Food Programs

When is a park not a park? When it serves mostly as a mess hall for the homeless, says Alan Lowenthal, the Long Beach city councilman whose district includes Lincoln Park. Lately, the town's oldest park has become the site of numerous civic-minded and church-sponsored feeding programs for the homeless--and the cause of unhappiness by nearby Pine Street business owners.

In the latest giant step away from the mammoth Los Angeles Unified School District, the San Fernando Valley's two charter schools will begin running their own breakfast and lunch programs today. After nearly a year of unresolved bargaining with the school district, the Vaughn Next Century Learning Center in Pacoima and Fenton Avenue Charter School in Lake View Terrace announced last week that they would take over fiscal control and legal liability of their cafeterias.

A new program that would allow residents of Blythe Street in Panorama City to do volunteer work and pay a small fee in exchange for fresh, discounted food is being considered by community and church leaders. Members of the Blythe Street Project and the Mary Immaculate Church in Pacoima met Wednesday to discuss the possibility of beginning a program that would let residents pay $14 and do two hours of volunteer work in exchange for about $40 of fresh food.

Golfers raised more than $15,000 for Ventura County Food Share in a tournament sponsored by the Ventura County Sheriff's Department. Each of the golfers who played in the benefit Friday at the Los Robles Golf & Country Club paid a $95 entry fee that went to Food Share. "It's a fabulous amount," Food Share business manager Judith Bowles said. "Our donations from functions people put on for us are sometimes $1,000 or less. This is an extremely important donation."

The Security Council agreed to extend for six months a humanitarian program to help ordinary Iraqis cope with economic sanctions. Despite its unanimous vote on the "oil-for-food" program, the council remains deeply divided over how to improve conditions in Iraq and restart U.N. arms inspections halted by Western airstrikes. The U.N. program allows Iraq to export $5.25 billion in oil over six months to buy food and humanitarian supplies.

The former head of the United Nations oil-for-food program for Iraq and a brother-in-law of an ex-U.N. leader were charged with bribery and conspiracy to commit wire fraud tied to the program. Benon V. Sevan, 69, the first U.N. official to be charged with wrongdoing under the program, and Fred Nadler, 79, a businessman and brother-in-law of former Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, were named in an indictment unsealed in Manhattan.

Clyde Miller's grandparents would have been proud of his plans for an abandoned car dealership in South Gate. As owners of an Oklahoma restaurant during the Depression, Miller's family fed chicken dinners to people who could not pay, he said. After they moved to California and his parents opened a restaurant in Modesto, his family expected him to spend his breaks busing tables and giving food to people behind the kitchen.

Anaheim officials said Tuesday they will move a food distribution program out of a city-run community center, after residents complained the program was mismanaged. The planned change at the Jeffrey Lynne Community Center is one of a series of steps city officials said they will take to improve services at the center, which has been criticized in recent months by residents alleging widespread misconduct in its operations.

A committee of city officials and residents will meet this week to suggest possible relocation spots for a free food program at W.O. Hart Park, a five-day-a-week charity that three weeks ago received its walking papers in the form of a new city ordinance. Mayor Gene Beyer and Councilman Fred L.