You Are Cordially Invited to AV YouthBuild’s Fall Open House
YouthBuild Charter School of California
When:
Thursday, August 20, 2009 at 6:00 p.m.
Where:
AV YouthBuild Campus
39360-B Summerwind Drive
Palmdale, CA 93551
RSVP:
661-266-8900 or
JStowe@YouthBuildCharter.org
This article appeared in the AV Press, Saturday, August 8, 2009
By Daisy Ratzlaff
Valley Press Staff Writer
LANCASTER – Palmdale and Lancaster officials hope a newly-instated mediation program resolving neighborhood disputes will help foster greater communications between neighbors and relieve courts, code enforcement and sheriff’s department personnel of having to deal with issues pertaining to matters residents could otherwise solve themselves.
Darren Parker, president of the Antelope Valley Human Relations Commission, said residents who have complaints about their neighbors’ cars being parked on their front lawns or overgrown tree branches that grow into their yards now have an alternative option rather than notifying city or deputies to handle “the more civil rather than criminal matter.”
“This program is designed to help neighbors who are in dispute at no cost to them t solve their problem in order to build safer, better and stronger neighborhoods,” Parker said.
The mediation program, which runs under the Neighbor Dispute Resolution Program, was developed by the Los Angeles County Human Relations Commission, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich and the Antelope Vally Human Relations Commission as well as Lancaster and Palmdale city officials. It officially began operation Thursday and will allow residents to call a special hot line and ask for one of 20 mediators and four senior mediators to help resolve neighbor-to-neighbor problems, Parker said.
“we found out that one out of every three cases that the task force deals with may at some point have started as a neighborhood dispute,” he said. “We are happy that we have law enforcement with us, and it looks like it will take the work off their desks and put in the proper place, where the issues can be addressed on a one-on-one basis.”
WHAT:
City of Lancaster announces a joint effort with the Los Angeles County Human Relations Commission, Antelope Valley Human Relations Commission, and the City of Palmdale which will provide citizens with a neighbor-to-neighbor dispute resolution program
WHEN:
Thursday, August 6, 2009, at10 AM
WHERE:
Los Angeles County Superior Courthouse
42011 4th St E
Lancaster, CA 93534
WHO:
Los Angeles County Human Relations Commission
City of Lancaster
City of Palmdale
This story appeared in the Antelope Valley Press on Monday, August 3, 2009.
By DAISY RATZLAFF
Valley Press Staff Writer
LANCASTER – Despite cutbacks in many educational programs, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department’s Stop Hate And Respect Everyone, or SHARE, tolerance program is still going strong and continues to teach Antelope Valley youth about respect and tolerance.
The unique program that aims to combat hate and intolerance with the help of a custom-built mobile theater has, since its start in October 2008, visited dozens of high schools within Los Angeles County and is now being joined by Los Angeles Police Department officers in an effort to spread the message even further, said Lancaster Deputy Greg Chatman.
“We want to infect the world with tolerance. We want to lead strongly and be part of change,” said Chatman, who took on the lead of the program about three months ago. “We want to educate our youth by sharing our knowledge, because we too had struggles to overcome. They have made us who we are today and we as a department and as sheriff’s deputies really care and we will take the trailer wherever there is a need.”
The SHARE program, which was in the planning stages for two years, was established in partnership with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, the county Board of Supervisors, the Simon Wiesenthal Center, the Museum of Tolerance and other public and private organizations.
The idea for the trailer was developed when sheriff’s Chief Neal Tyler was 8 years old. He saw separate drinking fountains and bathrooms for nonwhites and “knew how screwed-up that was,” said Tyler at the August 2008 demonstration.
This story appeared in the Antelope Valley Press
Friday, July 31, 2009.
By DAISY RATZLAFF
Valley Press Staff Writers
PALMDALE – Racial and ethnic slugs, profanity and the phrase “white pride” were spray-painted in black letters on doors, walls and windows at Wildflower Elementary School in an apparent hate crime, sheriff’s officials said.
Graffiti was found on 90% of the walls of the school’s main building and of classroom bungalows when custodians arrived early Thursday at the campus on 35th Street East north of Avenue R, sheriff’s deputies said.
“I first saw the graffiti on the doors and then I saw the rest,” said custodian Roger Brown, who added he found the damage hard to believe. “I was like, ‘Holy moly.’ ”
Added Jesse Brunell, who works with Brown: “We are just blessed that they didn’t get the front of the school. I guess we can be thankful for that.”
Deputies believe the vandals entered the campus, which is closed for summer vacation, either from a dirt field off Avenue R or off 35th Street East overnight. Based on the lettering, deputies said they believe the vandalism was the work of more than one person.