SOUTH-CENTRAL : Grant Will Send Youths to Monterey

The Los Angeles Urban League has been awarded a grant to send South-Central youths on annual trips to Monterey over the next seven years.

The Noel Foundation, a nonprofit organization, announced the award Aug. 10. The grant is a non-cash award that will reimburse the Urban League for the costs of sending up to 40 youths each year to Northern California. The students will tour the Monterey Peninsula and historical sites in the area for about a week each summer, according to Urban League officials.

“This is a first-of-a-kind proposal and program for the league,” said John Mack, president of the Los Angeles Urban League. “Basically, this is a very generous grant to the Urban League that will make it possible for some youths from South-Central to be able to have a once-in-a-lifetime exposure. A lot of our youths have never visited Malibu, and the thought of them going to Monterey and visiting the Maritime Museum and seeing that beautiful area should open some new horizons.”

The grant is estimated to be worth about $40,000, said Noel Irwin-Hentschel, founder of the Los Angeles-based foundation and chief executive officer of American Tours International.

“We thought it was important to share America with kids from our own community who would otherwise never get to see (another) part of the country,” Irwin-Hentschel said. “We want kids from Jordan Downs or Nickerson Gardens who have never had an opportunity to go outside a five-mile radius of their neighborhood, let alone through the state.”

Participants will be selected based on need and merit.

Information: (213) 299-9660.