“Nearly one million—three in 10 California teens—are left unsupervised after school three or more days each week” (Opinion Research Poll, June, 2006)
A little over two years ago, law enforcement people from all over the place met with state legislators and pleaded with them to put key legislation in place “to ensure high–quality [prop. 49 after school] programs roll-out successfully.” At the time, an official added, “these reforms are necessary because serious financial and administrative barriers currently keep many kids from participating in great after-school programs.”
Here are some more sound bites from fightcrime.org news release from that meeting at the Capital in advance of the legislative hearing which eventually saw SB 638 through to the Governator, who signed it into law in July of 2006.
“Many people believe kids are most likely to get in trouble at night or on the weekends, but it is really the after-school hours that law enforcement worries about,” said [then Sacramento Police] Chief Najera. “I know that when after-school program are funded and more kids have something to do, we’re going to see that spike in juvenile crime start to diminish.”
“The law enforcement leaders cited several key findings from a new survey of California teens, ages 12 to 17, commissioned by the anti-crime organization FIGHT CRIME: INVEST IN KIDS California, as evidence of the need for after-school programs to prevent juvenile crime.
POLL KEY FINDINGS:
- Teens who are left unsupervised are three times more likely to engage in criminal behavior;
- More than twice as likely to hang out with gang members;
- More than three times as likely to smoke marijuana; and
- More than five times as likely to use drugs other than marijuana.
- In the past year, one in five of the teens surveyed had engaged in activities that could have resulted in arrest, and one in five had been the victim of a crime.
“Our youth keep learning after 3 o’clock,” Sacramento County District Attorney Jan Scully said in a statement. “Whether they learn how to become criminals or productive members of the community is up to us. We need to invest in good after-school programs to give them a constructive alternative to the lure of the streets.”
So how are we doing? Well, when you take into account these programs don’t even assist high school aged kids (they are primarily geared towards k though 8 ),and you factor in how little each school gets for prop 49 funding, and you consider the ages of the kids who just terrorized Natomas are 15 through 20, and you remember that for three months out of the year kids are not even IN SCHOOL, you can begin to see the complexities of these problems.
I said it before and I’ll say it again: TEENS NEED SOMETHING TO DO… after school or in the summer. And they need MENTORSHIP from caring adults, not taser guns being waved in their faces. Is it coincidence that kids in bad neighborhoods do NOT want more police there?
YES to minimum police levels and better cop to resident ratios; NO to a police state!!!
Further proof that TEENS are being neglected is the fact that organizations in Sacramento like Stanford Settlement can not get the funding they need to keep their TEEN CENTERS open. Stanford’s program is in Gardenland, and they are $300,000 in the hole and their after school teen program is in severe jeopardy. Feel free to pop in and donate a few bucks if you can spare them.
The gang problem is definitely NOT just a county or city problem. It is a STATE and even NATIONAL problem. And it’s not just a problem limited to GANGS per se. It’s a YOUTH delinquency problem. And there are a kajillion other ways to go about fighting it outside of implementing a shortsighted city tax increase. WE NEED A COMPREHENSIVE CRIME BILL.
PS: WE DON’T HAVE A “GANG” PROBLEM IN NATOMAS. WE HAVE A “LOST SOUL” PROBLEM. DON’T SEND COPS. SEND MENTORS.
Problem is Joe is that only a select few people want to help. Most of society is either rich, arrogant, insensitive, apathetic or just plain lazy. Americans have entitlement complexes and don’t think they should have to lift a finger to help anyone but themselves. That’s just the way it is baby. Do you see any other media or bloggers or public people getting as mad about this as you are? No. Only place you will find angry people is in the anonymous comments section of the Bee’s web site, and most of those people probably live in the suburbs where crime is not neqarly as bad as it is where you are. I am one of them. But I do care about the problem and commend you for being a lone voice of reason.
I dare them to put that on the ballot. It will get crushed. Fargo is a buffoon and everyone knows it. Listen to how she talks to people at city hall meetings, like she is the smart one and everyone else is a complete idiot.
You’re on a tall soapbox today Joe…and the right one.
Thanks all. Blessings
Joe
Did anybody hear Sheedy last night, she was a star, said the tax is wrong. It has been put together at the last minute by none other than the incompetent Fargo, and tax and spend liberals. I am fed up of hearing why I have to pay for these stupid teens that need a center to go to to stay out of trouble, where are their parents. These do nothing teens can go to summer school, volunteer at a hospital, get a job, help an old person, mentor a younger kid, spend time in prison if they are criminals, clean up a park, work at Habitat for Humanity, no one has ever proven that an after school program will stop a punk from putting a gun in a mom’s head in a garage to steal her cell phone. I saw the SWAT team do a demo in Creekside today, maybe they can clean up the kids that are causing the community grief, and they can set up a community program in prison where they can make metal signs and repay the victims for their losses. If anybody thinks more money is needed, they’re foolish, look at all the money that has been spent on drug reduction, a big help that’s been.
PH, I agree with you wholeheartedly. TAX MONEY is not going to solve the problem. They can’t even manage the money we give them now. The only people who support this tax are LAZY or have WAY TOO MUCH BLIND TRUST in this local government.
Also, someone needs to be making a bigger deal out of the fact that this tax TOTALLY UNDERMINES the police/fire department MASTER PLAN they have been discouraged from putting in front of voters. I am very surprised Rick Braziel is not getting piping hot about this. KJ has not referred to it either.
We MUST have minimum police levels, but NOT a police state. And we don’t even have GANGS in all areas of the city
Sheedy and Waters are the only bright stars in an otherwise very DIM constellation of sacramento officials
Well, last night I was driving home about 11:30 from a business dinner, and I saw no less than 3 groups of kids out walking together (groups of 4, 7, and 3) between 11:30 and 11:50pm. None of these kids could have been over 15, and most were 12-14 or so. I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t let my kid out to walk major streets in Natomas at 11:30 at night unsupervised.
This is a nightly occurrence when I come home late.
After school is one thing, but there is something much more difficult going on here: parental negligence?
Joe, the idea of a Police State in Sacramento is ludicrous - your getting a little daytime AM radio with that comment. I figured out the real conspiracy, and it goes back to 2002 (note the clear denial from the companies - it’s a conspiracy.
Since I’m sort of introducing myself on this blog, let me leave you with a joke (one does have to have a sense of humor to deal with this level of bs):
Young Chuck, moved to Montana and bought a horse from
a farmer for $100.00. The farmer agreed to deliver the
horse the next day. The next day he drove up and said,
‘Sorry son, but I have some bad news, the horse died.’
Chuck replied, ‘Well, then just give me my money back.’
The farmer said, ‘Can’t do that. I went and spent it already.’
Chuck said, ‘Ok, then, just bring me the dead horse.’
The farmer asked, ‘What ya gonna do with him?
Chuck said, ‘I’m going to raffle him off.’
The farmer said, ‘You can’t raffle off a dead horse!’
Chuck said, ‘Sure I can. Watch me. I just won’t tell
anybody he’s dead.’
A month later, the farmer met up with Chuck and asked,
‘What happened with that dead horse?’
Chuck said, ‘I raffled him off. I sold 500 tickets at two
dollars a piece and made a net profit of $898.00.’
The farmer said, ‘Didn’t anyone complain?’
Chuck said, ‘Just the guy who won. So I gave him his
two dollars back.’
Chuck grew up and now works for Heather Fargo.
Oh wait, that doesn’t work. That plan would actually make sense.
Darnit.
Not only that, those are the same unsupervised hours that teens get pregnant!
I don’t have the facts and figures, but the S Natomas Community Center has some pretty weak programs as I recall. No facilities for sports and so forth, which are of interest to boys, the primary bad actors in teen crime (though, I’m shocked at the participation of girls, which has increased).
I tried to get a Big Brother for my oldest boy, who was really needing a male mentor - there was a waiting list a mile long because there weren’t enough men volunteers who made it through screening and training.
I’ve heard from men I know who have participated in mentoring that it’s incredibly worthwhile for them and that they regret they could no longer participate for whatever reason.
JL, when you saw these kids out at 11:30 at night, did you tell the police about curfew breakers? If someone doesn’t let the police know, how will this law start getting enforced?
Hi JL and welcome. You can always tell a Joe Sac regular from a new reader because the regulars never comment on my intentional extrapolations and sarcasm.
Of course we won’t have a police state. Only stated to draw an extreme comparison for those who need extreme comparisons.
Funny joke.
Lori, agreed! As I have said, these programs are far too punitive. I know at least ONE guy now who wants to do a teen mentorship program w me in N Natomas. STILL waiting to hear back from Lynn Corbett, Sacramento City Youth Development Director…… tap tap tap…
Mike, indeed! Call these curfew breakers in! Let’s go Natomas! Let’s make them enforce the curfew!