LIFE'S LESSONS PREPARED HIM TO HEAD CITYTEAM

HE'S AT the helm of an operation that has gone from a small start-up
in downtown San Jose to offices in nine U.S. cities and seven foreign
countries.

He's convinced he's in a growth industry.

So why isn't Pat Robertson happier?

Robertson -- the president of CityTeam Ministries, not the religious
broadcaster -- deals in human capital. The non-denominational
Christian mission he heads works with the disadvantaged in inner
cities -- the homeless, the addicted, the mentally ill, disaffected
youth. He sees a lot more of the latter coming our way.

``I think we're going to see the crime rate just escalate,'' Robertson
says of the approaching demographic bubble of 15- to 39-year-olds,
particularly the young men who statistically are responsible for the
majority of crimes committed. ``I don't think that we have the tools
to deal with the level of juvenile crime that we're going to see.
Jails and prisons are not the solution. The drug epidemic and the
crime epidemic are going to be very closely tied together.
Unfortunately, there are going to be a lot of opportunities for
organizations like ours to serve the community in the future. We're in
a growth industry, and it's frightening. It's terrifying, really.''

Not that Robertson, 52, plans to wring his hands and do nothing as the
problem approaches. In his 25 years with CityTeam, he's learned a few
things -- as has CityTeam itself.

CityTeam was founded in 1957 as the San Jose Rescue Mission, a shelter
and feeding program for homeless men. Over the years, its scope
widened to include women and youth in cities from Seattle to Miami as
well as overseas.

``As we started traveling a little bit,'' Robertson says, ``we began
to discover that there were common issues wherever we went in the
cities. Any place in the world, the language may be different but
there's a common urban culture and common urban problems. When you
meet those problems, then you can use common strategies and common
principles virtually any place you go.''

What seems to work?

Being local, for one. ``We live right there in the community,'' he
says, ``because the problems in a community don't happen between 8 and
5. We work with a lot of people who have either just come out of
prison or have spent a lot of their life in prison and don't want to
see their kids going down the same road. We work with them and the
kids at a very grass-roots level. They know we're there for the long
haul.

``We've also found that people are basically spiritual,'' he says.
``When people are alienated from God, they're often alienated in all
of their other relationships. So when we can work with people in such
a way that they can achieve reconciliation with God, often one of the
byproducts is a reconciliation with all their other
relationships.

``And then,'' he adds, ``we're really a no-nonsense ministry. We
really get people to take responsibility for their own issues. We're
compassionate to people who are hurting; people need to be loved. But
at the same time they need to be gently brought to the point where
they can take that responsibility. Alcoholics and drug addicts, nobody
can make them better. They have to want to be better. Nobody can make
more excuses.''

Personal experience

Robertson knows the value of some of the CityTeam techniques from
personal experience. ``My personal background is part of the reason
I'm here,'' he acknowledges.

A native of Salt Lake City and the eldest of five children, Robertson
was deeply affected by his parents' divorce when he was 16. He joined
the Air Force immediately after graduating from high school, served
four years, including a year in Vietnam, worked as an electrician
after his discharge and eloped with a woman he'd met in Alabama.

``I was really a jerk as a husband and very physically abusive of my
wife, Kathy,'' he says. ``All the anger over my parents' divorce and
Vietnam and all those issues just came out, and I was a very abusive
person.''

A neighbor couldn't help noticing, and suggested the couple attend his
church. ``And I went to church and I had a real and truly transforming
spiritual experience,'' Robertson says. ``I realized God loved me and
would forgive me. And so I'm still married to the same woman and we
have three kids and I love her very much. I started working on my own
life, and I said, `If this will work for me, and I was such a jerk,
this should work for anybody.' ''

Toward that end, the Robertsons enrolled at Prairie Bible Institute in
Canada, where Pat learned of the San Jose Rescue Mission. Invited to
work there, he began as a summer youth camp counselor and signed on
full time in 1975 -- ``when I was still skinny and had hair.''

``I went on later to Pepperdine University and got a graduate degree,
which helped me a lot,'' he says, ``but I would still say that most of
what I've learned I've learned the hard way -- on the job, hard
knocks, lots of failure, and building a good team.''

Among the things he's learned about the people CityTeam
serves:

``Of the homeless population, there's a significant number that are
mentally ill. It's a struggle to serve that population.

``The greatest percentage, though, have some kinds of addiction
issues. And even if you put them in a good place to live or you get
them a job, if you haven't dealt with the underlying addiction, it's
going to take over them. As soon as they get money in their pocket,
they'll go back to using.

``And then there's another population group, which is predominantly
single-parent women who were abandoned or have their addiction/abuse
issues and need places to go. But common to most groups -- and it's a
significant and growing issue -- is the addiction. One of the great
concerns that I have is that kids are using drugs at a younger and
younger age. It's frightening what this portends for us in the future.''

Alternatives to gangs

To help, CityTeam offers young people programs like the camps with
which Robertson was involved early on -- alternatives to the gang
involvement that often includes drug use. ``And we're also providing
parenting classes; we have to equip parents in this day and age. The
temptations and struggles kids face now are more significant than kids
have ever faced before, and parenting is a real test.''

On the overall issue of homelessness, Robertson says, society in
general and CityTeam in particular need to focus on treatment and
education. ``I think CityTeam needs to work more on that,'' he
acknowledges. ``And training. A living wage is a real critical issue
here in the valley. Those are issues we're pretty passionate about,
along with lots of others: finding ways to move people from welfare
and dependency into independency and really feeling good about
themselves, about being role models for their kids and their families.
Those are all big issues we've got to work together on.''

Working on those issues takes money, in CityTeam's case about $14
million annually, none of that from government or United Way funds.
Instead, CityTeam relies on individual donations, many of them
generated by those ubiquitous newspaper ads around the holidays
showing a bearded homeless man sitting before a plate of food.

``We've gone from having 3,400 donors a few years ago to between
40,000 and 50,000 donors today,'' Robertson says. ``We have a very
broad base of people who support us on a very consistent basis -- not
huge donors but a lot who give $10, $15, $25 a month. And we have
thousands of volunteers who also help us. We're really a team; that's
why we have our name.''

`Nothing deters him'

CityTeam's (and Robertson's) no-nonsense approach impresses others
besides donors and volunteers. ``Pat is very effective at working with
the disenfranchised and homeless from a business perspective,'' says
Barry Del Buono, executive director of the Emergency Housing
Consortium, another major homeless-services provider. ``Nothing deters
him. He's kind of like an oak tree in the midst of saplings.''

``I've finally reconciled myself to being one of the old guys, one of
a handful who've been here 25 years or longer,'' Robertson says.
``I've earned my seniority, so I try to make sure that I mentor young
people. I have a real desire to help pass on the vision and make sure
that others get a chance to learn and lead.''

And he's not snooty about it.

``It's challenging to run an organization like ours, but I'm having a
ball doing it,'' he says. ``Some of my friends are former cons and
prostitutes and murderers. And I count it a great privilege of having
them as some of my very best friends in the whole world. People who've
been transformed by the grace of God.''