Longtime community volunteer and retired County Parks employee Juanita Heinley died Sunday.

Heinley, 88, was a familiar face at community events, especially those centered around seniors. A founding member of the Santa Clarita Valley Committee on Aging, she made the needs of seniors a priority and helped raise money to build the SCV Senior Center on county property next to William S. Hart Park in Newhall.

She retired from the County’s parks department in 2004 after serving 35 years. She greeted visitors at Hart Park’s office and helped the department start a fishing derby for young children throughout the county.

“Juanita helped me when I was first elected to the Board of Supervisors in 1980,” said Supervisor Michael Antonovich. “She was a remarkable lady and her life was dedicated to improving the quality of life for the residents of the Santa Clarita Valley and our county.

“She was a good role model and inspiration and showed the community that, regardless of your age, you can still be a contributing member of the neighborhood.”

Antonovich will ask the Board of Supervisors to adjourn their weekly meeting May 19 in Heinley’s memory.

Her service to the community extended long beyond the workday, when she would volunteer for various nonprofit groups, such as Zonta, which gave her a Lifetime Community Service Award in 1996. She was named SCV Woman of the Year in 1978. In 2000, she was named Volunteer of the Year for Los Angeles County.

She told the Daily News that year that she attributed her long life to “staying active, sharing close friendships and the love and understanding of her family.” Describing her greatest award, she said “the satisfaction of knowing that perhaps I’ve helped in some way. I just wish I could do a lot more.”

“Many meetings ago, Juanita, Russ and I and many others too numerous to mention, worked tirelessly to get the Committee on Aging/Senior Center up and running in the late ’70s, early ’80s,” said Barbara Stearns-Cochran. “We had our disagreements – mainly because of her position with the County, and ours from a volunteer standpoint – but the end result was the same. It took both groups to make it happen. A very successful organization was formed and continues its success today.

“Juanita was a tireless, dedicated worker, a woman who loved life, her family, friends, and the community.  Now she’s helping seniors on a higher level,” she concluded.

Wendy Moore, president of the Acton Agua Dulce Women’s Club, where Heinley was a member, shared an article written for the club’s newsletter in 2008.

Webster describes the word treasure as “wealth, rich materials or valuable things.”  It goes on to describe: “to regard as precious; prize; cherish.”  Well, we in the Women’s Club have come to revere certain women … women who have proven themselves to be valuable over the years, who are wealthy, not in material things, but in mind, body and soul!  It follows that we consider them precious, and we do prize and cherish them. Without them there certainly would not have been a Women’s Club, nor much of a community.  We’ve come to regard them as our “Treasures.”

Juanita Heinly, she of the sapphire, laughing eyes, is truly one of the Women’s Club’s “Treasures”.

When speaking to her … watching her graceful hands move gently over photos of bygone days … seeing those huge, luminous eyes … hearing that rich contralto voice … one is mesmerized back into one of those gorgeous 1940’s films.  You know the kind, one starring Bogart, or maybe Holden … with dark, moody backgrounds, and luscious clothes and hairdos, and the heroine looking a lot like our Ms. Heinly.  Makes one wonder why she never appeared in films!

Juanita and her husband Hank were early pioneers in Agua Dulce and they both worked as a terrific team in helping start the Agua Dulce Civic Association  (still going strong today!).  Hank and she built their home where Nita still lives.  And, of course, Juanita plunged into the business of the early Women’s Club, with too many memories and events to record in this short space!  She became President of the Club in 1960; followed by the prestigious “Pioneer Family of the Year 1991.”

Without those early prescient thoughts and pioneer spirit, which flowed from the Gals in 1948 and through the early 50’s, there might not have been a Women’s Club today.

Juanita “danced” through those days of the Women’s Club, setting standards and goals which continue to this day.  Is it any wonder that we consider her a precious jewel which we prize and cherish?

Private services have already been held.