Go-to youth needs time off

He’s a big kid, 15 years old and already about 5 foot 11. He’s built solidly enough that his school’s football coach wants him to play. He lives in a very rough part of Wilmington, and his older brother used to have a reputation for getting into trouble. But Steven Sojo is not the neighborhood bully. He’s the neighborhood go-to guy.

“Anytime anybody needs anything -- a favor, baby-sitting, you need to fix this, Steven’s there,” says Diane Castaneda, supervisor of the Family Development Network counseling unit at the Toberman Settlement House. “He puts everyone before himself.”

Steven’s brother Andres cleaned up his act and now works in security. Steven thinks he might join his other brother, Alonso, in the Navy and maybe even try out for the SEALs. But even more, he wants to go to college and perhaps become a social worker.

“I like being around the kids,” he says, dangling his 2-year-old cousin upside-down. “They make me laugh.” The kids like being around Steven. His sister’s three children from downstairs and two tiny cousins from across the street swarm around him.

Steven lives with his parents in a one-bedroom apartment in a neighborhood known for gang activity.

“You can’t walk around safely,” says Steven’s father, Jose. “Anything can happen, day or night. At 1:30 in the afternoon a kid got killed over there, a 13-year-old kid. He had belonged to a gang. When you’re this age in Wilmington, it’s hard.”

Jose suffered a serious back injury seven years ago. The following year, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer. He is in remission now but can’t work because of persistent back pain. Steven’s mother, Bernardita, just lost her job of six years at a legal firm.

To help out, Steven works odd jobs. He mows lawns, washes cars and works for his uncle’s painting business. His earnings go back to the family.

“He’s a very hard worker,” Jose says. “He always tries. He’s a very good friend.”

Steven will go to the Wilderness Camp in August courtesy of The Los Angeles Times Summer Camp Campaign. Campers there pitch their own tents and cook their own food. Apart from that training, Steven says he would like “to get out and meet new people.”

“He does a lot of soul-searching, thinking of the future,” Castaneda says.

“He needs one week to be in tune with himself.”

About 11,000 children will go to camp this summer thanks to the $1.6 million raised last year.

The annual fundraising campaign is part of the Los Angeles Times Family Fund, a fund of the McCormick Tribune Foundation, which this year will match the first $1.1 million in contributions at 50 cents on the dollar.

Donations are tax-deductible. For more information, call (213) 237-5771. To make credit card donations, visit latimes.com/summercamp.

To send checks, use the attached coupon. Do not send cash.

Unless requested otherwise, gifts of $50 or more will be acknowledged in The Times.