A stable, musical retreat
Floyd Franklin, 15, remembers becoming a ward of the state five years ago. It was when he began jumping from foster home to foster home, living with strangers, feeling like he never belonged and being separated from his two sisters.
After their mother was deported to her native Belize, the siblings -- Floyd, then 10, Sheena, then 8 and Alyssa, then 11 -- were left in the care of Floyd’s father. They were removed from their home after Floyd’s father threw a jar of peanut butter at him, sending him to the hospital with a bloody gash on his head.
His father was jailed, and the kids were separated in the foster care system. Floyd has lived in five homes, where he engaged in fights and arguments and was accused of lying and stealing.
Still in the system, Floyd and Sheena have found some stability for the last year living in Los Angeles with another foster mother, Sonya Arline. They hope to reunite with Alyssa.
A foster parent for nine years, Arline understands Floyd’s emotional dilemma. “There are a lot of kids out here who need a home and want a family,” she says. “But it’s hard for a kid to come into your home and not know how it’s going to be.”
Floyd, however, has found solace at the Salvation Army Santa Monica Corps, where he has learned to read and write music and play the piano in the organization’s Westside Music School program. This summer, the organization will send Floyd and about 170 other kids ages 9 to 18 to the Chris Mallet School of Music session at Camp Mt. Crags in the Calabasas Mountains for a week.
In his second time going to the music camp, Floyd will learn how to play the trumpet, perform a solo on the piano and participate in recreational activities.
“There’s really no conflict there unless you make it,” Floyd says. “It makes you want to get away from the bad things in life. It’s pure happiness there.”
The camp experience provides a sense of unity for campers, says Anthony Begonia, the music director of the Westside program.
“As a foster child, he’s gaining more intimate relationships with people who really want to direct him in a good path,” Begonia says. “He’s looking for some stability in his life, and I think this is a nice, positive outlook for him [to know] he’s needed and he’s wanted here and everyone loves him, and he can reciprocate that.”
With $1.8 million raised last year by the Los Angeles Times Summer Camp Campaign, approximately 8,000 children will go to camp in Southern California this summer.
The Summer Camp Campaign is part of the Los Angeles Times Family Fund, a McCormick Foundation fund, which matches all donations at 50 cents on the dollar.
Donations are tax-deductible as permitted by law. Addresses will not be released or published. For more information, call (800) LA TIMES, Ext. 75771, or e-mail familyfund@ latimes.com.
Mail donations using the attached form (do not send cash), donate by phone at (800) 518-3975 or donate online now at latimes.com/donate.
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