LAGUNA BEACH : CSP Youth Shelter May Cut Programs

Battered by financial woes, the CSP Youth Shelter may have to help fewer teen-agers or cut back its counseling services and other programs, the shelter’s director said this week.

Although the shelter’s remaining $51,000 mortgage was paid off by the city a year ago, ongoing cutbacks in state funding have kept the center from regaining its financial equilibrium, director Judy Friesen said.

“Our deficit at this very moment is $95,000 for this budget year,” she said. “We’ve used our reserves. We have to come up with money.”

Last week, the shelter mailed 1,600 letters to former supporters, hoping for additional financial aid.

The two-story shelter, which opened in 1980 on a quiet residential street, operates under the umbrella of Community Service Programs. There are three other shelters in north Orange County, but they are usually all full, Friesen said.

“If they are all full, the children sleep on the beach or they sleep on the streets or they try to find friends they can stay with,” she said.

The Laguna Beach shelter is different from the others, Friesen said, in that it provides a full-time counselor for its young residents.

In response to a string of difficult financial years, the Laguna Beach shelter has come to rely heavily on about 30 volunteers who help with daily activities, including cooking, grocery shopping and driving teen-agers to Alcoholics Anonymous or Alateen meetings.

The six-bed shelter serves as a temporary home each year to about 300 youngsters between the ages of 11 and 17. The goal is to counsel the teen-agers and their families so they can be reunited, a goal that is achieved about 85% of the time, Friesen said.