Gang Crimes Underscore Need for New El Rio Gym

Sure, the experts say the best way to keep kids off the streets is to give them something else to do.

But with 4,000 children in the neighborhood and no community gymnasium, civic leaders have a tough time coming up with enough youth activities--especially at night.

So for more than two years now, local officials and residents have been struggling to raise $1.2 million to build a new gym.

The recent rise in gang violence in this small, unincorporated neighborhood across the Ventura Freeway from Oxnard has put the goal of breaking ground in 1998 into sharp focus, gym supporters say.

“We need to cater to the younger population here,” said George Perez, an El Rio native and president of the El Rio Gymnasium Athletic Commission. “Will the gym solve the gang problem? I don’t think it will. But it will be a big step in the right direction.”

With the promise of a $100,000 challenge grant from the Los Angeles-based Weingart Foundation received last year, the finance committee has about half the money needed--$600,000.

And today at Rio Mesa High School, the committee and County Supervisor John Flynn’s office are sponsoring a basketball fund-raiser that will pit Ventura County sheriff’s deputies against California Youth Authority staff members.

“It’s going to be interesting,” said Flynn, who has helped lead the quest for donations and whose district includes El Rio. “There is some competition between the deputy sheriffs and the CYA.”

Flynn said the 11,000-square-foot gymnasium would draw youths not just from El Rio but from the nearby communities of Nyeland Acres and Strickland. Plans for the building also call for a sheriff’s substation and a small public health clinic.

“I think this community needs a hub,” said Sal Godoy, a Rio School District official. “I think this facility would provide it.”

El Rio teenagers agreed, saying a community gymnasium would give area youths a safe place to congregate.

“Kids wouldn’t be out on the streets with their friends at night drinking,” said Alex Rodriguez, 16. “They would have something to do.”

Perez said El Rio already boasts a little league, a sports club, a girls softball organization and several other youth activities. But, said Perez, “If it is raining or dark, there are no activities.”

Godoy and others envision a building bustling with youths who would gather to wrestle, box and play volleyball and basketball. Adults and seniors would also benefit from the facility that would feature meeting rooms and office space, supporters say.

Flynn and others started raising money for the gym from federal grants and private sources about two years ago.

“But this is something that the community has wanted for the last 20 years,” Perez said of the gym, which supporters are talking about building on Rio Del Valle Junior High School property on Rose Avenue.

Perez said that because El Rio does not have a recreation department, it does not have a pot of money to pursue a capital project like a new gym. Supporters have had to turn to public and private sources.

As El Rio becomes increasingly plagued by gang violence, gym backers say the need for the facility grows.

A 19-year-old was shot twice in the back and once in the buttocks Tuesday as he walked down Balboa Street in El Rio.

Another 19-year-old man was shot in the back on East Stroube Street on April 10. And a gunman fired on two teenagers March 21, also on Balboa Street.

“People are scared around here going through neighborhoods,” Alex Rodriguez said. “They might get shot.”