Encino Facility Had Gone Dormant : Family Service to Occupy Youth Center

A West Valley youth center, beset by fickle teen-age tastes and failing financing, will be resurrected as a family activity center, Los Angeles officials said Tuesday.

The 25-year-old center at 17400 Victory Blvd., Encino, will be operated by Family Service of Los Angeles, a private, nonprofit counseling service. The group will take over the 16-acre center from the San Fernando Valley Youth Foundation, which is being disbanded.

The Sept. 1. switch has been arranged by West Valley City Councilwoman Joy Picus.

Family Recreation

Family Service will use the two buildings for “family-focused recreation,” classes, a “latchkey” children’s program and individual and family counseling, said Anthony A. Lufrano, president of the 55-year-old organization, which is financed by the United Way.

“We hope to develop it into a conference center for groups,” Lufrano continued. “We’re planning a greenhouse program to train kids and young adults and get them placed in jobs with gardeners and landscapers. We want to develop the site into a sports complex.”

The Army Corps of Engineers owns the site in the Sepulveda Flood Control Basin and leases it to the Los Angeles Department of Parks and Recreation for $1 a year.

Originally built with donated materials and labor and later expanded with federal funds, the center was used heavily in the early 1960s for dances and other activities.

Use of the center dropped off because of changing life styles in the late 1960s. Sports groups have continued to use two ball fields and a small bicycle track, but the most recent building tenants have been a job-placement service and private counselors.

‘Source of Irritation’

“It’s been a source of great irritation and sadness that it’s been dormant for so long,” said Doris Meyer, Valley aide to Mayor Tom Bradley.

Kate Sheridan, a North Hollywood resident who helped start a 1953 fund-raising effort to build the center, recently served as the Youth Foundation’s secretary. She said her group had hoped that rent from the tenants would help finance maintenance and recreation programs.

“But we had to go to court to get some of the tenants out and that broke us,” Sheridan said. “We couldn’t rent it and we couldn’t afford to operate it. The type of things Family Service is talking about doing is exactly what the center needs.”