OFFICIAL
PRESS RELEASE
For
Immediate Release
Tuesday, September 5, 2006
Contact Person: Mr. Lim Leang, Event Chair
Phone: (209) 468-5633
PRESS
RELEASE: UNITED CAMBODIAN FAMILIES FUNDRAISING GALA AND ANNUAL CELEBRATION AT MEKONG HARBOR RESTAURANT, SEPTEMBER 30, 2006 AT 6:30PM ADMISSION $40.00 BY PRE-REGISTRATION ONLY
Stockton,
CA - The 2006 United Cambodian Families (UCF) Fundraising Gala, an Annual Celebration Dinner, is scheduled for Saturday, September 30, 2006 at Mekong Harbor Restaurant at 4555 N. Pershing Ave., Suite 9, Stockton, CA 95207.
Since its inception as a non-profit organization in October 2003, UCF dedicates to serving and strengthening Cambodian families in Stockton and beyond through its collaboration and partnership with several organizations. In 2005, with a tremendous support and assistance of Community Partnership for Families (CPF), UCF has a new family service center at Diamond Cove II, and has secured a grant from First 5 of San Joaquin County. This grant has enabled UCF staff to provide tailored and culturally appropriate case management services to under-served, low-income Cambodian families in the surrounding communities. Moreover, through the Healthy Fish Education Project, funded by the Environmental Health Investigation Branch (EHIB), UCF is leading efforts to educate the Cambodian community about the dangers of mercury in fishes and help them to stay healthy and productive.
Constantly, UCF board members and staff are dedicated to expanding their efforts in the areas of family case management, youth leadership development, and community health and awareness. They will continue to collaborate with partnership agencies, such as CPF, the Asian Pacific Self-Development and Residential Association (APSARA), and San Joaquin County Public Health Department, the EHIB and others to maximize efficiency and effectiveness in service delivery and advocacy.
"Please join UCF to fulfill its mission to unite families and empower parents and students to succeed and fulfill its vision to bring the best of Cambodian culture to our families in order to prosper in the United States," Sophat Sorn, President of UCF, expresses. "Your generous support and contribution can help us advance our efforts to better our community and help us to make a big difference in our community."
R.S.V.P. by September 15, 2006. Admission is $40 per person. Business / Organization Sponsorship is Available.
For information and registration, visit UCF's website at:
www.unitedcambodianfamilies.org
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OFFICIAL
PRESS RELEASE
For
Immediate Release
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
Contact Person: Mrs. Onna Oum, APSARA (209) 944-1700
PRESS
RELEASE: Stockton’s 2006 Southeast Asian
Graduate Celebration on Friday, June 30, 2006
at 6:00PM at Mekong Harbor Restaurant. Free with
Pre-Registration for Eligible High School Graduates.
Stockton,
CA - 2006 Southeast Asian high school graduates
are invited to join in a unique gala and dinner
event called “Honoring Our Graduates”
- The 2006 Southeast Asian Graduate Celebration.
This event is to be held on Friday, June 30, 2006
at 6:00PM at Mekong Harbor Restaurant. It is presented
by the organization Asian Pacific Self-Development
and Residential Association (APSARA), along with
partner organizations Lao Family and United Cambodian
Families (UCF). This year’s celebration
welcomes special guest speaker, Sophoan Sorn,
Founder and Director of an international cultural
arts project called Stockton Crossing Cultural
Bridges.
Admission
is free for each eligible high school graduate
of Southeast Asian descent, on the bases of pre-registration
and availability (first-come, first-served basis).
Costs for non-graduates (including parents and
guests) are $20.00 per person. Each graduate is
allowed a maximum of three guests (including two
parents). Table sponsorship is available at $180
per table for 10 people.
Pre-Register
ONLINE today at APSARA’s website at www.apsaraonline.org
. A downloadable form is also available for download
via APSARA’s website. Pre-registration ends
on Tuesday, June 20, 2006. All attendance is accepted
by pre-registration only.
Mekong
Harbor Restaurant is located at 4555 N. Pershing
Avenue #9 in Stockton, California. Formal dress
code is strictly enforced.
For
further information or questions, please contact
Mrs. Onna Oum at (209) 944-1700, Mr. Sophat Sorn
(209) 483-2368, or Mr. Bee Vang (209) 466-2071.
The
organizers of this event shares: “We look
forward to an exciting celebration honoring our
2006 Southeast Asian high school graduates!”
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MERCURY-LADEN FISH POSE RISK
TO WOMEN, CHILDREN
DANA
NICHOLS
Record Staff Writer
Published Sunday, Aug 14, 2005
STOCKTON
-- Stockton women who eat too much Delta fish
are exposing themselves and their unborn children
to toxins that can cause brain damage and other
health problems, a state researcher says.
A survey of 500 low-income women conducted last
year in Stockton found that a third of them were
regularly eating fish caught in the Delta and
in nearby rivers and lakes. Roughly a quarter
of those were eating more of the fish than recommended
by government health guidelines intended to prevent
mercury damage, said Alyce Ujihara, a scientist
in the California Department of Health Services
Environmental Health Investigation branch.
CALFED,
the joint state and federal program seeking to
restore the Delta and secure its water supply,
is spending $4.5 million during the next three
years to study mercury and warn residents of its
dangers.
Studies that began in the last year include monitoring
mercury levels in fish living in area rivers and
bays, surveying the habits of anglers and fish
consumers and researching how pure metallic mercury
gets converted to methylmercury, the form that
is poisonous to animals and people.
California
is naturally rich in mercury. Between 1860 and
1980, about 90 percent of the mercury mined in
the United States came from the coast range of
Northern California, said Jay Davis, a research
scientist for the San Francisco Estuary Institute
and one of those leading the research program.
Gold
Rush miners used mercury to extract gold from
crushed ore.
Thousands of tons of mercury from those gold-mining
operations washed into California's rivers, sloughs
and bays. But only about 1 percent of that mercury
exists in the methyl form that accumulates in
the food chain, Davis said.
Methylmercury
became world famous in the 1950s and 1950s when
hundreds of residents of Minamata, a fishing village
in Japan, died and others gave birth to grotesquely
deformed babies because a chemical plant dumped
the pollutant into waterways.
The
methylmercury levels in fish here are much lower
but are often above government safety guidelines.
Fish tested from the San Joaquin, Cosumnes and
Feather rivers typically have mercury levels ranging
from .5 parts per million to 1 part per million
or more, Davis said.
Some fish in the central Delta have lower levels,
sometimes even lower than the .3 parts per million
safety standard the U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency recommends for people who eat fish three
times a month.
"You
can reduce your exposure by knowing the species
that are low and the places that are low."
Davis said.
For example, striped bass, largemouth bass and
catfish tend to have high levels of mercury, Davis
said. Bluegills and salmon have lower levels.
But
catfish and largemouth bass don't move around
much, so if they are caught in a relatively low-mercury
area like the central Delta, they tend to be less
contaminated, Davis said.
Striped
bass, on the other hand, move around a lot and
are likely to be high in mercury no matter where
they are caught, Davis said.
Ujihara said the damage caused by mercury at the
levels present in local fish tend to be things
like mild coordination, memory and attention problems
-- things that show up in large studies but may
not be noticed by the individuals affected.
"They
are subtle, very subtle," she said of the
effects.
Complicating the issue is the fact that aside
from the poisonous contaminants, fish is a healthful
food.
Sending
a health message that it is OK to eat some fish
but not a lot, is more difficult than telling
people to not eat fish altogether, Ujihara said.
That
challenge was plain Thursday in a crowded room
at the Park Village Apartments on Alvarado Avenue
in Stockton. Ten Cambodian immigrants, were discussing
their fishing and fish-eating habits with May
Lynn Tan, a health educator for the California
Department of Health Services.
Speaking through a translator, Poeun Phy listed
the fish he catches in local waters and eats:
"catfish, striped bass, sometimes sturgeon."
Later, Tan asks if anyone has seen signs or heard
radio or television announcements about the dangers
of eating too much fish.
People shake their heads. One man once heard about
it from his son, who saw it in the newspaper.
Phy said he had once heard something by word of
mouth about health dangers. No one else in the
room had heard about the warnings.
State
officials are trying to change that. Soon, Tan
had the group poring over a proposed sign written
in languages including Hmong, Spanish, Russian
and Cambodian.
Tan
asks how they would react to the sign's recommendation
they eat striped bass no more than twice a month.
"He
would find a new place for fishing," said
Sophat Sorn, translating another man's comments.
Sorn
is director of United Cambodian Families, a tiny
Stockton-based social service agency. He has a
$10,000 grant from CALFED to spread the fish-safety
gospel among the Cambodian community in San Joaquin
County.
Sorn,
who grew up in Cambodia, fishing in the muddy
waters of rice paddies, said it is sometimes hard
to convince immigrants that fish here are dangerous.
"And
when they see the water here is clear, they say
'there's nothing wrong with the fish here, this
is clean water," Sorn said.
Contact
reporter Dana Nichols at 209 546-8295
or dnichols@recordnet.com
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