Two Decades of Nurturing Families : Community: Since 1970, the Maud Booth Family Center in North Hollywood has offered shelter to working single mothers and, in return, garnered loads of volunteer support.

Rosa Salcedo doesn’t live at the Maud Booth Family Center in North Hollywood anymore.

But Salcedo, who raised 10 children there during her 15-year residency and now lives in her own apartment just two blocks away, has stayed close to the spot that brought her and her family so much joy.

“I love this place because it’s home,” Salcedo said of the center as she rounded up six of her sons and daughters for a family photograph this weekend. “People helped me here. They gave me a chance.”

On Saturday, the Salcedos and 2,000 others--residents, former residents and representatives of the Volunteers of America--celebrated the Maud Booth Family Center’s 20th anniversary with a giant block party and happy exchanges of stories about its successes in helping families.

Opened in 1970 and named for Booth, who co-founded the VOA in 1896, the center was one of the first facilities in the nation to offer working single mothers child care, low-income housing and family counseling in one location.

In its early years, the VOA-run center whose $1 million budget is provided by the state, individual and corporate donors (including the Disney and Lockheed companies) and the United Way, served mainly Anglo families. Salcedo, who started as a cleaning lady when she came to the center from Mexico in 1972 and now teaches preschool there, was one of the first Latinas to move in. The center’s population now is 98% Latino.

“I raised my children here--my last daughter, Alicia, was born here,” Salcedo recalled. “My oldest daughter, Martha (Rocha), lives here and runs the kitchen now. All of them (ages 12 to 29) are married now, except for Veronica, 17, and Alicia, 12, who live with me. I got my chance here, and now this is my life.”

Emma Rosales, a current resident of the 500-unit housing complex, has raised her three children at Maud Booth since arriving from Mexico in 1974.

The center, Rosales said, offers “a safe place for children, a place where they can be while I work” as a machine operator at a nearby factory. “It’s a very good place. There are no gang problems here.”

There are gangs in the neighborhood, though. The center addresses that problem by providing a Teen Club where about 150 teen-agers find alternatives to gang activities. The group was formed for the center’s teens who attend nearby junior highs and high schools.

“We know everybody who lives here and we don’t have any trouble,” said Jimmy Rodriguez, 16, the club’s treasurer and a Maud Booth resident since he was 5. “We know who’s in a gang and who’s not.”

Edson Martinez, 14, a club member for two years who lives in the complex with his mother, Rosario, a center teacher, and a brother and sister, added: “The club keeps us out of trouble.”

Local gangs have tried to recruit teen-agers from the center, “but we stay in the Teen Club,” said its president, Alma Galindo, 15, a Maud Booth resident since she was 6. Her younger sister and two brothers attend the center’s child care program. Their mother, Elidia Galindo, studies accounting at Valley Vocational College and does volunteer work at the center, as do other parents.

“Any time there’s anything to do, the teens volunteer,” said center director Tanya Cooley. “The teen program is very important. It’s one of our tools in fighting back the gang problem.”

Members meet Friday nights. They go to movies and participate in other group activities. Teen Club members finance their camping trips and outings by selling candy and other items. They work in the summer, serving breakfast to the center’s younger children or assisting senior citizens in the area with their chores.

They did much of the work for Saturday’s block party, setting up booths and chairs, assisting with the children’s game area and helping put up the stage, painted with colorful murals by South African artist Christine Haberstock.

At the anniversary party, mariachis, a Disneyland band and folk singers provided continuous music. There were strolling mimes and clowns, Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse and other Disney characters, bingo for adults, ring toss and other games for children and a 4-by-3-foot cake donated by Ralphs Grocery Stores.

Food booths up and down Klump Street offered soft beef tacos and salsa (provided by Acapulco restaurants), nachos and lemonade.

There were also martial-arts demonstrations by students of grand master Muhammad Shabazz, who volunteers his time to teach karate at the Maud Booth child care center.

The center’s child care program is open to youngsters ages 2 to 12. It serves about 170 children in six classrooms and a fenced recreational area.

Children at the center attend daily classes Monday through Friday. They receive breakfast, lunch and an afternoon snack.

There also is a study-hall program after school for elementary-aged students. A computer program recently was introduced for children ages 5 to 12 to assist them with math, language and writing skills. Parents may attend English classes in the evenings.

All the hustle and bustle at the center, residents and VOA representatives agreed, is produced in large part through the assistance of numerous volunteers, including retired teachers, professional dancers and artists.

“A lot of our children don’t get the chance to go outside the community as much,” director Cooley said. “We no longer have our van. We had to give it up because it cost too much to run and pay for maintenance. And the cost of insurance was tremendous. So we try bring people in to increase the children’s cultural awareness. . . . And some of the parents volunteer to teach things like sewing and knitting.”

Although its charitable works haven’t changed over the years, “the neighborhood was a little bit more mellow when we were here, not so bad with drugs and gangs,” recalled Don Zambrano, 27, a former center resident who returned for the anniversary party with his mother, Connie, and sister, Isabel Gonzalez, 25. His other sister, Charlotte, is married and lives in Alaska.

The Zambrano family moved to the center in February, 1971, six months after it opened.

Born and raised in California, Connie Zambrano was divorced and working as a seamstress in a nearby furniture factory.

“That was the only skill I knew,” she recalled. “I had dropped out of school and I had three small children. In counseling at the center, the lady encouraged me to go back to school, and that helped me get a job at the public library. I still work there, at the Panorama City branch.”

The center was home for the Zambranos until 1973, although the children continued in its child care programs until each turned 13.

Connie Zambrano now lives in San Fernando; Don, a mental health worker at Olive View Hospital in Sylmar, lives in Van Nuys; Isabel, an LAPD employee, in Sylmar.

“There should be more places like this, where they take care of kids, where kids can go after school,” said Isabel Zambrano.

“If we hadn’t been here, we would have been without anybody until 5 o’clock. But we were here for eight hours.”