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9th Annual Unsung Heroine AwardsCelebrating the acheivements of women in Cook County

The Cook County Commission on Women's Issues and Cook County Board President John H. Stroger, Jr. celebrated Women's History Month by honoring 17 outstanding women at its annual "Unsung Heroines Awards Breakfast," Tuesday, March 2 (2004) at the Chicago Cultural Center's Preston Bradley Hall in downtown Chicago.

One of the recipients was:

Emma Lozano, Chicago - 8th District

Deborah Lopez, Women's CommissionerRoberto Maldonado, Cook County Commissioner, 8th District

(Photo caption, left to right - Roberto Maldonado, Deborah Lopez, Emma Lozano, Pres. John H. Stroger, Jr., Peggy Montes)

Emma Lozano is founder and president of the grass-roots community group Pueblo Sin Fronteras and its partners, Centro Sin Fronteras and the Sin Fronteras Law Program. Her organizing dates to the 1970's, when she and her brother Rudy worked for amnesty, union representation for undocumented Latino immigrants, and the creation of a Mexican-based independent political organization. During the tenure of late Chicago Mayor Harold Washington, she helped draft school reform policies that led to the creation of local school councils. In West Town, she organized to facilitate the amnesty process for over 3,000 immigrants, and also led the fight to clean up the dilapidated Kosciusko School, relieve public school overcrowding, and construct what became a model bilingual gradeschool -- the Rudy Lozano Public School. She has been an effective coalition-builder among the Mexican, Puerto Rican, and African American communities and among labor unions and churches in the struggle for legalization and protection of undocumented immigrants, and the group's marches and rallies have drawn crowds in excess of 10,000. Today, Fronteras' law program serves over 100 primarily undocumented people each week, and is currently fighting deportation orders for over 200 individuals.