Compton Block Clubs Find Strength in Numbers as They Wage Battle Against Neighborhood Gangs, Drug Dealers

On North Burris Avenue in Compton, curb-side drug deals take place in broad daylight. Gang members harass passers-by. Graffiti defaces the walls between houses and empty beer bottles and fast-food bags litter the road.

Disorganized and afraid, some residents say they have begun carrying weapons to protect their families.

“I have to carry a knife, which is something I have never done in my life,” said one resident, who asked not to be identified. He said his frustration grows deeper each time the drug dealers pressure his children.

“One day they are going to make us do something,” he vowed.

On North Sloan Avenue, a block east of Burris, such a day came in May, 1985. A gun battle erupted between warring gangs, leaving three youths dead in the street.

“I decided right then I was going to organize a block club,” said Ethel Miree, 53, a Sloan Avenue resident.

Now, police and city officials agree that Miree’s 32-member group of active, interested and outraged residents has substantially improved life along that northeast Compton street. Sloan Avenue is relatively free of litter and graffiti, as well as the loitering that usually characterizes illicit drug trading.

“We were just like (Burris) over here,” Miree recalled. “But we were persistent in that we were not going to allow drugs to be sold on our street.”

Block clubs, ranging in size from 10 members to more than 100, have become a front-line force in Compton’s longtime battle against crime. More than 200 clubs have been organized in recent years and at least 50 have had an impact, especially on gang and drug activities, city officials say.

“What you are seeing is common in any inner-city area,” said Cmdr. Tom Armstrong of the Compton Police Department. “One block has joined together and is clean. The next (block), things are out of hand.

“We can’t be everywhere, so responsible people are going to have to take an active role in running their community,” Armstrong continued. “If we go down the street and the (dealers) are just standing in their front yards, we can’t do anything unless somebody is willing to say those people are committing a crime.”

Community activists say that type of individual involvement is becoming more widespread as the city’s murder rate--one of the highest in Los Angeles County--continues to soar.

“People are getting tired of the gangs and the violence and the writing on the walls,” said Royce Esters, chairman of the city’s Standing Committee on Crime. “They are asking themselves ‘What are we going to do here?’ ”

One Burris Avenue resident, who also asked not to be named, said recently that she has tried for two years to organize her neighbors, but without success.

“Most of them are scared,” the woman said. “A lot of them are older people and the (Spanish-speaking) people don’t feel like they have a right to complain.”

The woman said she bought her house because she was unable to afford one in a better neighborhood. The worst part, she said, was having to send her teen-age daughter to live with her grandparents at a safer location.

Even if she had the money to move, the woman said, there is no guarantee she would be able to sell her house on Burris.

“The neighbor next door tried to sell his house, but he couldn’t,” she said. “The druggies would bother the potential buyers, so they would just leave.”

From the woman’s front window one recent morning, nine young men could be seen congregating on the lawn of a nearby house, drinking malt liquor and listening to rap music blaring from a boom-box tape player. The woman said they were gang members out for a routine day of dealing drugs.

Cars would occasionally stop in the street. One of the youths would walk out, pass a plastic sandwich bag containing a white substance to one of the occupants, then take back a handful of cash.

A Police Department spokesman said no statistics are kept on crime by street, so there is no way to tell if Burris or Sloan have any more or any less trouble than other neighborhoods in the city.

But city officials say they believe Burris has it worse than Sloan, and the difference is that Miree’s block club has thrown a spotlight on people who were causing the problems.

“Somebody has to be willing to stick their neck out,” said Phyllis Frierson, who is the block club liaison for the city. “That is what it is going to take if you want to control gangs.”

Councilman Maxcy D. Filer says residents should confront the drug dealers. “I am not suggesting that they be vigilantes,” Filer cautioned. “But they need to do like Martin Luther King Jr. did with segregation and picket the drug houses. Some people say they don’t want to put themselves out there on the line, but he put himself out there.”

Dealer Forced Out

Daniel Biddels, who helped organize the Northeast Kay-Van Ness Block Club, says his group did just that last year, forcing out a suspected rock cocaine dealer.

“(First) we got in touch with the Police Department and set up guidelines on how to show (nonviolent) force,” Biddels said. “Then all of the neighbors got together and converged on the property where the rock house was.” The drug dealers “had no choice but to leave. They weren’t happy about it, but they were outnumbered.”

While extolling the merits of block clubs, Councilman Robert L. Adams says he understands why some people fear getting involved.

“We have had a problem with reprisals,” Adams said. “There was a resident over on Piru (Street) who had his house shot up (after he informed).”

Miree acknowledged that gang members used to try to intimidate her. “They would leave nasty notes on my lawn and hide in the bushes and yell obscene things at me,” Miree recalled. “One even took a shot at me and the bullet went right by my head. But I kept believing in the Lord.”

Strength in Numbers

Block club leaders said they also find their strength in numbers, not only against the gangs but against the politicians.

Members of the Killen Place Block Club said it took 100 residents marching on City Hall to get the City Council to act against some neighborhood pushers.

“I don’t think (the council) did it out of the goodness of their hearts,” said Brenda Sykes, a longtime Killen Place activist. “These things have been going on for 17 years. But they knew we were tired of it and that they had better do something . . . (The district’s Councilman) Floyd James said he was aware that there had been a problem. Then why hadn’t he done anything?”

The last seven of those years Gwendolyn Julian, the block club’s president, went door-to-door trying to get people to help her do something about the dealers.

Officials Ignored Her

Despite all of her efforts, Julian said, the active membership of the block club was less than 10 and city officials, for the most part, were ignoring her.

“We had tried to show them we were under siege . . . but I guess the City Council knew we only had five people,” Julian, 36, said.

But last August, a “rock house” shoot-out spilled onto Killen--a middle-class street of well-kept homes--and endangered several neighborhood children playing nearby. Although no children were hurt, it was “the straw that broke the camel’s back,” Julian said.

“The people finally got tired of being afraid, and after that things quickly turned around,” she said.

More than 70 people showed up for the block club’s September meeting, Julian said. The new members wrote letters to James and then descended on the council chambers in October, demanding that drug dealers on Killen Place be shut down.

Public Nuisance Declared

The council placed public nuisance citations against two houses where narcotics activity was suspected, warning the property owners that unless the alleged drug sales were stopped the houses would be condemned.

James did not return several calls this week for comment.

Miree, whose street is also represented by James, said that the councilman has always been helpful toward her club.

No one from Burris, though, has gone to the council demanding action, and residents say conditions there are deteriorating.

Miree said she has occasionally invited Burris residents to join her block club, but none have.

“I guess the people over there didn’t think that they needed me,” Miree said. “It is so terrible with the drugs there . . . I won’t even drive down their street.”