GRANT-WRITERS MAKE INDEPENDENT SWITCH : FIRM HELPS WOMEN FREE TIME FOR FAMILY.

Byline: Enrique Rivero Daily News Staff Writer

After 22 years with a thriving career as a Ralphs supermarkets executive, Kathy Patton reached a point two years ago where a career meant less and family meant more.

As manager of operations for the company, the Agoura Hills resident worked an average of 60 hours a week writing market analyses and in-depth reports.

But her then-3-year-old son, Weston - her first child, who she had at age 35 - was growing up fast and she feared she would miss those formative years.

``I couldn't be supermom,'' Patton said. ``It was hard for the family, it was hard on Wes, hard on my husband, and it wasn't very satisfying for me.''

Then she learned that Kristina Brook, owner of the Newbury Park-based grant-writing firm K & M Enterprises - was looking for independent contractors to write grant proposals.

Now she works an average of 20 hours a week and has more time for her family. She is one of about seven women - all former career women in their mid- to late 30s, and all relatively new mothers - who left the rat race to become independent contractors for the company.

Brook says she never intended to take these half-dozen or so women with similar such backgrounds under her wing. It just turned out that way, perhaps because of word of mouth, she said.

``It just so happens we're all in the mid- to late 30s, so we've done the career thing,'' said Brook, 35. ``Now we're starting to do the shift to motherhood and we want to find a balance where we can do our career and still have a family, which we're all committed to.

``It's not like I went out and looked for all these people,'' she said.

Brook started the company four years ago after having worked for Interface Children Family Services and the city of Inglewood's nonprofit juvenile diversion program.

K & M specializes in education, social service, juvenile justice and health care grants.

As a community service, the company also is working on a grant for the Conejo Valley Historical Society to get money to buy display cases for about 1,300 pounds of Chumash Indian artifacts unearthed about two years ago at the Chappell development near Ventu Park Road. Brook is on the society's board.

K & M Enterprises has racked up an impressive record in its four years - about 80 percent or 90 percent success, Brooke says, explaining that of eight grants the firm applied for last year, all were funded.

The first woman to come aboard was Michele Fortney-Leach. Leach also had worked at Interface and Brook knew she had formidable writing skills.

At the time, Brook says, Fortney-Leach had two preschool-age children.

``I was getting swamped with work and I said, `Could you help me?' '' Brook recalled.

Fortney-Leach obliged, and since then other women have joined K & M's force.

``Now more and more women happen to be hearing about what I'm doing,'' Brook said. ``I don't know why men haven't talked to me about it. It's not like I'm going out and looking for all these women.''

Patton said she's much more fulfilled at her job than she was during her executive years. Now she's doing something she believes in - helping secure grants that help people - while still having ample time to be with her family.

Yes, she took a major cut in pay - she estimates she earns about one-third her previous salary.

``But I'm working two-thirds less time, so it's equitable,'' she said.

And she's particularly proud of her own track record in getting grants. ``I've had a 100 percent hit rate on every grant I've ever written - in this business it just doesn't happen,'' she said.

Overall, she's found that balance between career and family that Brook said so many women want.

``I'd been searching and searching and trying to figure out what I wanted to do for so long,'' Patton said. ``I fell in Kristina's lap, or she fell into mine - I don't know which. It was like a godsend.''

And Brook herself is about to fit her contractors' collective profiles more closely - she's expecting her first child in October.

``We're really excited about this - we waited a long time for this,'' she said.

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Photo: (color) Kathy Patton, left, with her son, Wes, is gl ad she found Kristina Brook's K & M Enterprises.

Joe Binoya/Special to the Daily News