Fostering Goodwill at the Holidays

Wendy Perlera surveyed the Shoshone Room in Cal State Northridge’s Satellite Student Union on Sunday evening and her heart warmed at the sight: Small kids, teenagers, moms, dads and grandparents sat around holiday-decorated tables, laughing as they devoured the turkey and trimmings stacked high on their plates.

With a popular radio disc jockey providing the evening’s entertainment, the fourth annual Penny Lane Foster Teen Thanksgiving Celebration was underway.

“This dinner gets families together, and it lets foster kids get close,” said Robert, a Lake View Terrace 17-year-old, who attended the dinner with his foster family of two years.

“I was dreading Thanksgiving this year,” said Marin, 15. “This celebration made it nice.”

The idea of a communal dinner for foster families originated with Perlera--a onetime foster teen herself--four years ago when she, then 22, found herself depressed and at loose ends at Thanksgiving.

Seeking company and wanting to help others in her situation, she approached the owner of the clothing store where she worked as a clerk and asked him to donate funds for a dinner to which she would take a group of foster teens she was counseling for the Los Angeles Department of Children and Family Services.

“My boss came through, and that year I took 20 kids to the Red Lobster,” Perlera said. “They didn’t think anyone would do that for them.”

Four years later, with a number of local sponsors on board, the social worker and three friends from her retail-sales years presided over Sunday’s Penny Lane feast that fed more than 350 teenagers and their foster families.

“Wendy laughs, cries and protects these kids,” said William Binion, a co-organizer of the annual event. “To see where she is now is amazing. She’s worked so hard to get here.”

A native of El Salvador, Perlera arrived in Los Angeles at the age of 12 to be reunited with her mother and father, from whom she had been separated for six years.

Her dreams of a happy life together were quickly dashed, when she discovered her parents were both alcoholics, unable to care for her properly.

After enduring four years of emotional and physical abuse at the hands of her mother, at age 16 she was placed in the first of four foster homes where, she said, her downward spiral continued.

“I became a mean, bossy girl who hung out with the wrong crowd, found the wrong boyfriends and used drugs and alcohol,” Perlera said. “I was a mess.”

*

Following her high school graduation at 19, and with no apparent prospects, Perlera enrolled in a county-sponsored independent-living class, where she was encouraged to enroll at Cal State Northridge, from which she graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Mexican American studies in 1997.

Currently in a master’s degree program at Cal State Northridge, Perlera is also a case worker with Penny Lane Foster Family Agency in North Hills, which provides foster homes and mental health services for troubled children.

Perlera, also serves as a mentor to former foster children attending CSUN, helping them through the first years of living independently.

“I want to be a role model,” Perlera said. “I teach them that they have to make it on their own. If I could do it, they can.”

Personal Best is a weekly profile of an ordinary person who does extraordinary things. Please send suggestions on prospective candidates to: Personal Best, Los Angeles Times, 20000 Prairie St., Chatsworth, CA 91311. Or fax them to: (818) 772-3338. Or e-mail them to: valley.news@latimes.com.