Mormon Stalwart is Tamworth Citizen of the Year

Australia Day 2014 was memorable for more than one reason for Tamworth citizen, John Green OAM, a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Mormons). John was nominated as ‘2013 Tamworth Citizen of the Year’ without his knowledge. He was chosen for the honour from five finalists for his service to the community.  

“John Green has given voluntarily, enthusiastically, and generously of his time and energy over the past 40 years,” said Tamworth Mayor, Col Murray, as he announced John Green as the winner in front of 200 people crammed into the Tamworth Community Centre.  At the same time as witnessing Tamworth’s Australia Day Awards, the audience also saw a naturalisation ceremony for 19 people.

John Green expressed his gratitude for the support and love of his family and acknowledged them as his greatest supporters.  John’s loving wife, Maria, was thrilled her husband received such a prestigious award. She said, “It was humbling, but well deserved acknowledgment for all my husband’s time and hard work over these many years.”

During John’s acceptance speech he said, “When I moved to Tamworth in 1973, to marry Maria, I meant to stay only a short time.”  Maria had been in Tamworth since 1959 where she joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as a 14 year old girl. However, John found that Tamworth was so welcoming, all thoughts of leaving soon diminished as he became involved in the community and Church activities.

As a recognition of years of service to the community, in 2013 Mr Green had been awarded the Order of Australia (OAM) for his contribution to local government and the population of the Tamworth.

Green’s first community involvement began as a result of his membership of the Church. In 1973, he joined the Church basketball team which played in the local competition. Green subsequently became a referee and a committee member of the Tamworth Basketball Association.

This pattern continued across the spectrum of Green’s life. By profession, Mr Green was a social science teacher at Oxley High School, and he coached the students in softball. As the teams improved, they wanted to play ‘grade’ softball. As a result, Green became the inaugural president and one of the founding members of the Tamworth Softball Association.

As the teams became more competitive, they were unable to be represented at the regional and state championships without having a qualified umpire from their area.  After realising this need Mr Green stepped up to become the first qualified softball umpire in Tamworth. As a result of his contributions to the game he was made a ‘life member’ of the Tamworth Softball Association.

Always wanting to be of service, when John’s children became involved in hockey, so did he.  First he was the ‘Minkey’ co-ordinator [the under 8 age group] and eventually he became president of the Junior Boys Hockey team.

As social science high school teacher, Green wanted to broaden the knowledge of his students but he also wanted them to experience first-hand things they learned. He first organised trips for Year 10 students to Central Australia. 

Later, year 8 students experienced the Gold Coast under his direction.  “I wanted as many students as possible to attend these tours,” said John Green. He made the trips as cost-effective as possible by negotiating with local bus companies, co-ordinating all aspects of the trips and even providing catering.

Further trips to New Zealand and then mainland China were planned and orchestrated by John Green and his wife Maria. Not only did he want to introduce his students to other cultures, he wanted other cultures to experience those from rural Australia.

Mr Green knew he wanted to encourage a strong community spirit in his city and also ensure that there was a solid moral code amongst its citizenry. One of the ways to do this was through service in local government. Just two years after arriving in Tamworth, he was elected as a councillor on the Tamworth City Council, a position he held for 29 years.

In this role, Green was chairperson of the Tamworth Sister City committee overseeing the establishment of sister-city relations with Gore in New Zealand, Chaoyang District in Beijing, Sannohe in Japan and, just recently, Nashville, Tennessee.

His spirit of community service continued when John also became an inaugural member of the Tidy Towns Committee. In this period, he was able to include the Tamworth Mormon branch in the ‘Adopt a Road’ program with many Church members working together to keep a long stretch of road clean.

To add to his list of contributions, John has been chairperson of the Victoria Park Co-ordinating Committee which oversees relationships with Tamworth Regional Council, the botanic gardens, Marsupial Park and model railway, all of which are community-based organisations.

John served in many positions in his church including as district president, a role in which he supervised a number of branches within the Tamworth District which extends over hundreds of square kilometres. His daughter, Michelle, says she enjoyed traveling with him on Church business to Coffs Harbour and many other areas.

Michelle has moved from her Queensland home to Tamworth to help her parents due to their ill health.  John is in the late stages of terminal cancer and Maria suffers with a brain tumour.

When asked what drove Green to give so much time and resources to the community he said, “I wanted to ensure that strong moral values would be upheld and I wanted to contribute to the creation of a great community.”

He says his favourite scripture is from the Book of Mormon:

“But that ye would humble yourselves before the Lord and call on his holy name, and watch and pray continually … thus be led by the Holy Spirit, becoming humble, meek, submissive, patient, full of love and all long suffering; having faith on the Lord; having a hope that ye shall receive eternal life; having the love of God always in your hearts, that ye may be lifted up at the last day and enter into his rest” Alma 13:28 – 29.