Youth Programs

Several new after-school youth programs are expected to receive funding from the City Council tonight. The YMCA and Rising Child Care Inc. are seeking more than $40,000 to provide a variety of activities including basketball, arts and crafts and day trips. The programs are held on weekday afternoons and are aimed at students in grades four through six. The programs would be offered at schools citywide.

The Raspberry Pi, a $35 computer about the size of a credit card, made headlines last week when all the 10,000 units available for pre-order were snatched up just minutes after they went on sale. Even after the units had sold out, international interest in the computer was so rabid that the websites of the two retailers authorized to sell it — Premier Farnell and RS Components Ltd. — crashed under the weight of the traffic. "We weren't surprised by the enthusiastic reaction," said Eben Upton, executive director of the Raspberry Pi Foundation in Britain.

The city is seeking proposals from youth-oriented community groups to operate the city's after-school programs for children 6 to 12 years old. Since 1992, the city has been providing after-school programs for young people at two locations. But after reviewing the high costs of running those programs, which drew only a small number of participants and duplicated other community services, the City Council decided in June to change the way its youth programs are operated.

In a large conference room at City Hall East, more than 100 gang-intervention workers gathered last week to hear about a new approach to heading off gang violence and the destruction it causes. They had come to hear a family tell its story. The mother did most of the talking, guided by a counselor. She was there with two of her children, a son and a daughter, and they'd been through the wringer. An older daughter had gotten in trouble, deeper and deeper. She'd neglected her schoolwork and fought back when her parents tried to discipline her. She ran away from home, got pregnant.

Responding to a crowd of residents who filled a church auditorium Monday night, Mayor Tom Daly promised he would urge the City Council to grant their plea for more youth programs to combat violence in the city. Leaders of a grass-roots organization called Orange County Congregation Community Organization complained that gang violence has increased sharply in recent years, while the city has made deep cuts in its Parks and Recreation Department programs.

In a yearly effort to raise money for community-based police programs in the northwest San Fernando Valley, the fifth annual Devonshire Dash will be held Sunday at Cal State Northridge. The event will feature competitive 5K and 10K runs and a 5K walk around the campus starting at Plummer Street and Zelzah Avenue, said Officer Ruben Lopez of the Los Angeles Police Department's Devonshire Division. "We expect to have at least 1,500 runners," he said. "Most of them are kids."

To help keep kids off the streets, local schools may remain open after regular hours under an agreement with the city that will be discussed tonight. Santa Ana Unified School District trustees will begin the discussion with a presentation from Cleve Williams, the city's director of recreation and community services. The details must still be worked out, but schools could remain open until 6 p.m., said John Bennett, the deputy superintendent of the schools. The campuses now close about 3 p.m.

The Wilshire Center Community Involvement Assn.'s third annual auction and brunch begins at 1 p.m. today at the Radisson Wilshire Plaza Hotel, 3515 Wilshire Blvd. Funds from the event will be donated to the Bresee Foundation's youth programs, the Wilshire and Rampart Explorer Scout programs, the Felipe de Neve branch of the Los Angeles Public Library, and the First Baptist Church's youth program. The cost of the brunch and an opportunity to make bids is $35.

Youth programs that provide scholarships and anti-gang recreational activities will be benefited by a shifting of $450,000 of city funds and community block grants. The City Council last week unanimously approved new funding of $300,000 for the Santa Ana 2000 community college scholarship program and $150,000 for the anti-gang program Project PRIDE. "We feel it's money well spent," City Manager David N. Ream told the council before the vote.

Five county programs that serve troubled youths--and a sixth that helps former jail inmates readjust to life outside prison--were saved from the budget ax Tuesday as county supervisors voted to rescind their termination notices. Earlier this month, all of the programs had been put on notice that their funding would run out in September, but after much public outcry, county officials reconsidered.

There were 11 gang shootings in Los Angeles over this year's Father's Day weekend, a holiday that can be bittersweet for young men alienated from their fathers. Deputy Mayor Guillermo Cespedes, who heads Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's anti-gang efforts, was so distraught over the carnage that he dragged himself home at the end of the weekend and sat down to write his letter of resignation. He labored over it for an hour or so. Then he put the letter away and went back to work. Modest, insightful and slightly rumpled, Cespedes is one of Los Angeles' most quietly effective city leaders, despite having what must be one of its least-enviable responsibilities: Day in, day out, he spearheads the effort to reduce gang violence.

Resources Junior Achievement of Southern California : Entrepreneur programs for middle school and high school classrooms. (323) 957-1818 After-School All-Stars : A Los Angeles-based nonprofit that is launching an entrepreneurship program for middle school students. (310) 275-3232 Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship : Los Angeles office of the New York nonprofit provides entrepreneurship education programs and runs student business competitions. (213) 241-9011 Source: L.A. Times research

Fourteen-year-old entrepreneur Gianna Gallardo is entering ninth grade, but in some ways she already has an advantage over many small-business owners. Having created a detailed business plan, the Culver City teenager sells handmade bookmarks decorated with her drawings. She has managed to raise prices 50% recently. And she has landed some outside capital, which she invested in a laptop computer for her part-time business, Custom Mark Bookmarks. It's still a very small enterprise.

In a summer wonderland of theme parks and sparkling beaches, city officials soon will be offering canoe and kayak trips along the upper reaches of the Los Angeles River. Tickets for the Los Angeles River adventure are expected to go on sale as early as July 8, and promoters are promising a ride like no other. The route through the San Fernando Valley's Sepulveda Basin flood control channel will take customers along a 3-mile stretch of river where the water is 10 to 15 feet deep and edged with willows, sycamores and slanted concrete walls a stone's throw from the 101 and 405 freeways.

Glendale officials will introduce a budget next week that would slash millions in city services and serve several employees with pink slips. City Council members have indicated support for roughly $4 million in service cuts — including elimination of all programming at Deukmejian Wilderness Park and police-sponsored athletics programs for at-risk youth — as they try to fill a projected $18-million budget gap. "It's been a difficult year,...

The whole point of establishing a new anti-gang program in Los Angeles two years ago was to finally be able to identify which strategies worked and which didn't. The longstanding L.A. Bridges and the newer Bridges II programs were jettisoned precisely because no one had any way to determine whether they, and the millions of dollars paid to their gang-diversion and intervention contractors, were doing any good. The centerpiece of the new Gang Reduction and Youth Development program was to be a commitment to rigorous, transparent, scientific and verifiable evaluation.

United Way of Greater Los Angeles has awarded grants totaling $141,000 to three local youth programs. The National Council on Alcoholism & Drug Dependency, Los Angeles, which provides teen parenting classes, literacy classes and substance abuse counseling, received a $70,000 grant. "This means we can get the services out there and start this collaborative effort," said Terry Hayes, executive director of the organization at 8915 Avalon Ave.

Fees for city-sponsored summer youth programs will not rise this year, but increases are likely in 1996, when the city anticipates a budget shortfall. To try to close the gap, the council will schedule special sessions this summer to consider a number of policy changes, including cost increases for youth events. "We need to raise the fees commensurate with the cost, or not do the program," Mayor Don R. Griffin said.

Salinas, the small city in the heart of the salad bowl of the world, ended the decade with two distinctions: a record number of homicides, and the imminent closure of the last bookstore in John Steinbeck's hometown. Signs at the B. Dalton bookstore read "50% off -- Non-returnable" as faithful customers stopped by to purchase one last book and pay respects, muttering indignantly about the idea that Salinans don't read. The sales clerk expressed relief that he had only four more days to watch over the near-empty shelves: "It's like dying a slow death."

Leadoff batter Peng Zixuan has been playing baseball all of four months, and his stance is a bit wobbly. But after a few swings, he smacks an infield single past the mound and eventually rounds the bases to score the first run of the game. Zixuan is more than an enthusiastic 10-year-old. He embodies the hope and future of Major League Baseball in China, which is holding its first games here this weekend, between the Dodgers and the Padres. Zixuan and his teammates plan on attending.