3 Californians Sit With First Lady for Speech

Three Californians were among 10 citizens invited to sit with First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton during President Clinton’s State of the Union speech Tuesday night. They were hailed by administration officials for having made a difference in their communities.

The three Californians:

* Officer Chris Lonsford, 27, of Fontana

A member of the Fontana Police Department, Lonsford was honored by Clinton in May for bravery demonstrated when he pursued and arrested three armed robbers in November 1996. For his actions, he also received the Fontana Police Department’s highest honor, the Medal of Valor.

Lonsford was the first of five officers hired in Fontana through the president’s Police Hiring Supplement Program, which aims to put an additional 100,000 police officers in the field.

* Loc Truong, 23, of San Luis Obispo

A member of AmeriCorps, Clinton’s youth service program, Truong works as a mentor to eight at-risk teenagers. Along with his parents and six siblings, he came to the United States from Vietnam as a political refugee in 1981.

Truong majored in biochemistry at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, but, he said in an interview, he plans to enter graduate school and eventually become a school principal.

* Maurice Lim Miller, 52, of San Francisco

Miller serves as executive director of Asian Neighborhood Design, a multi-service community development corporation that assists low-income families with job training, counseling and finding affordable housing.

The nonprofit organization was recognized by Clinton’s Initiative on Race commission for its efforts on behalf of racial reconciliation. Miller himself is biracial, the son of a Chinese father and Latino mother.