■ U.S. Reps. Mike Thompson, Bobby Scott address Vallejo school, keeping youth out of jail

An auditorium packed Monday morning with Vallejo students of Jesse Bethel High School’s law academy, Advanced Placement government class and senior humanities class heard national and local officials say, “We need you.”

U.S. Rep. Mike Thompson, the Democrat who represents Benicia and Vallejo in California’s 5th U.S. House of Representatives district, introduced them to U.S. Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Va., who has written the Youth Prison Reduction Through Opportunities, Mentoring, Intervention, Support and Education (Youth PROMISE) Act.

Thompson and Scott were longtime friends in the House before Thompson became the chairperson and Scott became the co-chairperson of the House’s task force charged with proposing ways to reduce gun violence, Benicia’s congressman said.

One of those approaches is Scott’s bipartisan Youth PROMISE legislation, Thompson said, calling Scott “a real leader in this area.”

Scott said many in government have campaigned on stiff or “three-strikes” sentences.

He decried clever campaign slogans based on those approaches. He said instead, as his legislation proposes, the focus should be on intervention, which can save up to $5 for every $3 invested.

“How can we afford to pay for these programs? Look at what you’re paying now!” Scott said, calling the high national rate of incarceration “counterproductive.”

He said the money spent on incarceration should be “put on the table,” available for spending on prevention and intervention programs.

If that approach is taken, then after an initial government investment “programs will pay for themselves indefinitely,” Scott said.

But for that approach to work locally, all elements of a community must work together to develop an optimum solution that would work in a specific city’s — or even a neighborhood’s — situation, he said.

It’s a proactive approach that calls on a community to make its own plan for early intervention to reduce the number of youth — particularly young African-American and Latino boys — who turn to lives of crime. As Scott pointed out, America’s per-100,000 incarceration rate remains much higher than that of other countries.

He said the Youth PROMISE Act purposefully doesn’t tell a city or neighborhood what it should do.

“What works in Chicago won’t work in Montana,” he said.

“It’s evidence-based, not slogan-based,” he added, explaining that some outside programs imposed on communities just haven’t worked, or haven’t been as effective as plans developed by residents on their own.

However, the Youth PROMISE Act does describe what has been effective in reducing crime and recidivism elsewhere, includingz research and studies that participating communities can use as a guide, Scott said.

Scott called it a comprehensive approach that starts in early childhood and works step by step so youth don’t “drift off and get into trouble.”

Pointing out that legislation doesn’t happen on its own, Scott told the packed theater, “Young people, you are electing the people who are making the choices.”

Those choices, he said, have included spending money to jail and imprison offenders rather than on intervention programs that may be less costly in the long run.

Furthermore, the programs a community or city develops must appeal to the residents, he said. “Do what the people want to do. Local buy-in is important.”

But he told the youth in the auditorium, “I don’t have the answers. We need your input. You deal with this on a daily basis, and you know more than we do.”

Vallejo Mayor Osby Davis, who said his annual golf tournament fundraiser raises $50,000 that’s spent on preschool reading and after-school activity programs, said, “There is a crisis in our city.”

He said despite those programs Vallejo has seen increases in youth violence, sexually transmitted diseases and incarceration.

“I encourage you to help us,” Davis told the students. “I need you to participate, to tell us what needs to be done.”

Reminding the students that they don’t just compete for jobs with the person sitting next to them, but against those in other countries in the world’s global economy and its search for educated, qualified and skilled employees.

Vallejo police Capt. Jim O’Connell described a 1999 case in which one young Vallejo man killed a close friend in a dispute about a $5 gambling debt.

It’s a case, he said, that has continued to bother him. “It was so senseless.”

But similar crimes continue in his city — 26 murders, a third of which are gang-related and stemming from people still unable to resolve disputes peacefully, as well as nearly the same amount of attempted murders, 275 deadly weapon assaults and 400 armed robberies reported last year.

With Thompson’s help, Vallejo police had a gun buyback event that removed 344 weapons off the street — enough to fill a pickup truck bed, Thompson said.

O’Connell said local officials want to give youth the skills to resolve problems, as well as such opportunities as the police department’s Cadet and Explorer programs that can become pathways to college.

“There is no need for someone to be killed over a $5 debt,” he said. While offenders need to be held responsible for their actions, he said youth need mentors who can steer them away from making poor choices and instead give them the chances to do right.

“You are a huge part of that,” he said.

The Rev. Jim McCoy, pastor of Union Baptist Church, said the faith-based community also wants to help, and added that his own church is starting a program that challenges youth to “be better, and not be a bully.”

Area churches also are becoming safe havens for youth who feel overwhelmed by problems or are threatened by violence and molestation, McCoy said. Some have hot lines for youth to call when they consider committing suicide.

He worried that youth are exposed to violence through movies, and acknowledged that some students believe they must act tough so they’re not perceived as weak.

“What goes into your mind will reach your heart,” McCoy said. “We need to search collectively for another way.”

Saying there are many members of the Vallejo community worried about the city’s youth, he offered to speak with them. “I make it my priority to talk to any of you … I’m here … call me. I will be there,” he said.

Thompson concurred. “We’re here for you. We all have public numbers.”

Emari Scurlock, a Youth Partnership student intern, already is one of the students who speaks for teenagers, specifically on campaigns to reduce alcohol, tobacco and drug use as well as some of the causes of violence, health problems and other challenges her classmates face in a program that has identified dangerous places in Vallejo.

“Education and academics are important,” she said.

Rizal Aliga, a Bethel law academy member who also has been a leader of the Vallejo Youth Commission, said Vallejo needs to identify the social, economic, education and cultural needs of its students and address such threats as delinquency and drug use.

It needs to outline the programs that counter the negative activity, and promote them, he said.

Just as important, he added, youth need to advise Vallejo’s government as well as other organizations and agencies in the city.

“Vallejo needs all of us, especially the youth, to get involved,” Aliga said.

Vallejo’s United School District’s governing board already has adopted some of the methods advocated by the Youth PROMISE Act, Hazel Wilson, a board member, said. “We’re already committed to a pathway to college, not prison,” she said. “We have full-service community schools.”

She said those schools provide up to three meals a day for students who need them, as well as health care — including mental health services — and family support.

The district has organized specialty academies like the law academy that, as it grows, is expected to produce high school students qualified as paralegals. It also has schools with Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) programs that soon will be offered in the lower grades.

“We want schools to be safe,” Wilson said, explaining that school resource officers need to be trained to address contemporary problems, and shouldn’t be counted on as the only solution. A “positive behavior” program is an additional approach, she said, as the district tries to promote prevention and early intervention instead of punishment.

“We’re open to listening and working with all departments and community partners,” she said.

Thompson told the students that “Schools in Vallejo are great,” and the graduates they produce “are our future leaders. You will run the businesses — and the state.”

He also told them a personal story, how he dropped out of high school after his final basketball season, presuming he’d have a sports career. Unable to enter a community college, he joined the U.S. Army — something a modern high school dropout no longer can do — and found himself fighting in Vietnam.

While in the Army, Thompson got his equivalency diploma, and once back in the U.S. he entered a community college, received a California State University degree and went on to complete graduate school. Along the way, he returned to high school to complete the last two courses needed for an actual diploma, which he earned just before being awarded a master’s degree.

“The way you’re doing it is a lot smarter. You get more opportunity to do it the right way,” he said.