ANTI-GANG MENTOR NEEDS WHEELS.

Byline: DENNIS McCARTHY

SAN FERNANDO - His 1987 Ford Taurus station wagon has more than300,000 miles on it, the transmission is ready to go, and it'll be a miracle if it passes the smog test later this month when the registration comes due.

But Brother Skippy and his old ride keep on rolling along on a shoestring.

An odd way for one of the most important men in the northeast San Fernando Valley to be getting around. You'd think the city would be sending a limo for him.

Everyone who knows the score in this pocket of the city where gang tension and violence are starting to percolate again knows no one is doing more to keep the peace on these streets than 68-year-old Fermin Rivera, known warmly as Brother Skippy.

``He's an old-timer who came up the hard way, which means gangs, drugs and a lot of prison time when he was a young man,'' says Blinky Rodriquez, who as executive director of the nonprofit Communities In Schools organization in North Hills has been at the forefront of efforts to bring gang peace to the Northeast Valley.

With the recent spate of gang-related shootings shaking that truce, old- timers like Rivera are more important than ever to get it back on track, he says. ``Skippy comes at them (gang members) a different way than most, through the heart,'' Rodriquez says. ``He tells them about all the lies he bought into as a youngster, just like the ones they're buying into now.''

That old car of his takes him to Juvenile Halls, work camps, jails and straight to the homes of second- and third-generation gang members following in the footsteps of their fathers and grandfathers, says Rudy Trujillo, pastor of Praise Chapel in San Fernando, which has an active anti-gang young ministry.

``Skippy's such a tremendous asset to this community,'' Trujillo says. ``He reaches a lot of kids being raised in a gang mentality. Many of them have heard about him from their fathers and grandfathers.''

Heard about the tough, San Fernando kid growing up in the '50s nicknamed Skippy by an aunt after a popular, naughty boy character in the funny pages.

Skippy Rivera, though, went far beyond naughty.

``I became a gangbanger, drug addict, a criminal, a real boogeyman to a lot of people,'' he said Wednesday morning, getting ready to pick up some day-old bread and bakery items to deliver to homebound seniors and poor people in his neighborhood.

He does that, too, in addition to giving these people rides to the hospital or grocery store in that old car of his, says Victor Ortega, youth ministry director at Praise Chapel.

``By the time I was 35, I had already been in prison in three different states, and had nothing but a bad reputation,'' Skippy continued. ``I was sick and tired, then I found God.''

It was 1968, the last time he walked out of prison for good, came home to San Fernando, and became Brother Skippy to a whole new generation of local kids heading down the same road he had already traveled.

``These kids know I've been there so they hear me,'' he says. ``Gangs bring nothing but misery. They bring torment to mothers, early deaths and prison time.

``I don't try to tickle their ears, I tell them the way it is. When they fall in prison, they'll be cryin' for their mamas, but it will be too late.

``It's a dirty, no good life - gangbanging and drug dealing,'' Brother Skippy says, sliding behind the wheel of his old car Wednesday, ready to roll along on a shoestring again.

You know it's funny, says Ortega. At first glance, Skippy is often dismissed as someone's grandfather who has seen better days.

``But you give him a minute . . .,'' Ortega says.

Give him a minute and you meet one of the most important men living in the Northeast Valley today.

But if that old car of his dies, which it will soon, a lot of people living in this community are going to suffer. So the people over at Praise Chapel are hoping for a little holiday miracle for Brother Skippy.

A donated car. It would be accepted by the Praise Chapel International San Fernando Youth Ministry, a nonprofit organization, and a receipt will be provided for tax purposes, Ortega says.

For more information, you can reach the ministry at [phone].

CAPTION(S):

photo

Photo:

Pastor Rudy Trujillo, left, and Fermin ``Brother Skippy'' Rivera stand outside Praise Chapel in San Fernando, where they work to keep young people from getting involved with the downward spiral of gang life.

Phil McCarten/Staff Photographer