Targeted Outreach - Governor's Office of Crime Control & Prevention ...

Appendices 53
All youth are immediately assigned a Guardian Angel (GA)
to act as their case manager. Any staff person can be a GA.
They are assigned to youth by the program directors,
based on availability of staff.
The two program directors are responsible for filling out
the intake and tracking forms at their respective Clubs.
They gather information to complete the documentation
from the youth’s GA and from probation.
Programming
The content of FtF programming is provided largely by
Club staff, but two outside organizations’ representatives
also contribute. The Club provides homework assistance;
computer lab time; a Guardian Angel; case management
(by the Club director); Smart Moves; Teens, Crime and the
Community (a Club course); a team building project; and
videos and discussion groups.
The Westside Family Coalition provides staff who teach
Anger Management/Conflict Resolution and Job Smart,
an outreach program for at-risk youth. Job Smart includes
job development, job counseling, job search training and
job preparation. The curriculum covers resume writing,
networking and self-esteem building.
Police, probation and Club staff all track the progress and
attendance of the youth, and all attend the youth’s orientation
and “graduation” ceremonies.
Changes to the Club to accommodate the initiative
Program directors reported that few changes were necessary
to make regular Club programming accommodate
FtF, because FtF operates in the evenings when the Clubs
are open only to teens. With no younger kids around,
there are fewer safety issues or concerns. In addition,
although there are a few times when FtF kids participated
in regular Club activities, most of their time was spent separate
from regular members. Finally, there were fewer than
five youth involved in any one session, so their presence
was not considered problematic for the other Club youth.
Two changes that the Club made were the use of Guardian
Angels with the FtF youth, and giving Club staff increased
access to probation and police personnel through their
personal beepers.
Boys & Girls Club of St. Paul: “Getting Out”
Program Overview
The Getting Out Program is a collaborative effort of the
Boys & Girls Clubs of St. Paul and the St. Paul Police
Department. The program offers free tattoo removal to
gang involved youth when they commit to leaving their
gang and taking other steps toward changing their lives.
Tattoo removal is critical for youth who want to leave
gangs because tattoos can be an external marker of gang
involvement. Employers or other gang members may continue
to mistake a youth as a gang member as long as they
retain their tattoo. In order to qualify for monthly treatments,
youth are required to put in 20 hours of community
service each month and work with a case manager to
attain their personal goals.
The program has five main components: community service,
education, job skills, life skills and recreation. Unlike
other Boys & Girls Clubs initiatives, it is not a facility-based
program. The program hinges on the relationship developed
between a youth and one case manager. Youth are
assigned to one case worker who helps them set goals and
find the resources, either within or outside the Club, to
achieve those goals. As a result, many of the Getting Out
youth did not visit the Boys & Girls Club.
Goals
The primary goal of the initiative is to create a network of
services that will support youth attempting to get out of
gangs. Specifically, the goals are as follows:
• Establish a referral network that will enable the Club
to identify 35 youth who have expressed interest in
getting out of gangs;
• Build a network of service providers who will assist
gang-involved youth in meeting their needs;
• Establish a case management system to track participant
progress in achieving personal goals in community
service, education, job skills, life skills, and
positive peer interactions; and
• Create a mechanism to remove gang-related tattoos
as participants show satisfactory progress toward
meeting their goals.
Gangs in St. Paul
At the time of our research, the Twin Cities had a unique
and pervasive gang problem. Its Midwestern location and
proximity to Chicago and Detroit had led to the infiltration
of prominent national gangs including Bloods, Crips,
Disciples, Latin Kings and Vice Lords. Some of these gangs
had been recruiting in the Twin Cities since the 1970s and
were known to be involved in drug distribution. They had
also been responsible for several homicides, including
those of police officers. Newer local gangs, particularly
Southeast Asian gangs, had also begun to form. These
gangs were thought to be more territorial in nature and
focused on the protection of members in their group. At
the time of our research, Asian gangs had not been
involved in serious shooting or homicide incidents, but
were becoming well-armed. Other local or neighborhood
gangs were also constantly evolving.