1993_03 Insight March 1993

              March 3,1993
Page 9
Hotline encourages conversation, coping
♦ City-wide advisors
council 35 possible
suicide victims daily.
By Cynthia Ryan	
Staff Writer
Someone *s life may have been saved
today.
The Help in Emotional Trouble
(HET) hotline receives approximately
30 to 35 calls in a 24 hour period from
people considering suicide or having
trouble coping with other serious problems.
Established in 1965 by local mental
health professionals who took calls in
their homes, the hotline started training volunteers and opened on a 24-
hour basis in 1972.
Volunteers for the hotline must participate in a rigorous 56-hour training
program.
The program includes 32 hours of
seminars by local professionals and a
24-hour internship on the line, supervised by an experienced counselor.
According to Mary Cardell. HET
director for four years and a 6-year
volunteer, approximately 9 5
percent of the vol-
rtX^
students and
the other five
percent are
concerned
community
members.
Volunteers are
expected to make
a one-year commitment to the hotline. This consists
of working one four-hour shift per
week.
Cardell said the average callers arc
38-year-old white females in low-
income situations.
"It's somebody who needs to talk.
HELP...
Something has happened in a person's
lifeand they need a non-judgemental,
non-involved ear to talk about the
problem," Carftell said.
The most likely topic of conversation, according to Cardell, involves
relationship issues.
HET does not offer
advice, but refers
callers to resources
j for help within the
community.
"Typically, if a
person has talked to
us on the line, say for
10 or 15 minutes,
they're going to gel
about four or five referrals," Cardell said.
Referrals range from
counseling and legal assistance to
housing assistance.
Michael Bence, a 23-year-old graduate student in psychology, agrees
with Cardell in that HET does not
give advice to callers.
"The way HET operates, the basic
model, is to not help the individual,
but to help them help themselves. We
don't give advice. When you give
advice you become responsible for
that advice. If it was wrong then it's
your fault."
Not only docs working on the hotline
h;lp callers, but it also gives students
valuable experience.
"An advantage of working at HET is
gaining thinking tools and learning
not only how to apply them to the
hotline but also how to apply them to
yourself and to the people with who
you interact in life," Bence said.
"HETis thfrbest experience you can
gel withoutalot of qualifications. All
you have to do is care. You have to
care and you have to want to be there."
The next training session starts June
2. Students interested in volunteering
should contact Mary Cardell at 486-
4703 or contact Michael Bence in the
psychology advising office, at 278-
5134.
Graffiti
from page 1
swamped in graffiti." Pimentel said.
"If wc don't do something they'll
bury us. It's impossible for the police
to catch these guys. They' re so short-
handed."
The profusion of graffiti in Fresno is
no longer confined to older neighborhoods a few miles from downtown.
Many store owners believe the problem has spread north in the city in just
the past few years to communities
which were once relatively graffiti-
free.
Christine Lanham, owner of One
Hour Motb Photo at First Street and
Barstow Avenue near Hoover High
School, echoes Pimcnicl's frustration.
Lanham said a month ago she arrived at work to find her store and
many others in the Hoover Marketplace covered with iridescent graffiti.
It covered not only the buildings, but
fences, mailboxes and even air conditioning units on the rooftops.
"It's frustrating because you have
so many other things to work on,"
Lanham said. "It's very tough to be a
small business. I don't need to spend
my money because some kid put paint
on the door."
The costs of cleaning up graffiti are
being borne by businesses that once
never had to plan for it.
Manco-Abbott, a property management company, attends to the Hoover
Marketplace common areas.
"In the last two years, wc had to
include a figure for graffiti removal in
our budgets which we never had to do
before," said Gloria Schcrmcrhom, a
partner in Manco-Abbott.
Schermerhom said it costs $75 to
$100 a month to clean up Hoover
Marketplace because of "tagging".
"Sometimes you have to sand blast,"
Schermerhom said. "These kids arc
really innovative. It's a mess."
"I think it's a total violation of
someone's property," Schermerhom
said.'There'sa lack of respect. I can't
see what the motivation would be."
Meanwhile, amid increasing public
anger and frustration over graffiti, the
Fresno Police Department is trying to
formulate a plan to deal with the problem.
"City Hall has received a lot of complaints," said police spokesman Sgt.
Renee Martin. "There's a high level
of frustration out there."
Martin said the police department
has put officers in the field on occasion with the specific purpose of catching "taggers" in the act, but such measures stretch already-thin police resources.
"We don't have a full-force attack,"
Martin said. "Wc don't have the
manpower. Right now we're accessing what options we do have."
One of those options, Martin said, is
assigning an officer to Neighbors
Against Graffiti, (NAG), a volunteer
neighborhood-watch organization.
Robert Qucsada, deputy city manager for inicr-govcmmenial relations,
oversees the city's graffiti special
projects program and works closely
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Quesada's office functions as a liaison between the city council and the
community. Quesada estimates that
graffiti-related issues take up 10 percent of his time.
"It's fairly obvious that the graffiti
problem is getting worse," Quesada
said. "People are so angry they feel
they have to do something about it.
They're tired of being victimized."
Quesada's department was instrumental in starling a graffiti reward
24-hour hotline. Callers can remain
anonymous and report information
regarding a graffiti act and receive a
reward for information that leads to
an arrest or restitution.
Quesada also oversees an anti-graffiti sub-committee composed of 25
citizens. Quesada said the committee
organizes four quarterly volunteer
graffiti clean-ups, the next scheduled
for March 27. The committee also has
a contract with the Fresno Unified
School District to hire school groups
to clean up graffiti. The committee
supplies the materials and some clubs
have earned S600-S700 for a
weekend's work, according to
Qucsada.
Qucsada said the committee is recommending that the city council pass
a half-cent spray paint tax on every
can. The council recently agreed to a
committee recommendation that a
full-time community service officer
be assigned to the anti-graffiti program.
"It's like any other crime we have,"
Qucsada said about "tagging". "It's
all over. It's not anything that belongs to any one social group anymore. It's crossed all socio-economic
boundaries."
Dr. Thomas Dull. CSUF criminology professor, believes "taggers" arc
economically frustrated young people
who still haven't given up hope of
attaining "the American Dream."
Dull said "tagging" is not an act of
vandalism and treating "taggers" as
criminals will only exacerbate the
problem.
"One of the reasons I don't believe
graffiti is an act of vandalism is that if
you wanted to destroy, there's a lot
(else) you could do," Dull said. "I
think the majority of people involved
in graffiti arc interested in achieving
the American Dream but a lot of them
see the opportunity of achieving that
closed to them."
Dull thinks "tagging" is an attempt
by an individual to establish a crude
form of ownership over property. He
believes the act seeks to establish a
bond for the "tagger" between himself and his'community.
Dull said the growing incidence of
graffiti in even so-called "good neighborhoods" is a symptom of the same
frustration felt by lower income individuals.
"A lot of kids in middle-class neighborhoods are wondering if they're
ever going to have a piece of the pie.
It's the same frustration that's in the
lower class," he said.
Dull said he sympathizes with frustrated store-owners hit by graffiti, but
News in brief...
Possible smoking
ban in dorms
A smoking ban in the CSUF residence halls is under discussion.
Endorsing the ban would prohibit smoking in any of the buildings, including individual rooms.
Dr. John Wetzel, director of housing, said that each ycarout of about
1,100 students, approximately 50
smoke.
Wetzel said the ventilation system in the hallsdoes not adequately
avoid the effects of second-hand
smoke and he feels now is the time
to join the smoking ban.
If approved, the ban will go into
effect in the fall.
Women's center
holds discussion
"Backlash," the best-sell ing book
by S usan Faludi, forms the basis of
a weekly discussion group at the
Women's Resource Center on the
corner of Shaw and Jackson avenues.
The group meets from noon to 1
p.m. on Fridays.
Participants may bring lunch.
Dessert will be provided by the
Women's Council (WCSU).
Contact Diana at 278^969 with
questions.
Presentation to
celebrate quilts
"Quilters" by Molly Newman and
Barbara Damashek will be presented in CSUF's John Wright
Theatre from March 19 through
the 21 and from March 24 through
the 28.
The presentation includes music
and words celebrating pioneer
women and the joys and sorrows
they experienced while travelling
West
Admission is S8 for the public,
S6 for senior citizens and S4 for
CSUF students.
For tickets and additional information, call 278-2216.
9
Teacher fair in
Tulare County
The eighth annual Tulare and
Kings counties Teacher Fair is
scheduled for March 5-6 at the
Tulare County Fairgrounds in
Tulare.
The event runs from 4-8 p.m.
Friday, March 5 and 9 a.m.-2 p.m.
Saturday, March 6.
Candidates should bring resumes
and letters of reference. No registration fee is required.
More information may be obtained from Glen Lewis, personal
administrator at the Tulare County
Office of Education Building, at
733-6306 after 5 p.m.
said that punishment will not solve
the underlying social causes behind
the act.
"I can understand someone whose
property is being damaged.of feeling
violated and wanting to strike out,"
Dull said. "(But) I think one of the
worst things you can do is arrest these
kids. Wc need to find more positive
approaches to getting individuals involved in their neighborhoods. Locking them up is a negative approach,"
the professor said.
Dull believes that incarceration reinforces in an individual the belief
that he is not a pan of the neighborhood and docs not diminish his hatred
and frustration.
"Wc can take the point of view that
they're just a bunch of hoodlums out
to destroy but it doesn't leave a lot of
solutions," Dull said. "The solutions
are not easy, but the solutions are to
increase opportunity for youth, more
jobs, more job training, education to
keep them in school. The more we can
keep them in society using legitimate
means, the less likely that they feci
they have to use illegitimate means to
acquire."
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