'HOW EVERYBODY PULLED TOGETHER'.

Byline: Carol Rock Staff Writer

SANTA CLARITA - More than 700 people who were jolted from their homes the morning of Jan. 17, 1994, were living in four American Red Cross shelters by sundown that day.

Five days after the Northridge Earthquake, numbers decreased to 591, with the Santa Clarita Valley Boys and Girls Club in Newhall packed at capacity, with 160 people inside and 110 camping outside. Those outside were mostly Latinos from countries with building standards significantly less stringent than those found in Los Angeles County.

With families afraid to return to buildings checked out by building inspectors, officials sent bilingual counselors to the park the reassure the campers and shelter occupants that it was, indeed, safe to go home again.

The Red Cross also delivered meals to the area's 20 mobile home parks, many of them severely damaged, with homes shaken from their foundations or supports driven through the floors.

Nancy Albrecht, a Red Cross volunteer since 1988, says she remembers that morning as if it were yesterday.

``I was in bed when it happened and said to myself, OK, this is what all the training is for,'' Albrecht said. ``But I really wanted a cup of coffee, so I made that my goal before I made my way over to the Red Cross office. I had no idea what I was going to find on the way over or when I got there.

``The pipes had broken in the Emergency Operations Center, so we were in the radio room sitting ankle-deep in water. Probably not the safest thing to do, but there was a job to do and we did it. I was there until close to midnight - we had no heat, no electricity, but a generator to keep the radios going.''

After that, Albrecht was assigned as a shelter manager at Canyon High School. The location was close to her home, but the assignment kept her so busy that she didn't get to clean up the debris in her own house until two weeks after the disaster, when the shelter at the high school closed.

``I was there at least 12 hours a day,'' she explained. ``What a lot of people don't understand is that, for about three days, we are on our own. National Red Cross agencies are going to do the best they can to get here and help, but we are there, even though we're local volunteers who are victims ourselves, until they can arrive.''

Albrecht still serves her occasional two-week stint as a duty officer on the disaster response team, on call around the clock. But she'd like to see more people involved in the training courses, especially now when things are calm.

``Right after an event, everybody takes the courses and there are huge meetings with lots of people there, but when it's not exciting any more, interest goes away,'' she said.

Jim Ventress, executive director of the local Boys and Girls Club, has vivid recollections of the weeks surrounding the earthquake. As the administrator of the largest facility used as a Red Cross shelter in the Los Angeles area, he saw the community's perception of the club change from just a place for kids to a haven for intergenerational and unilateral caring.

Just months before the quake, Ventress had offered the club as a shelter should facilities at neighboring Hart High fill up.

After the quake, he traveled remote canyon roads to the club house, and, by the time he arrived, volunteers had set up 283 beds in the activity center and gymnasium. He estimated 400 more people were camped out in the park surrounding the building.

With no power, generators were used to make meals for the 800 people who came to the shelter the first few nights. Food came from Burger King; chefs from the Hilton Garden Inn in Valencia came over to cook, and the Red Cross was able to serve three meals a day. Broadcast appeals brought community members with diapers and other special needs, especially because three newborns were sheltered with their families in the club; other community volunteers brought water and supplies. ``We were open for 3 1/2 weeks,'' Ventress said.

``What really hit home for me was to see our teenagers react with the shelter residents,'' he said. ``The first three days, we had a lot of seniors inside; some of them had lost their walkers. Our kids would carry these seniors from the vans to their beds or carry them to the restroom. It was beautiful to see.''

There was one mother that Ventress had to convince to bring her family inside when there was room; she and her family had been sleeping a tent and the children wanted to come inside.

``This one mom could not speak English, and her kids were interpreting,'' he said. ``I went outside to see her, and by her tent she had a candle and a picture of the Virgin Mary. She just didn't want to come in, but we convinced her to come and look around. First I showed her the lights with the safety chains, then a window that had come out of the frame but didn't break. But the crowning touch was a sign just outside my office door. When the kids read it to her 'God Is On Our Board of Directors,' that seemed to reassure her.

``She and the family moved inside that night.''

If it happened again, Ventress said, the club is ready to respond the same way.

``It was just amazing to see how everybody pulled together,'' he said. ``Nothing else was important. Every now and then, something needs to happen to remind us to count our blessings every day.''

Carol Rock, [phone]

carol.rock(at)dailynews.com