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ANTI-GANG SERVICE: 'Agency Should Be Centralized, Not Separate Los Angeles Sentinel; 2/10/1994; James Bolden Los Angeles Sentinel 02-10-1994 'Agency Should Be Centralized, Not Separate Entities'. By JAMES BOLDEN Staff Writer Community leaders called it a drastic move, but described their gathering at one of L.A.'s oldest black churches Tuesday, as a last ditch attempt to save the South L.A. operation of the nation's largest anti- gang agency. "We wish that we didn't have to go through this," said the Rev. Leonard Jackson, a minister of the host First African Methodist Episcopal Church. "The only way we can make sure there is an improvement, is that we have to take a positive stand." The leaders, who included ministers, politicians, businessmen and members of the community, called for breaking the Community Youth Gang Services up into separate headquarters--an East and South Los Angeles office with separate operating budgets. But the agency's Executive Director, Bill Martinez, who attended the meeting and heard the complaints disagreed. "If anything, I think we have the need to try and bolster the (existing) operating resources," Martinez told the Sentinel in an interview. "What I would like to do, however, is centralize a lot of our administrative functions because duplicity causes waste," Martinez said. "If you can save that waste on the administrative side, then you have that much more resources to spend on the operational side," Martinez said. Martinez added that for these reasons he wanted to centralize the agency, simply because the move would heightened the operation. "Having everybody under the same roof would give more of a psychological sense that we are all in this together," he said. The announcement had reportedly been delayed for months in order to give Martinez time to address inadequacies they say are slowly making the South area operation extinct. Though most of the complaints center around the agency's board of director's failure to repair damaged equipment and vehicles and to fill spots left open by frontline Crisis Intervention Workers, the greatest concern has been the denial of resources and an alleged attempt to dismantlement the South L.A. operation. Community Youth Gang Services began its operation on a modest budget in 1981. Today, the agency, whose largest contributors are the city and county, operates on a $3.9 million yearly budget. Neither county nor city officials would comment on the proposed break up. Other arguments at the meeting included the board's selection of Martinez, a former senior planner with the Southern California Association of Governments, to head the agency. Martinez arrived at the agency with no experience with gangs. He had served as senior planner for SCAG since 1989, as project manager for the Emergency Transit Operations Program, and coordinator for the Regional Emergency Transportation Planning Task Force. News Topics | Home | Research | History | Blood Gangs | Crip Gangs | People| Life in a Gang | Gallery | Iraqi Cards | Memorial | Migration | Graffiti | Resume| Injunctions Homicides | Maps | California Prisons | Contact

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