From an immigrant housekeeper that makes burritos for the needy to a Ph.D. graduate who founded a national social service agency, four area women were honored last week by the Santa Monica chapter of the Young Women’s Christian Association.
About 450 people filled the ballroom at the Loews Santa Monica Beach Hotel Thursday for the 27th annual “Women of the Year Dinner.” Recipients included Kristina Andresen of Santa Monica, Gloria Curiel Parker of Santa Monica, Christine Schanes of Venice and Manuela Mata of Hacienda Heights.
The women were nominated by their peers and chosen by a 10-person board of business and community leaders, said YWCA program administrator Robin Turner. They were honored for making significant contributions to their communities.
Located at 2019 Fourth St., the YWCA Santa Monica/Westside provides community service programs to more than 10 area communities. Worldwide, the YWCA represents more than 25 million women and girls in 115 countries. The group’s vision is to end racism and “be a premier organization for women and girls, a source of strength and a voice for women.”
Here, the Daily Press caught up with all four awardees.
Kristina Andresen
• Born: March 6, 1951, in Indianapolis, Ind.
• Education: Bachelors of architecture and science from Ball State University.
Andresen is an architect and entrepreneur who YWCA officials said “empowers women and works toward diversity by example.” She was the only woman in 1969 to graduate from Ball University with a degree in architecture.
She serves on the board of Upward Bound House, which provides transitional housing for homeless children and their parents; the executive board of both the Westside Economic Collaborative and the Santa Monica College of Associates; as chair of the Santa Monica Rotary Literacy Committee; trustee at the First United Methodist Church of Santa Monica; volunteer building commissioner at City Hall; and member of the Santa Monica Chamber of Commerce Government Affairs Committee, which works on issues relating to legislation and City Hall.
What single accomplishment of yours are you most proud of?
“Rather than a single accomplishment, I’d just say... the thing that I’ve enjoyed working on the most is really working with Upward Bound. We have 70 units of low-income senior housing that we have built, and we have 22 units of transitional housing for homeless children and their parents.
“The original founder of Upward Bound House was Donald Shelby, who was my longtime minister at the First United Methodist Church and, through his vision, Upward Bound House — it was his vision to provide housing to homeless children and that has been my longtime church.
What one thing would you most like to change in Santa Monica or the greater westside?
“They asked me what my one wish for Santa Monica was... and I said that I was hoping that, there are so many diverse groups in the community that it would be wonderful if people could find more common ground and work together.
“I know that the chamber and City Council and lots of people have many different viewpoints, and rather than people speaking of the ways they don’t agree, it would be great if people would find the ways they do agree and work together.”
Manuela Mata
• Born: May 10, 1955, in Durango, Mexico.
• Education: Through the third grade.
Mata is a housekeeper and maintenance worker who holds down two jobs, five days a week. But it’s not until the weekends that Mata really gets busy. She’s known as the “Burrito Lady” for her regular work feeding homeless and poor people on Skid Row in Los Angeles.
“Twenty-eight years ago Manuela made a promise to care for the homeless and the poor, if she made it safely across the Rio Grande to her husband in California,” reads a bio sheet on Mata passed out for the award dinner. “In November 1987, Manuela’s promise became her passion.”
Today, Mata provides meals every other Sunday, every Thanksgiving and every Christmas to thousands of people on Skid Row. She also makes a trek to a small village south of Tijuana four times each year to take food, clothing and other necessities.
Asked what accomplishment she was most proud of, Mata, who is not fluent in English, replied that she was amazed by her first trip to the small village south of Tijuana.
With the help of an English-speaking co-worker, Mata described how during that first trip, her group arrived as many of the town people were attending mass in a hut-like church atop a hill. While the town prayed, Mata said her group set up tables with food, clothes, toys and other items they had brought from the United States. The look on the people’s faces when they came out of the church, Mata said, was like nothing she had ever seen before.
“You have to live these things,” she said.
Since then, Mata’s group has built a new church in the village.
Asked if she could change one thing about Santa Monica and the greater westside, Mata replied that she would like to see more people get involved as volunteers.
“I would like to bring help to the people,” she said. “I don’t like to see the people suffer. It breaks my heart, especially the babies... I like somebody else maybe doing what I’m doing.”
Gloria Curiel Parker
• Born: May 11, “in the 1950s” in Oakland, Calif.
• Education: Bachelor of Science in business administration from the University of Southern California. Law degree from Loyola Law School.
Parker is an immigration law expert and motivational expert who appears twice weekly on Spanish-language television channel Univision’s morning news to answer listener questions about immigration.
What single accomplishment of yours are you most proud of?
“Setting a good example for my daughter, in showing her that if you set your mind to something you can accomplish it — and that you should be sensitive to the needs of people around you and try to do good for others, as a goal for you to live by for your entire life.
“My daughter is already following in these footsteps. She is a very kind-hearted, good-spirited kid.”
What one thing would you most like to change in Santa Monica or the greater westside?
“That’s a tough one... If I could change the emphasis of spending more money on educational needs of the children I would do that. In Santa Monica it seems that it’s a great city... but I still feel that some of the expenditures are going to things that are not as important as the investment in our future of our children’s education...
“Some of those curbs, they’re very beautiful, but the maintenance and the expenditures are some of the things I’d rather see spent on computers in the schools for our children... Also, I live on a very hilly street, and I can’t see the purpose of those curbs being lowered, I’m not sure what the terminology is, but I don’t see the purpose of lowering those...
92C,“I appreciate the beautification of our city — but at the expense of losing valuable teachers and more benefits for the students, that really bothers me.”
Christine Schanes
• Born: April 9, 1948, in Jersey City, N.J.
• Education: Undergraduate degree from University of San Diego. Law degree from American University in Washington, D.C., and a Ph.D. from Notre Dame in international government and relations.
Though Schanes accepted the “Woman of the Year” award on behalf of Children Helping Poor and Homeless People — and not herself — she has been instrumental in the group’s success.
“When I was first told I had been selected, I wasn’t sure I could accept,” she said. “For I feel that what I do is part of a group effort to help end hunger, poverty and homelessness.”
Schanes is co-director and co-founder of CHPHP, which “involves thousands of young people and adults serving tens of thousands of children, women and men in need each year in California, Oregon, Colorado and Arizona.”
What single accomplishment of yours are you most proud of?
“I would use the word that I’m most grateful to the volunteers and donors of people helping CHPHP for everything they do to help end poverty and homelessness...
“For example, there was a booklet put together, it was several inches thick, from many of the students that have worked with us — we work with over 15,000 volunteers, we’re in four states, and we don’t have a building, and we’re not properly funded. It’s just an amazing thing.
“One of the volunteers, her name is Sydney, said, ‘Even a small dent in the problem can make a difference. If everyone tried to make a dent, it would make a huge difference.’ Just magnificent.”
What one thing would you most like to change in Santa Monica or the greater westside?
“I would change the laws that prohibit the charitable giving of food, and I would have the city encourage the charitable giving of food, rather than make it illegal...
“There is a huge amount of hunger in the city of Santa Monica, as well as in the County of Los Angeles and the U.S., and everybody needs to help address that problem. We have 3 million children in the state of California that go to bed hungry every night, and there’s no excuse for that... Some of those children are in Santa Monica, and we must do something to help them. And everybody can help.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on April 5, 2004. Read the original PDF.