After-School Programs Threatened

Nine-year-old Oscar Fuentes has run smack up against California’s slowing economy and high energy costs.

He and his playmates at Rosemont Elementary School in the Echo Park area of Los Angeles were told this week that the highly praised after-school program in which they are enrolled will get no more money from the state to keep it going.

The implications are easy enough for even a fourth-grader to understand: By the end of the month he may have no one to help him do his homework, and the volunteer instructor may not come anymore to teach his friends how to dance.

“We get to do fun activities and we get free snacks,” said the round-faced, dark-eyed Oscar, who was hard at work on math assignments after school. “It’s sad the program might be cut.”

More than 36,000 youngsters and parents in Los Angeles, Ventura, Santa Barbara and other counties could be affected by the demise of the Juvenile Crime Prevention Program, begun in 1996 as a pilot project to provide constructive activities for low-income children and their families.

About $9.7 million was included in the governor’s January budget proposal to keep the 12 centers operating for two more years. But in the April budget revision, that funding was eliminated.

California’s suddenly weaker financial health, affected by a combination of surging energy expenses and softening revenue, is beginning to be felt even on playgrounds, said legislators and other state officials.

“There had to be some hard choices,” said Blanca Barna, a spokeswoman for the California Department of Social Services. “It was important that resources be focused on programs that are currently a priority.” Those priorities for the department include child welfare, adoptions, foster care and independent living, she said.

Supporters are mounting a vigorous effort to have state funding restored to the juvenile program.

“It’s a tough year,” acknowledged Assemblyman Tony Cardenas (D-Sylmar), chairman of the Assembly Budget Committee, which is considering such a restoration proposal. “The economy nationally and in the state has shifted now. But I’m personally pushing for [the program] and trying my best to protect it throughout the entire process.”

The committee’s vice chairman, Assemblyman George Runner (R-Lancaster), however, noted that the Legislature has already approved a separate $121-million juvenile crime prevention package to be funneled through the state Department of Corrections and that the threatened program could be included in it.

“If other funding is available, I’d like to see why it can’t be folded in,” Runner said.

Supporters laud the program for its focus on strengthening the community. In addition to the after-school activities, it includes efforts to improve the bonds between families and schools, help single mothers keep their 10- to 14-year-old sons out of gangs, and counsel families with youngsters already in the juvenile justice system.

In Long Beach, more than 200 people rallied at City Hall recently as the City Council unanimously passed a resolution urging the governor to save that city’s program, which serves 3,000 people each year and is run by the YMCA.

“It has brought families together, kids, moms and dads, to take control of their lives and be participants in their community,” said Councilwoman Bonnie Lowenthal.

She cited an example of participants drawing up a petition for a stop sign at a dangerous intersection near a park as something “that had not really occurred before in neighborhoods where so many of the families are immigrants and non-English-speaking.”

An independent evaluation by Philliber Research Associates of a sample of families enrolled in the program found that it helped to significantly decrease delinquent behavior, substance abuse, arrests and citations and improve family cohesion, social adjustment and school achievement.

“If you start taking away programs that have proven to curb juvenile crime just to save energy, all you’re doing is moving one problem and adding another,” said Daniel Perez, who is in charge of the Ventura County program, run by Interface Children Family Services. Until the state cutback was proposed, it was expected to receive an $800,0000 grant to maintain tutoring and counseling programs previously funded by the county.

About 450 people have been served by the Santa Paula center in the last three years, and many in this low-income community--victims of domestic violence, single working mothers, first-time juvenile offenders and at-risk elementary school students--depend on the free services.

“If this funding goes, it eliminates our whole center,” Perez said. “It’s very disheartening.”

Such a prospect is indeed disheartening for Ana Romero, a 28-year-old Echo Park mother of three.

For three years her daughter Jamillet, 11, has been enrolled in the Juvenile Crime Prevention Program at Rosemont, run by the nonprofit community group Para los Ninos, and has made steady improvement in her school scores and her self-esteem.

Romero’s husband, Hector, works in construction, and Romero is about to start a new job as a grocery store cashier. But without the after-school program, she is not sure what the family will do.

“What my daughter learns here, she teaches to her brother and sister and to me and my husband too,” Romero said, waiting to pick up Jamillet from the Rosemont program, which runs from 2 to 6 p.m.

Jamillet is enthusiastic, too.

“I feel like a teacher for the family,” the dark-eyed little girl said proudly. “I especially like going on the field trips, and it’s sad if my little brother won’t be able to go to the program.”

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Times staff writer Jenifer Ragland contributed to this story.