I decided to move to Orange in the early ‘60s, our realtor called us and told us the neighbors were having a meeting about our moving in,” she said.

“Some of them were concerned about us living on this small block of 10 houses because they already had a black and an Asian there.

“They felt another minority on the block would be bad for property resale.”

The Caineses moved in anyway. And that “depressing beginning,” Caines said, was one of the reasons she became a community activist.

Now, more than 30 years later, she can’t imagine living anywhere else, she said. “I feel safer here in Orange County than I do anywhere else.”

And while things here seem to have generally improved in the area of race relations, “so many things are still the same,” she said. “Races have grown apart here and everywhere.”

The reason? “Maybe it’s a fear that the minority is becoming the majority,” she said.

In her position at KOCE, Caines reaches out to embrace all people. “I feel that every person, regardless of race, color, size or shape needs to be considered part of our concern,” she said.

Caines has never allowed racial prejudice to get her down. Oh, she’s aware of it, all right. She sees it “creep around the corners from time to time.”

But she’s just too busy to worry about it, she said.

“Life is a struggle, and you might grow weary of all of the unhappy things that are going on,” she said. “But I believe that if you put out your hand to make things better and somebody slaps it, you just keep trying. Love them anyway!”

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A surprise at Orangewood Ball: When the Orangewood Foundation stages its annual Orange Blossom Ball on Saturday at the Hyatt Regency Irvine, there’s going to be more than comic impersonator Rich Little and veal medallions on the menu.

Charlotte Lopez, Miss Teen USA 1993, will make an appearance. The 18-year-old UC Irvine student spent 13 years in the foster care system before she was finally adopted.

“My parents are a gift from God,” says Lopez, who is from Vermont. “They are the most awesome parents you could have. They have opened me up, helped me form my interests.”

Lopez was a child lost in the system, she says. She was taken away from an abusive mother when she was a baby and put up for adoption when she was 3.

“A family wanted to adopt me, but, because of financial problems, they never did,” Lopez says.

For the next 13 years she was ushered in and out of “tons of foster homes,” she says. “I just got lost in the shuffle. I was a good kid. I wasn’t one who had to have constant attention. Then I turned 16 and decided I didn’t want this anymore. I needed a family . I really thought I deserved one after living in foster care for so long.”

Television journalist Diane Sawyer thought Lopez’s story was so interesting that she featured her in a January program. The theme of the show was “making dreams come true,” Lopez said.

People are surprised that Lopez turned out so well, after all of those years in foster care. But they shouldn’t be, she says. “We’re not bad kids who need a place to stay. We are kids whose parents can’t take care of us for some reason.

“People shouldn’t judge foster children until they have the chance to talk to them. I think people ignore foster children because they don’t want to see all of the problems these children have. But I say, ‘See it!’

“They need to look at foster children. They are the adults of tomorrow.”

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New guild formed: An Alzheimer’s Guild has been established to provide volunteers and financial support for the Alzheimer’s Assn. of Orange County. Active members will pay $40 annually in dues. Supporting members will contribute $150 per year. The guild plans to stage two benefits annually. Diane Gates of Villa Park is president. To join, call (714) 283-1111.