{"id":9564,"date":"2013-12-20T23:16:40","date_gmt":"2013-12-21T04:16:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/coatesvilletimes.com\/?p=9564"},"modified":"2013-12-21T08:39:03","modified_gmt":"2013-12-21T13:39:03","slug":"coatesville-community-mourns-passing-of-johnson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/coatesvilletimes.com\/?p=9564","title":{"rendered":"Coatesville community mourns passing of Johnson"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"SB-Paul-Johnson\"<\/a>

Paul Johnson<\/p><\/div>\n

County’s first African-American District Justice, former Coatesville City Council President<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

12\/21\/13, 8:40 a.m.:<\/strong> Updates with additional comments<\/em><\/p>\n

COATESVILLE \u2014 Paul Johnson, a member of the Coatesville Area School District School Board, a former City Council member and president and a District Justice \u2014 Chester County’s first African-American to hold that post \u2014 has died, the school district confirmed Friday afternoon.<\/p>\n

The district issued a brief statement on Johnson, who represented Region 1, Coatesville and Valley, on the board of education:<\/p>\n

\u201cThe District is deeply saddened by the passing of Mr. Paul Johnson last evening,” statement said. “Paul was a true friend of the Coatesville community and a passionate school board director for the last 10 years with a deep devotion to our students, staff and community. He will be missed. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family.\u201d<\/p>\n

Johnson, 81, was widely known in the community and active in literally dozens of local organizations, from the Chester County Intermediate Unit, to the Brandywine YMCA, United Way of Chester County, Coatesville Area Senior Center and countless others.<\/p>\n

Dr. Joseph O’Brien, Executive Director of the Chester County Intermediate Unit paid tribute to Johnson’s work with students and the greater Coatesville community.<\/p>\n

“Paul was simply one of the very best human beings I have ever had the privilege to know and work with \u2013 he cared deeply about all students \u2013 and all staff members \u2013 and all people,” O’Brien said.\u00a0 “He was tough as nails, but gentle and caring for people.\u00a0 He leaves a legacy of greatness for Coatesville and for all of Chester County Intermediate Unit.\u00a0 As I have been telling staff, tears and great personal emotion come out of all of us, for we will all miss Paul!<\/p>\n

“May God grant him rest and peace \u2013 and a wonderful place in heaven for all the good that he has left here on earth\u2026”<\/p>\n

Funeral services have not been set.<\/p>\n

The Times will have more coverage, and local reaction on this story, Saturday.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

County’s first African-American District Justice, former Coatesville City Council President 12\/21\/13, 8:40 a.m.: Updates with additional comments COATESVILLE \u2014 Paul Johnson, a member of the Coatesville Area School District School Board, a former City Council member and president and a District Justice \u2014 Chester County’s first African-American to hold that post \u2014 has died, the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9565,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,3],"tags":[1989,126,24,29,927],"class_list":["post-9564","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-featured","tag-brandywine-ymca","tag-city-council","tag-coatesville","tag-coatesville-area-school-district","tag-coatesville-area-senior-center"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/coatesvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/coatesvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/coatesvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/coatesvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/coatesvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9564"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/coatesvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9564\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9571,"href":"https:\/\/coatesvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9564\/revisions\/9571"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/coatesvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/coatesvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/coatesvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/coatesvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}