SAN JOSE WINS GRANT TO TEACH ANTI-CRIME PROGRAM

San Jose has won a $210,000 federal grant to create a national anti-crime
training program that will show other communities how to ``weed'' criminals
from their areas and ``seed'' neighborhoods with housing, employment and
social programs.

After receiving more than $2 million in ``Weed and Seed'' grants from the
U.S. Department of Justice since San Jose's program began four years ago,
local organizers were praised by federal officials for their efforts and
were asked to create a training program to pass on their techniques to
other community groups and police departments.

In San Jose, the city's Weed and Seed program operates two centers in the
Olinder and Santee neighborhoods, and has initiated several programs aimed
at keeping youths off the streets during the high-crime afternoon hours,
rooting out gang and drug activity and generally improving the community.
The group has launched after-school programs, food banks, English classes,
sports programs and theater programs.

Some of the grant money, which is awarded to the city but managed by
community workers and volunteers, was also given to the police department
for community policing projects. Police worked with volunteers to get
truant kids back in school and to identify drug pushers, group organizers
said.

This year's grant money will be used primarily to create short training
sessions that groups from around the country can attend. Local organizers
will also create a training video and visit other communities on occasion
to provide on-site advice.

Any city or county seeking a 1999 Weed and Seed grant will be required to
send community representatives to a longer, more in-depth training
conference to be held here in September.

Maria DeLeon, San Jose's Weed and Seed program director, said the key to
the program's success has been to talk to residents first and then
coordinate efforts with government, businesses, churches and schools to
meet their needs.

``In other places people don't even talk to each other,'' DeLeon said.

``People asked to move abandon vehicles, for new stop signs or graffiti
removal, to get trees trimmed (or for help with) stopping gangs,'' she
said. ``One woman asked to have the wattage changed on the street lamps
even . . . and we say, `Yeah, well, we can do that.' ''

The city is picking up the tab for many of the non-training Weed and Seed
projects this year under its decade-old ``Project Crackdown'' program.

Checked-by: Mike Gogulski