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Also naming the 5400 block of Woodland Avenue as “Dr. Minnie Moore Johnson Way” to honor the life and legacy of community service of Dr. Minnie Moore Johnson to the City of Philadelphia.
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WHEREAS, Dr. Minnie Moore Johnson is a longtime resident and community servant in Southwest Philadelphia; and
WHEREAS, Originally from Brooklyn, NY, with a stint living in the deep south as a child, Dr. Minnie moved to Philadelphia as a teenager, eventually becoming a social worker; and
WHEREAS, Her first foray into community service involved feeding seniors at Thanksgiving in 1968, which grew to feeding more than 25,000 seniors at the then-Philadelphia Civic Center in 1988, garnering recognition by the Smithsonian Institute for her efforts, credited as the largest “one-day feeding in the history of the City;” and
WHEREAS, Always seeking to do more for her community, she was founder and CEO of Concerned Parents, Inc., a group that worked with the Pennsylvania Society of Prisons to provide community service opportunities to their clients; and
WHEREAS, Inspired by this work, Dr. Minnie returned to school to study criminal justice -ultimately earning her doctorate in the subject - to learn more about the people she was helping. While studying at Temple University, she became a part-time Life Skills Educator and then full-time Job Developer at the Prison Society, to help formerly incarcerated people find gainful employment and other benefits; and
WHEREAS, Ultimately serving as the first Program Manager at Prison Society’s Re-Entry Service Project, she created the only certified Job Development Course at Temple, which specifically cultivated job opportunities for individuals going through the re-entry process, and was developed as a pilot for the JOBS Project which is still used in the Pennsylvania Prison System; and
WHEREAS, Dr. Minnie also worked with youth aged 15-24 years old through Philadelphia Safe and Sound, an organization that centered youth violence reduction by funding after-school programs for young people impacted by crime and worked to prevent them from entering the system; and
WHEREAS, In addition to hundreds of awards from a myriad of city and state officials and prominent organizations, Dr. Minnie was honored by four U.S. Presidents - Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, as well as former Attorney General Janet Reno, the late Rev. Leon H. Sullivan, and U.S. Rep. Bob Brady; and
WHEREAS, Later in her career, Dr. Minnie worked as a program coordinator of Fathers and Children Together, or FACT, helping incarcerated fathers at Graterford Prisons by organizing one-on-one visits with their children. She currently serves on the board of directors of Greater Philadelphia Health Action, Inc.; and
WHEREAS, Her home, which is estimated to be over 100 years old, served as a beacon to the neighborhood for many years as the place where people came when they were hungry or needed a place to stay; and
WHEREAS, It is only right that her name graces the street that she called home for so many decades; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED, BY THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA, That the 5400 block of Woodland Avenue as “Dr. Minnie Moore Johnson Way” to honor the life and legacy of community service of Dr. Minnie Moore Johnson to the City of Philadelphia.
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