Board of Van Nuys Boys’ Home Agrees to Revocation of License

The license of a group home for troubled boys in Van Nuys will be revoked under an agreement hammered out Thursday between the home’s board of directors and state regulators, a state official said.

The agreement was reached after the directors heard Mark M. Reese, a state Department of Social Services attorney, detail evidence used to draw up a 17-page complaint against the home that accused its president, a minister, of sexually molesting a 14-year-old boy.

The complaint accused the Rev. Roger W. Burt of molesting the boy at the Youth Encounter Home that Burt operated on Valerio Street. Burt--who was president of the home and its parent company, Christian Counseling Assn.--has denied the allegation. No criminal charge has been filed against Burt.

The complaint also said Burt failed to notify state authorities that he was arrested by Los Angeles police in 1986 on suspicion of committing a lewd act in public with a male prostitute. Under a plea bargain with prosecutors, the lewd conduct charge was reduced to a trespassing violation, Reese said.

The complaint said the home was poorly maintained, listed several record-keeping violations and accused Burt of disciplining a boy by handcuffing him to a chair for several hours.

The state had temporarily suspended the home’s license May 13.

Under the agreement reached Thursday, Christian Counseling’s board of directors will not appeal the suspension and will allow the home’s license to be revoked, Reese said. The agreement must still receive formal approval of the Department of Social Services, but Reese said that approval is certain.

Reese met privately with four board members, Burt and Burt’s attorney for more than four hours Thursday at the Culver City office of the department’s licensing division.

As part of the agreement, the names of board members will be deleted from the complaint, and the document will only list the Christian Counseling Assn. Reese also agreed to remove language that accused the board of failing to properly oversee the facility.

Reese said he agreed to the deletions because the board members convinced him that they had tried to oversee the facility’s operations.

“These guys are public-minded individuals,” he said of the board members. “It’s just too bad these guys got caught up in this.”

Still, Reese said, the board was not as diligent as state regulators would have liked.

The Youth Encounter Home was opened in 1985 and contracted with Southern California probation departments to treat teen-agers with emotional, drug-abuse and behavior problems. It was licensed to care for up to six boys at a time. There have been no boys living at the home since the suspension.

Neither Burt nor the four board members could be reached for comment after the meeting, but Harley Broviak, who resigned from the board two years ago, called the home’s demise unfortunate.

“At one time, it was something we thought would really fly,” Broviak said.

Reese said Burt’s attorney, Stephen M. Fleishman, contested the sexual abuse allegations during the meeting. Burt could try to clear his name by asking an administrative law judge to review the case, but such a move would not affect the agreement allowing the license to be revoked, Reese said.