Senator George Runner
Serving the 17th District which incorporates portions of the Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Ventura and Kern counties.

Suppose your car needs repairs. After paying money to a mechanic, it’s still broken. Would you be foolish enough to pay the mechanic a second time? Most customers would try something different rather than waste money on a solution that fails to solve the problem. Yet throwing good money after bad is exactly what happened when the City of Los Angeles continued to fund the LA Bridges program, despite the well-known misappropriation of money by the non-profit organization.

In a 10-year-period, the City of Los Angeles has spent more than $100 million dollars on LA Bridges (which is supposed to allocate funds to various youth and anti-gang programs aimed at steering vulnerable youths away from the gang lifestyle) without producing one single success story.

Good intentions aside, without accountability taxpayer funds have been misused, and in some cases, used for criminal activity. Such was the case for the millions of dollars spent on “No Guns,” a program funded by LA Bridges and run by Hector Marroquin, a “former” gang member.

It turns out that as the City of Los Angeles continued to fund this program, Marroquin used city funds to give jobs to his wife and two kids at the program while also using his position to continue criminal gang activities, undermining the very goals that he was supposed to fight for. He received an eight-year-sentence for illegally selling assault weapons to FBI investigators earlier this year. His son is on trial for home invasion, and his daughter is being investigated for her involvement in a homicide.

Los Angeles taxpayers should be outraged by the abuse of power and money and saddened by the thousands of youths who did not benefit from LA Bridges.

By creating the Early Intervention, Accountability and Rehabilitation Commission, Proposition 6 would reform existing practices of funding anti-gang programs. Quite simply, the commission would audit every taxpayer funded anti-gang programs for quality and effectiveness.

I have always maintained that California cannot arrest its way out of the gang crisis it currently faces. After-school sports activities; violence prevention programs; job training and rehabilitation all play necessary and vital roles in tackling this problem. At-risk youths need an alternative to gang activity, and people returning from prison need opportunities to lead a law-abiding life.

So let’s fund programs to improve gang and crime problems and turn lives around; but let’s make sure these programs are accountable to taxpayers and the people they are supposed to help.

Proposition 6 will bring accountability to anti-gang programs and that’s why I urge you to vote yes on Proposition 6 in November.

George Runner is a co-author of Proposition 6. As a champion of public safety, Runner co-authored California’s Jessica’s Law and Amber Alert. He represents California’s 17th Senate District, which includes the High Desert of Los Angeles and San Bernardino Counties and sections of Ventura County. For more information, visit: www.SafeNeighborhoodsAct.com