Anti-Drug Project Puts Emphasis on Positive : Camarillo: Area Housing Authority is using fun and games this summer to teach 200 at-risk kids cooperation and responsibility.

Marilyn Berwick knows that 10-year-old Linda Garcia doesn’t want to hear a lecture--especially not on a glorious summer afternoon.

But offer her a free pool pass or a trip to Knott’s Berry Farm and she just might pay attention.

So Berwick, a program director at the Area Housing Authority, has designed a summer full of fun and games to teach 200 low-income kids to steer clear of drugs.

Drawing on a $35,500 federal grant, Berwick has set up recreation programs at public housing complexes in Thousand Oaks, Camarillo and Ojai. Instead of boring kids with a “Just say no” message, she teaches them to say yes--yes to cooperation, responsibility and good, clean fun.

“These kids get the ‘Say no to drugs’ message everywhere, but it’s not enough--we have to give them alternatives,” Berwick said.

A recent housing authority study found that residents of the agency’s Ventura County complexes have fewer drug and alcohol problems than public-housing tenants in Los Angeles and Santa Barbara counties.

But still, kids in Thousand Oaks, Camarillo and Ojai witness their share of substance abuse. And those living in the low-income housing complexes are especially vulnerable.

“Usually, there’s more visibility (of substance abuse) in these complexes, so the kids there become more of a target,” said Felipe Santana, a director at the county’s drug and alcohol abuse prevention center.

“Kids in Westlake or in Las Posas Estates also see substance abuse, but (abusers) there get treatment quickly and quietly,” Santana said. In contrast, abusers in public housing complexes may not have the money or access to get swift treatment.

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As a result, their drug or alcohol problems might linger--making the problem more visible to low-income kids.

To keep children from succumbing to these pressures, Berwick has hired youth counselors to act as mentors, buddies and teachers.

“I think these kids are really at risk,” Berwick said. “We don’t want to wait until a problem exists and we’re putting out fires.”

A few of the housing authority’s summer programs contain stark anti-drug messages. For example, counselors might don masks and ask the children to talk about the different faces that substance abusers wear as sobriety is transformed into intoxication.

More often, however, the activities are simply designed to build kids’ self-confidence and teach them teamwork. From rope climbing to kayaking to simply kicking around a soccer ball, the counselors emphasize fun.

And Linda Garcia loves it.

She gets to swim for free, play with counselors at the Camarillo Boys & Girls Club and even go on excursions planned for later in the summer. She also gets to boss other kids around, just a little, as she works through her morning chores of sweeping the concrete courtyard at her Ellis Terrace apartment complex.

“It’s fun ‘cause you get to go swimming for free,” Linda said after urging other kids to help her pick up litter on a recent Monday morning. “If you do your cleaning, you get a pool pass and it’s yours, and you can do whatever you want with it.”

Older residents also appreciate the programs.

“There used to be a lot of fussing and fighting around here,” said Savanah French, a mother of three who has lived at Ellis Terrace for four years.

“On Mondays, I used to walk out of my apartment and then walk right back in because the kids would have dropped candy wrappers and trash everywhere,” French said. “Now, they’re monitoring themselves.”

Residents of Ellis Terrace, like all Area Housing Authority tenants, must meet strict income guidelines: A family of four may earn no more than $28,950 a year. Since they pay 30% of their income for rent, most residents have little left over to spend on recreation.

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At the Leggett Court apartments in Thousand Oaks, Debbie Schrader said she could not afford to send her 11-year-old twins to summer camp. Even the least expensive program run by Conejo Recreation and Park District costs about $30 per child, she said, and “in a lump-sum shot, that’s a little much.”

Since most of the other families in Leggett Court are in the same fix, several dozen kids used to spend summers doing “anything and everything they shouldn’t have,” Schrader said. “There was nothing to keep them occupied.”

Until this year.

Sponsored by the federal drug elimination grant, recreation counselors come to Leggett Court twice a week to set up basketball games, arts and crafts, and sweaty soccer matches.

As he plays with the Leggett Court kids, counselor Way Tieu tries to nudge his rowdy charges toward decorum. Whistle around his neck, he reminds them not to call each other “stupid,” not to hog the equipment, not to leave crumpled Coke cans on the floor.

Swaggering mightily, 11-year-old Kellen Roland said he understands why Tieu feels the need to instill discipline. Not for him, but for the other kids participating in the summer camp program.

“It’ll teach them manners--not necessarily table manners, but how-to-cooperate and not-get-mad manners,” Kellen said, bouncing along the sidewalk in baggy shorts and a floppy, striped shirt. “Eventually, kids will get the picture: They come and listen and be nice, or they don’t come at all.”

As for himself, Kellen said, “I’m pretty cooperative.”

But after a moment of self-reflection, he admitted that he, too, could use some guidance. “If someone gets in my face,” he said with all the menace he could muster, “I’ll knock them out.”

The Area Housing Authority programs aim to encourage Kellen’s mature side while helping him control his bluster.

Said Berwick: “If we can get them out to try positive activities, if we can develop their social skills and motivation, we have a better chance of redirecting these kids.”