The Los Angeles Times from Los Angeles, California • 347

ntensifies Combat Campaign to Compton: rime in I If A I I fi residents have at times complained publicly about specific neighbors naming names and giving addresses in asking for some sort of help in coping with what they consider criminal behavior on the part of individuals. Several neighborhoods have presented petitions demanding action against specific "trouble spots," while other neighborhood groups are forming as ad hoc "action patrols" to help keep the level of criminal activity down in their own neighborhoods. Still other groups, including two with communitywide links, have threatened "vigilante action" to stop the worst offenders. One of these groups, a youth football league, proclaimed to the council that some of their members would "ride shotgun from now on," to protect spectators, players, and innocent bystanders from any further assaults, and a second group, the Community Alert Please Turn to Pg. 1 0, Col.

1 residential neighborhoods, at public gatherings, in the business sections of the city, and other places, including the public schools. Almost always linked to the complaints about crime are criticisms of the Police Department, most of them dwelling on the officers' response time too long or no response at all or the relative inaccessibility of senior police officials. Lumped in with the frequent citizen complaints about the lack of police protection are other complaints of police brutality. So far this year, the city has been slapped with several claims totaling more than $100,000 and in one case over $1 million for alleged overuse of force by police or false arrest. The city to date has denied all the claims and referred them to its insurance carrier, which has in turn denied all liability, thus forcing an undetermined number of lawsuits.

In several areas of the city, growth of criminal activity in the city, and thus creating an issue for Mrs. Davis. Even today, five months after Mrs. Davis' election, most city officials here are still sensitive about the news media's treatment of the city's crime problem. They note that while the city has a sizeable crime problem, they also blame news media for contributing to what is called "a perceived view" of crime totals as being higher than they actually are.

For many years, the term "law and order" was an ugly word in such minority communities as Compton, which is 70 black in population and 20 Mexican-American. Now, however, many minority residents are themselves using the term in angry public demands for better police protection. It has become an almost weekly occurence at Compton City Council meetings for bitter residents to relate "horror stories" of varying types of criminal activity which occur. in the 1960s conservative movement "law and order." The issue of crime and the fate of the city's 78,000 inhabitants was a primary issue in the election last June of current Compton Mayor Doris Davis, the former city clerk who became the first woman mayor in the city's history by ousting incumbent Mayor Douglas Dollarhide. Mr3.

Davis campaigned on a pledge to beef up the quality, size, and pay of the city's overworked and much criticized Police Department; and she was endorsed by the Compton Police Officers' Assn. In identifying crime reduction as the city's "number one priority," Mrs. Davis undoubtedly touched a responsive chord in the minds of many of the voters who chose her over Dollarhide. It was Dollarhide himself who, when asked by a reporter after the election what caused his defeat, responded by laying blame on the news media for reporting the wide BY STEVEN C. SMITH limn Sloff Wriltr COMPTON When talk turns to crime in this town many if not most residents may be speaking from personal experience.

Until the start of 1973, Compton was top-ranked or bottom-ranked, depending on your point of view in the nation in terms of cities' per capita crime. The 1972 crime sheets a shallow or superficial view of a city, to be sure nevertheless paint this city of 78,000 as a veritable outlaw sanctuary. Over 4,300 burglaries were reported here in 1972, followed by almost 1,200 assaults, 39 homicides and a legion of other large totals in less infamous categories. And although the 1973 totals are running somewhat below those recorded last year, itself less than 1971, residents here are becoming more and more angry about the issue of crime or put into the codeword of Police Chief Thomas Cochee Times photo is Hawaiian Gardens to Act on Major Program for Broadening Tax Base Southeast 1i ii iii iri 'I sop" ll iS. fa" It fewjipfiiiH 'Iv If 1 i 1 mm I iii 'i i I 4 ki tof ll: 111 i I mm TIT? iM meM itl VJ -Vv yJ tW- Sll1 hynr' 1 mm mAiiummtttthimiltmmimJm ii fc mmh -i mi' mini MmmmJimfi.

ii! iiniiiininimn inn-rl MWmmriMriiiMfilt I if fx JJ UltlUll SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 11,1973 PART XI I 1 And if that happens, the logic goes, the city's tax base will be. greater resulting in more revenue to the city. All- this may happen without any tax rate increase to property owners here. Just how the city can pay for these civic improvements without taxing property owners more than they are already levied is explained by City Administrator Jack Simpson. That explanation goes like this: The city's tax base will be, in effect, frozen; those public agencies which tax will receive their revenue based on that tax base.

Any new tax revenue, based on an increase of the assessed valuation over and above the frozen tax base, is earmarked for the redevelopment agency. That new money will then be pumped back into the city through the various projects gutters, traffic signals, etc. Encouraged by these moves, new businesses will move here further hiking land values. This will result instill more tax revenue again earmarked for the redevelopment agency to again pump back into the city through the various projects. Projections show that, through a five-year taxing effort, the agency will have the capacity to sell up to $3.9 million in bonds to pay for the projects.

Simpson emphasizes that there are no plans to demolish, condemn or rehabilitate present buildings of homes even though this power is Please Turn to Pg. 4, CoL 1 BY TOM GORMAN Timn Staff Writer HAWAIIAN GARDENS This 9-year-old city, historically unattractive to investors, is considering spending several million dollars to dress itself up in an effort to lure new business here. At the same time it is expected that land values will increase generating new tax revenue to pay for improved city services. The 33-page document detailing these plans will be presented to the City Council for final approval Tuesday. The meeting will be held at 8 p.m.

at City Hall. City officials refer to the plans as a redevelopment project, but there are no plans to rehabilitate or condemn property to make room for new developments. Instead, the plan calls for improvements in utilities and streets as a step in implementing the city's general plan. If approved at Tuesday's meeting, the redevelopment agency (whose members are city councilmen) would specifically: Improve Norwalk including the installation of sidewalks, curbsgutters, paving and drainage facilities, between 219th St. and 223rd St.

Install raised landscaped medians on Bloomfield Ave. Complete curbs, gutters, sidewalks and pavement on WardhamAve. Continue the city's utility Debby Chavez reaches in her purse for change after boarding a bus dispatched ar her command. Times photos by Steve Rice undergrounding program, with emphasis on Norwalk Blvd. and Carson St.

Update traffic control systems throughout the city- for improved traffic flow. Study problems of the water supply system within the city with consideration being given to the creation of a single purveyor to provide a better level of service and, as a reduce fire insurance rates. City Hall belief is that if the city takes the first steps in improving transportation and utility services, private businesses may be more encouraged to move here. Dial-A-Ride Rolls to Success i E.L.A. DISTRICT HEALTH OFFICER Medicine Led Her to America, Major Post 11 BY LARRY LANE Time, Staff Writer LA MIRADA Dial-A-Ride is the name.

Precisely, but colorlessly, it has been called a flexible-route intracity transit system, a first-of -its-kind for the Southeast area. Since debuting in mid-May, "the bus that thinks it is a taxi," as it has been described, has carried more passengers than expected, prompting expansion and imitation by neighboring communities. Residents use Dial-A-Ride much like they would a taxi. They call the dispatch center and tell where they are and where they want to go within city boundaries: the fare is 25 cents, the response time between 1 5 and 25 minutes. In its first week the system, which cost about $125,000 to develop, carried a daily average of 200 passengers.

Averages rose steadily during the summer. By August, City Administrator Claude Klug anticipated a leveling off of riders. But on Oct. 29 a new record was set 477 passengers in one day. Two 12-passenger vans have been added to the original fleet of four 17-passenger minibuses, serving residents from 7 a.m.

to 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday. Three special runs are made to Cerritos College in Norwalk on weekdays. And Klug says a number of recent promotions have aimed at expanding the number of people who know of and will use the service. One promotion allowed senior citizens to ride free on Mondays for a month.

Another took shoppers to La Mirada Center. A third took voters to the polls Nov. 6. "Right now," the city administrator says, "we're looking at plans to run the buses until 10 p.m. through the holiday season on some nights." Please Turn to Pg.

3, Col. 3 5 sSis! I' I 1 I lllllWliBllif 1 tmmmmmf Vs f. 1 BY MARY BARBER Timet Staff Writtr A tiny Filipina now carries the 80,000 patient load at East Los Angeles Health District Center. The new district health officer. Dr.

Pilar A. Centeno. moved up from the Whittier district subcenter in Pico Rivera and in both spots her bilingual abilities have been prized. It isn't any easier to find a Spanish-speaking woman doctor than it is to become one, both the district and Dr. Centeno have indicated.

"I have worked intensely on the matter of obtaining a Spanish-speaking doctor for the district," said Los Angeles County Supervisor Ernest E. Debs. Dr. Centeno certainly worked intensely on getting where she is, beginning with her early life in the Philippines. Her father was a judge, "the intellectual kind, who told us he wouldn't bequeath us anything but our educations.

He knew how valuable this was." The judge's seven children are two physicians, two lawyers, a nurse, an electrical 1930s her father's wisdom was challenged, but he could see his daughter was going to make it. In her pursuit of innumerable degrees and credentials, Dr. Centeno spent considerable time in America, including studies at Harvard University where she obtained a master's degree in public health after getting her M.D. in Manila. Health this time her own put Dr.

Centeno in America permanently in the 1950s, and she made a steady climb through pediatric positions. In 1954 she did research on hematology at City of Hope in Duarte and there met her husband, Dr. Bohdan Jelinek, a Czech with doctorates in both medicine and science. They live in Monrovia and Dr. Centeno administers the enormous work done at the East Los Angeles Health Center at 670 S.

Ferris Ave. "Here's my philosophy," she said. "As a physician my first obligation is to my patient. In public health, the community is a patient and therefore my first obligation is to the community." 1 f't '71 i Dial-A-Ride bus stands ready to take boys of Cub Pack 74C on a trip to visit a dairy. Dr.

Pilar A. Centeno engineer and a government worker. Dr. Centeno, the eldest, said that during her medical training in the Education Breaks Away From Routine With 'Gratifying Results Teacher, parent and student all "To offer learning opportunities through 12th graders, was conducted at El Dorado High School for an great deal about themselves and the behavior going on around them without having to commit it to paper or submit it in any kind of formal response." Officially, the program was known as "Real LIFE (Learning in a Flexible Environment)," and served as a short-term test of a possible "year-round alternative school" which the district may explore in coming months, SOUTHEAST OFFICE 8301 E. Florence Downey 90240 Phone, All Departments: 923-9711 Los Angeles Office Toll Free: Classified G39-1212 All Others 039-3131 and aided on field trips, others spent weeks at the school itself, initiating activities and returning on a daily basis, by student demand and interest." Outsiders became involved, too.

A school custodian started and supervised a gardening class. Cerritos Library hosted a field trip. There were slumber parties, visits to the zoo and amusement parks, a cultural visit to Little Tokyo and East Los Angeles, plus tours of hospitals, newspaper offices, the mountains and the beach. The joint staff report concludes: "It may be that one of the most valuable assets was that a few students were simply left alone maybe for the first time ever at school to observe the school milieu while at leisure to learn a A parent survey suggests that some spots still need to be worked-out, however, before they believe the program could be a successful alternative to the traditional program on a year-round basis. Although parents cited the" project's "high interest" and the students' "freedom to experience freedom in school," many also said more attention should be focused on basic educational goals, including reading and math.

Students volunteered to participate in the program, however, notes Frank Salas, one of the participating teachers. In his individual analysis of the project, Salas notes: "No one elected to take math, but the students built a geodesic dome Please Turn to Pg. 4, Col. 4 outside the classroom by taking many field trips." Methods used to. meet the objectives included teacher-student give-and-take on a first-name basis, with misbehaving students "simply asked to find an available activity one of which always included the opportunity to just go outside and let off some steam." Teachers found that older students assumed responsibility for younger students, helping them in crafts classes, acting as chaperones on field trips.

"One of the most gratifying things," the report to the board notes, "was the amount of time and talent donated by the parents of children in the program. "While many (parents) attended have a role in public education. The teacher instructs. The student learns. The parent supports teacher and student in pursuit of those objectives, usually from a vantage point which precludes first-hand participation.

Thus, while each has a place in the scheme of schooling, each role is separate and distinct, allowing little overlap or interchange. Such-is the curricular custom, fostered by tradition and reinforced by routine. But now come the survey results of a summer program in the ABC Unified School District to indicate that education might be able to reach a higher level of effectiveness by going against tradition and routine. The project, open to kindergarten eight-week period. More than 90 students enrolled, each working on a "contract" basic to earn credit in the subject area of individual choice.

"Don't be too disturbed if you find you lose interest in your project talk it over with your adviser and try it again," the contract read. Three-objectives were primary, said Harvey Hoyo, one of six teachers participating, in a report to district trustees. Those objectives: "To provide a humane and threatening environment "To offer classes and activities and to enable the students to decide which of these would meet individual needs..