Rep. Adam Schiff honors Kim, Kortoshian, Porto as Women of the Year
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July 30, 2018
Japan consul general’s ‘comfort women’ comments trigger international criticism
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Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Burbank) recently honored three women with local ties as Women of the Year for 2017.
Glendale resident Phyllis Kim, a court interpreter in Korean in Los Angeles, received a bachelor’s degree and interpretation and translation certificate from UCLA.
For years, Kim has been active with the Korean American Forum of California, which is dedicated to bringing attention and recognition to the comfort women of World War II. From 1932 until the end of World War II, more than 200,000 women and girls throughout Asia — many of them kidnapped, threatened or lured from their homes under false pretenses — were forced into sexual slavery by the Imperial Armed Forces of Japan.
Kim continues to raise awareness about comfort women and also works toward receiving a formal recognition and an apology from Japan for its past war crimes of sexual slavery by its military, and to prevent wartime crimes against women as well as children.
Through the dedicated efforts of Kim and the Korean American Forum of California, a comfort-women statue was installed in Glendale.
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Lena Kortoshian of La Crescenta attended CSU Northridge, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in mathematics and a master’s degree in leadership and policy studies.
Her career in education began in 1986, when she was working as an instructional assistant at an elementary school and a middle school in the Glendale Unified School District.
Since then, she has served in many capacities, including as a mathematics teacher at Glendale and Clark Magnet high schools, assistant principal of Herbert Hoover High School and a mathematics administrator at the Los Angeles County Office of Education. Kortoshian has also served as assistant principal and associate principal of Clark Magnet High School, and is currently the school’s principal.
Kortoshian served as a volunteer math tutor with the Committee for Armenian Students in Public Schools, a nonprofit organization that addresses both the educational and social needs of immigrant children in public schools, and she continues to tutor students after school.
She is also a member of the board of regents of Prelacy Armenian Schools, a board which is appointed by the Prelate and Executive Council of the Western Prelacy of the Armenian Apostolic Church of America.
Over the years, Kortoshian has received recognition for her contributions to the community, such as the Armenian American Chamber of Commerce’s Friend of the Armenian Community Award.
Betty Porto is co-owner of Porto’s Bakery & Cafe, which has locations in Burbank, Glendale, Downey and Buena Park.
The success of the Porto family stems from humble beginnings in Manzanillo, Cuba. After Fidel Castro’s violent revolution erupted in Cuba in the 1950s, Raul Sr. and his wife, Rosa, requested permission to leave the country. As they waited for approval, both Raul Sr. and Rosa were dismissed from their jobs.
To support their three children — Betty, Raul Jr., and Margarita — Rosa, a talented baker, refined her recipes and started selling her cakes to neighbors and friends.
The Porto family’s request to leave the country was eventually approved, and they entered the United States in the early 1970s. Once here, they opened a bakery in the Echo Park area of Los Angeles that quickly flourished, and Betty Porto, in addition to her siblings, was there to lend a helping hand.
Betty Porto attended John Marshall High School in Los Angeles, and simultaneously worked at the family’s bakery.
Upon graduating from high school, Betty Porto earned a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in political science from CSU Los Angeles, and UCLA, respectively.
She said her goal was to attend law school, but she changed her mind after spending time with her family at the bakery, and she said she wanted to support her parents, who had sacrificed so much for their children.
Over the years, Betty Porto and her siblings became increasingly involved in the community by supporting many organizations, including Glendale Healthy Kids, American Red Cross, Glendale police and fire departments, and the Alex Theatre.
For the past seven years, Betty Porto, a La Cañada Flintridge resident, has been a supporter of Union Rescue Mission, donating the remaining food from Porto’s Bakery & Café at the end of each day.
mark.kellam@latimes.com
