Jason Taylor, the legendary Miami Dolphins defender and member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, has completed his Community Hall of Fame Class of 2024 by selecting Diana Hughes as this year’s Youth Honoree. Hughes, a senior at Coral Reef Senior High School, will join Udonis Haslem (Celebrity Honoree) and Heather Geronemus (Corporate Honoree) at the Fourth Annual UKG Jason Taylor Community Hall of Fame Dinner on Saturday, May 18 as they are each celebrated for their outstanding commitment to others.
In a special tribute, Taylor will also celebrate Jason Jenkins (Oct. 30, 1974 – August 27, 2022) who worked with the Miami Dolphins from 2009-2022, serving as Senior Vice President of Communications and Community Affairs from 2015 on. Taylor will be renaming the Corporate Community Hall of Fame award in Jenkins’ honor.
The event will be hosted by the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Hollywood with all proceeds benefitting the Jason Taylor Foundation.
For the second consecutive year, the Jason Taylor Foundation accepted nominations for the Community Hall of Fame Youth Honoree. All nominated youth were first evaluated by the Community Hall of Fame Event Committee, with finalists submitted to Jason and Monica Taylor.
A 2024 Silver Knight Awards nominee, Diana founded the Cuda Care Pantry (CCP) at Coral Reef Senior High. The pantry provides nutritious snacks, school supplies, personal hygiene items, and second-hand uniforms to students at no cost, weekly serving more than 200 students. In response to the success of the CCP, Diana founded the Student Pantry Coalition in 2023, creating a network that fosters collaboration between students, parents, faculty, administrators, and non-profit organizations to support new and existing school pantries. Currently, nine different Miami-Dade high schools and middle schools are members of the coalition, having served more than 15,000 youth and families to date.
“This year’s pool of youth honoree candidates was unbelievably inspiring,” said Jason Taylor. “Monica and I continue to be amazed by the leadership and social responsibility displayed by young people throughout our community, and Diana is at the forefront of this movement. She not only addressed a need on her school’s campus, but had the vision and desire to rally students and adults from other schools to take initiative of their own. We are thrilled to add Diana to the Community Hall of Fame Class of 2024.”
For information on partnership opportunities and attending the Jason Taylor Community Hall of Fame Dinner, contact the Jason Taylor Foundation offices at (954) 424-0799 or by emailing info@jasontaylorfoundation.com or visit www.jasontaylorcommunityhof.org.
2024 Community Hall of Fame Honorees:
Jason Jenkins
Jason Jenkins was the heart and soul of the Miami Dolphins reach, impact and legacy in the South Florida community. A member of the organization since 2009, Jenkins served as Senior Vice President of Communications and Community Affairs since 2015 and oversaw the organization’s front-facing brands, with a focus on making South Florida a better place for people from all walks of life. He championed the Miami Dolphins FOOTBALL UNITES program, whose mission is to unite groups of different races, genders, sexual orientations, identities, abilities and faith around the power of football. Jenkins was influential in Dolphins Challenge Cancer since its inception, helping to build DCC into the largest fundraiser in the NFL, which has raised more than $64 million to fund life-saving cancer research in South Florida. During the global pandemic in 2020, Jenkins led the Miami Dolphins Foundation Food Relief Program as it donated over 1 million meals to help address food insecurity in the community while also providing resources to local minority-owned restaurants and businesses. Jenkins’ unifying presence helped build bridges between local law enforcement and the Black community at a time when tensions were high in America. His efforts in social justice programs became a model for the NFL. His many awards and honors include: 2022 Miami-Dade County’s Black Affairs Advisory Board’s Corporate Pillar Award, 2021 Civil Society Fellowship: A Partnership of ADL and the Aspen Institute, 2021 Co-Chair of the Social Justice and Racial Equality Committee as part of the Greater Fort Lauderdale Alliance, 2021 Generational Cure Honoree, 2021 Miami-Dade County Public Schools Superintendent CHOICE Award, 2020 Big Brothers Big Sisters of Broward County Visionary of the Year, 2019 Equality Ally by SAVE-Dade, 2019 Men of Valor Award.
Heather Geronemus
As Senior Director of Social Equity, Opportunity and Impact at UKG, Heather Geronemus drives the strategic direction of the company’s global philanthropic investments and initiatives focused on accelerating equity, opportunity and impact worldwide. Following the loss of her father, Dr. Robert Geronemus, to a drunk driver in 2009, Heather took a leadership role in Broward County’s Mothers Against Drunk Driving organization, establishing the Annual Walk Like MADD & MADD Dash Fort Lauderdale in 2011, an event which has since raised more than $4 million to save lives in Broward County. Heather’s efforts have been recognized with numerous MADD awards, including the 2011-’12 and 2014 MADD Florida Hero Awards for outstanding achievement, an award now named in her honor. Heather has served on MADD’s National Board of Directors and is an accomplished nonprofit volunteer leader serving additional organizations including the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, the Center for Disaster Philanthropy and many more. Her work to end drunk driving has been profiled in People Magazine and on NBC, ABC and CBS.
Udonis Haslem
No professional athlete has personified the spirit of “the 305” more than Udonis Haslem, a Miami native whose leadership, voice, work ethic, and passion made him the embodiment of Miami HEAT culture for 20 seasons and three NBA Championships, as well as a beacon in his hometown. Haslem founded the Udonis Haslem Children’s Foundation in 2005 with the mission to promote youth development and self-confidence. As the world was hit with the COVID-19 pandemic, Haslem partnered with Miami City Commissioner Ken Russell to launch his ‘Power Forward Through Hunger’ initiative focused on feeding underprivileged and at-risk communities throughout Miami by personally delivering pre-packaged meals. In 2022, UD Kids became The Udonis Haslem Foundation and evolved to broaden the organization’s scope of impact by focusing on mental health initiatives, particularly as they relate to criminal justice reform. In 2019, Udonis accepted the prestigious Don Shula Sports Legend Award for his extraordinary achievements on the court and his contributions to the community and in 2021, he was the first ever recipient of the Sports Illustrated Hometown Hero Award.
About the Jason Taylor Foundation
In July 2004, Miami Dolphins legendary defensive end Jason Taylor, established the Jason Taylor Foundation, a 501 (c)(3) organization. The Foundation’s mission is to support and create programs that facilitate the personal growth and empowerment of South Florida’s children in need by focusing on improved health care, education and quality of life.
Since opening its doors, the Jason Taylor Foundation has impacted tens of thousands of children through innovative programming including The Jason Taylor Reading Room, Cool Gear for the School Year, the Jason Taylor Children’s Learning Center, Jason Taylor Scholars and the Omari Hardwick bluapple Poetry Network, among others. For more information on the Jason Taylor Foundation, please visit www.JasonTaylorFoundation.org or follow on Facebook: www.facebook.com/jasontaylorfoundation or Twitter and Instagram: @jtfoundation99.