REPORT: NO TROUBLE FOUND AT CENTER HALFWAY HOUSE VIOLATIONS UNTRUE.

Byline: Charles F. Bostwick Staff Writer

ACTON - A state report says investigators found no substantiation to neighbors' complaints that residents of a drug-rehabilitation halfway house trespassed, harassed them or used drugs, or that too many men are living there.

The state Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs report said that the Armenian American Christian Outreach home had six beds, the number of residents for which it is licensed, and that there was no evidence of drug use, for which the residents undergo repeated unannounced tests.

``We have all kinds of accusations, but they never (prove) true,'' Armenian American Christian Outreach President CEO Bedros Hajian said of the neighbors' complaints. ``We have nothing to hide. How can you be drunk and drugged up if you are being tested?''

Neighbors in the Peaceful Valley area outside Acton have complained to state and county officials for months that the home's residents wander through the area, harass them and are suspected of numbering more than the maximum six, among other complaints.

The state report, based on a visit and interviews done in December by a Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs investigator and a Los Angeles County fire department inspector, said there was insufficient evidence to support those allegations.

There was no one living in the sheds neighbors said were being used as living quarters, the property was clean and residents and staff said residents are driven to and from the house, not allowed to walk, the report said. Former residents return to the home during the day to attend group sessions, which is allowed by the home's state permit, the report said.

The report did fault the home's operators for failing to notify the state alcohol and drug department after the October death of a 48-year-old resident. The man had a history of hypertension and died of a heart attack, the coroner's death certificate shows.

The report also faulted the home for not having a current analysis of its water supply.

The home's operators said their clients are blamed unfairly whenever a vehicle drives fast through the area, a beer bottle is left beside a road or someone suspicious is seen in the neighborhood.

One neighbor watches the home through binoculars, another man made an obscene gesture every time he drove past for months, and someone else stops his truck late at night and shines a light on the house, the operators said.

``All we're doing is helping people here,'' said Hajian, who said about 80 percent of the organization's clients - including home residents and people counseled on the outside - succeed in kicking their addictions.

Some neighbors are receptive, the operators said. One neighbor who raises horses brought them over for residents to ride.

Hajian, a Church of the Nazarene pastor, said he started in 1993 visiting Armenian immigrants in Los Angeles County jail. The people he visited were mainly there on drug offenses, and he decided that to help them get their lives together he had to open a residential facility.

He started with a home in Mission Hills, but the program outgrew that, and he bought a two-story, four-bedroom house on seven acres outside Acton.

``They're away from the city where the drugs are,'' Hajian said of the rural location. ``I didn't know there were methamphetamine manufacturers here at that time.''

Some of the men have been sent by courts, and others come in on their own off the streets, operators said. They said the home doesn't accept men with serious criminal records, but have taken in clients convicted of drunk driving, petty theft and spouse abuse.

The clients are predominantly Armenian immigrants or of Armenian descent, but the home takes in people of other nationalities and races as well.

Clients spend about six hours a day in group discussions, counseling and Bible study and also do chores around the property and hobbies like woodworking. Portraits of Armenian heroes are painted on the wall in the home's meeting room.

Clients who test positive for drugs or who fail to obey home rules are kicked out, operators said. Terminated clients are driven to the Acton Metrolink station and put on a train to Los Angeles.

``We physically take them from here, so they don't walk down the road: take him to the station, put him on the train, send him to Los Angeles, notify the court the same day,'' said Mike Gasparian, assistant director.