Program Offers Hope for New Life

Searching for a family in the gang life, Erica Parra found tragedy instead. Now, after forging a new life through a community program, she wants to help keep Pico Aliso’s youths out of harm’s way.

Parra, 23, said she had a tough family life while growing up near the housing projects in Boyle Heights, where six gangs divide their turfs within a two-square-mile area.

After dropping out of high school, Parra said, she started hanging out with the wrong crowd and dating Cesar Valdenegro, a gang member with whom she moved in.

Less than two years ago, her boyfriend was trying to leave the gang life, working in Homeboy Industries, an intervention program run by Father Greg Boyle.

He didn’t make it. Valdenegro was beaten to death with a blunt object. His killer has never been caught.

Devastated by her boyfriend’s death, Parra was left with a sense of numbness, caring little for life. Three days after the tragedy, she learned she was pregnant. Her world changed.

“Before I found out, I didn’t care, like I was going back [to the gang life],” Parra said. “After that, I said, ‘I’m going to take care of myself, I’m not going to lose my baby.’ ”

Parra found a job as a receptionist at Impacto (Imaginando Manana/Imagining Tomorrow), a Boyle Heights outreach program that works to curb violence in the housing project. It also provides tutoring and mentoring programs for young people.

A few months after she joined Impacto in January 1997, Parra was promoted to office manager. Now, as assistant program director, she coordinates the work of six new Robert F. Kennedy fellows from Pico Aliso.

The fellows, ages 17-21, will do 900 hours of community work with Impacto, while being paid $500 and a $2,300 grant upon completion of the program.

Impacto is financed by the RFK Memorial Center for Human Rights, Proyecto Pastoral Jobs for the Future, and AmeriCorps, the program formed by President Clinton that pays volunteers for community work.

About 30 children, ages 8 to 14, from the projects flock to Impacto’s center, located two blocks west of the projects, for after-school tutoring. Field trips to camps, beaches and museums are part of their itinerary.

“They take kids to places that they would never be able to go,”, said Pam McDuffie, whose daughter and granddaughter go to Impacto after school for help with their homework.

McDuffie, a city Housing Authority worker, said that her daughter, Star, 11, used to struggle with her homework. “Now she doesn’t come home without finishing her homework,” she said.

In addition to helping young students with their classwork, Impacto gives teenagers who have been released from juvenile hall a second chance by having them do community service, Parra said.

Flor Zuniga, a Los Angeles City College student and one of the new RFK fellows, said she wants to broaden the world of the children she works with.

“I want to show them that there is more than life in the projects,” Zuniga said. “I’m looking to major in technical theater. Most kids here only know movies. I want to show them what the theater is.”

The newcomers will have their work cut out trying to serve the 8,000 Pico Aliso residents who struggle to make ends meet. Besides mentoring youths, the fellows will help organize peace marches through the projects, as well as raise funds to help families bury their loved ones.

Half of the Pico Aliso residents are under the age of 18. As they go about their activities, they have to be on guard for the gang warfare that occasionally takes innocent lives.

In September, Roberto Villalpando, a 12-year-old who was not a gang member, was buried in Resurrection Cemetery after being shot to death by an unidentified gunman. Wilson Chavez, 22, was also struck by the same barrage of gunfire.

Zuniga, 21, who lives a few doors from where the young victim fell, said that the level of gang violence has grown more brutal with the use of firearms.

“It used to be fistfights,” Zuniga said. “Before, [the violence] affected mostly the people involved in that lifestyle and usually at night. Now it affects more bystanders. It can happen any time of the day.”

In spite of all she’s been through, Parra’s professional demeanor masks most signs of her harsh past.

“All I do is work so that I don’t have to keep thinking about [her past tragedies],” said Parra, who’s son, Cesar, is now 1 1/2 years old.

“She’s a pretty strong person. It’s not something any particular person would be aware of, it’s not something obvious,” Zuniga said.