NO SAFETY NET NEAR SCHOOLS PROSECUTORS GOING TO CAMPUSES AS GANG CRIME PROBLEM GROWS.

Byline: RACHEL URANGA and RICK ORLOV Staff Writers

With nearly 300 attacks near San Fernando Valley schools in 2006 and three gang-related shootings in the past month, police and LAUSD officials said Thursday that they need to boost crime-fighting efforts around local campuses.

Two teens were shot outside Grant High on Jan. 9, while a 19-year-old was wounded Jan. 16 in a drive-by shooting outside Sylmar High.

And just after noon Wednesday, a 17-year-old student was killed in a gang-related shooting a block from Monroe High School in Van Nuys -- an incident that triggered renewed calls for more and better programs to steer Los Angeles teens away from violence.

``The children are the victims in this,'' Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent David Brewer III said in a phone interview. ``You have to try and solve this in the community. This is more than just (adding) police.''

In his three months as head of the nation's second-largest school district, Brewer has pledged to work with Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to reduce violence by gangs, whose members number some 40,000 in the city.

Villaraigosa himself has said he will release an anti-gang plan later this month, while City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo on Thursday announced a pilot program that he hopes will quell violence in schools.

School administrators say help cannot arrive soon enough.

``It doesn't matter if you are a rich or poor area. The fact ... is that (gang crime) is escalating in the Valley, and while the crime is not on campus, it takes some of our students,'' said Janis Fries-Martinez, principal of Polytechnic High School in Sun Valley, where a class of adults learning English was robbed by two masked gunmen Wednesday night.

Martinez has hired six security guards and two off-track teachers to help secure the high school campus that serves 4,600 students.

According to figures provided Thursday by the Los Angeles Police Department, 293 violent incidents -- homicides, robberies or aggravated assaults -- were reported near high schools in 2006.

Officials said there were 33 incidents near Sylmar High -- the most for any Valley school. Five shootings were reported near San Fernando High, two near Taft High in Woodland Hills, and one each near Reseda, Sylmar and Monroe high schools.

Sylmar High was the site of a shooting earlier this month in which a 19-year-old graduate was wounded. Authorities said the victim might have been targeted because he had enlisted in the Army to escape the gang life.

It's just that type of activity Delgadillo hopes to discourage by assigning city prosecutors to local schools.

Markham Middle School, a campus in South Los Angeles that seven gangs claim as their territory, will get the first prosecutor. The program will be expanded to two Valley high schools within the next month.

``We are working with the school district on which schools this should work at,'' Delgadillo said at a news conference, adding that prosecutors will be able to better coordinate various programs that are in operation to combat gangs.

City and L.A. Unified officials already have an established partnership in fighting crime. Penalties are increased for crimes committed within 1,000 feet of any school in the ``safe schools zone'' program, created two years ago after 15-year-old Delish Allen was caught in gang crossfire near Locke High in South Los Angeles.

``There are efforts that are already under way and need to be strengthened,'' said Deputy Chief Michel Moore, who oversees the LAPD's Valley Division.

``As the mayor and our elected officials and civil and social leaders rally to this cause, as a public we need to challenge. There need to be strategies that are holistic, that are not overly centered on suppression or overly centered on intervention.''

rachel.uranga(at)dailynews.com

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