Parents Back Recreational Program for Handicapped : Children: REACH lost much of its funding when the Rancho Palos Verdes City Council cut its contribution to close its own deficit.

The parents of 60 developmentally disabled South Bay youngsters are mounting a fund-raising campaign to save a recreational program for the handicapped in Rancho Palos Verdes.

The program, called REACH, lost most of its funding when the City Council cut $110,000 from the recreation department’s budget in a bid to close a $2-million budget deficit.

If additional funds can’t be found elsewhere, the program will have to be shut down, parents said.

The opening fund-raiser will be a March 13 dinner and auction in Hess Park. The goal is to raise $10,000 or more, auctioning off paintings, houseplants and other donated items.

The city-subsidized program serves handicapped youngsters between the ages of 7 and 10. Operated by the recreation department, it offers trips to museums and theme parks and classes in living skills. Parents and group leaders say it is just about the only social life many of the handicapped youngsters have.

“We’re not going to let the program die,” said Carolyn Anthony, spokesperson for the REACH Parent Advisory Committee. “But we haven’t got much time. The current budget runs out in July, and after that we’re pretty much on our own.”

The city has been paying $40,000 of the $67,000 in annual program costs. The remaining money comes from fees collected from parents enrolling their children in various programs. Only 20 of the 60 youngsters enrolled are from Rancho Palos Verdes; the rest come from all over the South Bay.

Earlier this month the council cut its share of the REACH funding by two-thirds, to about $13,000 a year, saying the city could no longer afford to pay for youngsters from outside the city.

“There’s no way the programs can continue with that kind of cut,” Anthony said. The parents are meeting with local service clubs and the mayors and council members of other South Bay cities to ask for financial help, she said.

“We haven’t gotten any firm commitments yet, but they’re all receptive,” she said. “They want to know the cost and the numbers, so we’re working that up for them.”

REACH owns two vans to carry youngsters and is staffed by recreation department employees. It offers a variety of activities, including cooking classes that help teach independent living skills, Anthony said.

The cooking class takes place Mondays in the kitchen of the recreation hall at Rancho Palos Verdes Park. With four staffers helping them, 15 to 20 youngsters fix salads, cook hamburgers or spaghetti, and then eat the meal and clean up the kitchen.

“Without the staff there’d be no classes,” she said. Rancho Palos Verdes parents pay $28 per child for the Monday night session, while parents from other cities pay $38. The costs for other programs vary.

On weekends, two vanloads of youngsters make day trips to such places as Disneyland, learning “community skills” along the way. In the past, REACH has taken youngsters on overnight trips to Catalina or on the train to Santa Barbara, but these have been canceled because of the costs.