La Mirada has lost another pillar of the community who devoted his life to youth achievement. Darryl Adams, the vice president of the Norwalk-La Mirada school board passed away earlier this week. He was 59.
Adams was no ordinary elected school board member. He had been on the school board since 1993 and won re-election six times.
He became a teacher after graduating from USC in 1985 and took on additional work as an team athletics coach where he was mentor to an untold number of youths
In addition to coaching high school sports for close to three decades he also devoted many years coaching little league.
Adams also served on the Norwalk Social Services Commission, held fundraisers and was a keynote speaker at many functions.
But perhaps his legacy will be how he accomplished the unusual fete of being an elected official of nearly 28 years in a district encompassing two very distinctly different cities on a board that is elected by voters district-wide.
To those that knew Adams it was not surprising to have been on the board all those years because they knew he cared only about the students in the district and that passion also resonated with voters that participated through the years in local board elections.
Despite having a Norwalk address he received the endorsements of most of the city council members in both Norwalk and La Mirada and from prominent community members in both cities as well.
In October when the board was discussing schools on a list recommended for closure due to falling enrollment, Adams said he was against closing Foster Road Elementary I knew it was as good as done because that is the kind of respect he commanded from others around him.
That is because for more than three decades all he really cared about were our children.
