Teach Children Better Values to Help Them Survive, Williams Says

Los Angeles Police Chief Willie L. Williams told about 800 residents of the northeast San Fernando Valley Friday that adults must act more responsibly and teach their children better moral values to help them resist gangs and drugs.

“What do we have to do to save our children?” Williams asked the mostly African-American audience at Christ Memorial Church in Pacoima. “What do we have to do to teach our children to survive as adults?”

Standing at the pulpit in a gathering hosted by a group of black ministers, Williams sounded more like preacher than police chief. His comments were punctuated by applause and “amens.”

“Our children are our most important resource,” said Williams, who served as police commissioner of Philadelphia until he was sworn into the Los Angeles office in July. “They didn’t ask to come into this world. They’re our responsibility.”

The church where Williams spoke is not far from the site of the police beating of Rodney G. King that led to the ouster of his predecessor, Daryl F. Gates.

Pointing his finger at members of the audience, Williams challenged each person present to “identify one child in your neighborhood and spend an hour a week with him.”

“Do something difficult--spend an hour with that youth and just listen,” said Williams, 48. “They’re facing problems we never had growing up.”

Williams then described his own childhood in West Philadelphia, where there were gangs and drugs even during the 1950s. But the violence was not so intense then--or so lethal, he said.

“The only people who had guns were the police,” he said. Kids today can load a gun faster and “better than me and many other police officers.”

He described a memorial service he attended earlier that day in South Los Angeles for seven youths killed recently in gang-related incidents.

“One boy spoke, and you could see the crease in his skull from where he was hit,” Williams said. “He was one of the lucky ones. He was still alive.”

Williams said that some adults act as poor role models and send mixed messages to children about such things as drugs, alcohol and sex.

“We have to point out to our kids that moral values are the most important things,” Williams said. “We have to teach our young boys to respect our young girls.”