Schools Look Into Ousting Gangbangers : Thousand Oaks: Board ventures into unknown legal territory in exploring the possibility of expulsions.

Thousand Oaks school officials plan to explore the possibility of identifying gang members so they could be expelled because of their gang connections.

Arguing that a “slowly creeping climate” of danger threatens student safety, board member Richard Newman said gang members are by nature violent and pose a threat to other students.

“I don’t think there is an innocuous, well-meaning gang member in our town,” Newman told his colleagues on the Conejo Valley Unified School District board Thursday.

However, to legally bar students from school for gang affiliation--not specific behavior--would probably require passage of a new state law, said William L. Rukeyser, a spokesman for the state Department of Education.

“Even then, it would almost undoubtedly be subject to judicial review,” Rukeyser said.

“This is new territory,” agreed Conejo Valley Supt. Jerry Gross.

The proposal was not on Thursday’s agenda, but Newman raised the issue after board members approved a policy allowing principals to define and prohibit gang clothing in their schools.

Newman said Friday that he suspects there will be legal issues surrounding his proposal. But he raised the point as a way to begin discussion about what the district should do to stop the spread of gangs.

“For us to wait for a catastrophe to occur, and then react, is the wrong thing to do,” said Newman, a retired Simi Valley police officer.

Board President Dolores Didio asked Gross to explore the idea and return with more information. Although she questioned the legal implications, Didio expressed sympathy with Newman’s motivation.

“The bottom line is that all of us are grappling with what we can do to prevent the further growth of gangs in this community,” Didio said.

Gross said he would get an opinion from the school district’s attorney and discuss it with police officials well-versed in the gang culture of Ventura County. But on its face, the proposal raises concerns, Gross said.

“It’s like when somebody says, ‘I’m going to commit suicide.’ What do you do? Lock them up for the rest of their life?” Gross said. “It’s a real tricky issue.”

Besides the legal issues, such a policy could create a backlash if most of the students expelled were minorities, said Robert J. Meadows, an associate professor in the sociology and criminology department at Cal Lutheran University.

“The idea is, if they haven’t done anything, where do you draw the line? You don’t want to label somebody for something they haven’t done,” Meadows said.

But John Uelmen, Conejo Valley teachers’ union president, a social studies teacher at Newbury Park High School, agreed with Newman that gang members are troublemakers and should be removed from campus.

“As far as I’m concerned, safety should be the No. 1 priority, and constitutional issues would have to be second,” Uelmen said.