RETIREE'S `HOBBIES' SERVE COMMUNITY : AREA MAN FIGHTS GRAFFITI, MONITORS SAFETY AND MORE.

Byline: Victoria Giraud

Tom Haner is thoroughly enjoying his retirement and fills his time by volunteering.

``Everything I do is a hobby,'' Tom laughs as he reels off the list of activities that keep him occupied day and night.

For years now, Tom's been part of the City of Santa Clarita's Pride Committee, the Canyon Climbers 4-Wheel Drive Club, Arson Watch, the Ham Watch Unit and the Anti-Gang Unit. He's active politically and is the captain of Neighborhood Watch where he lives.

Tom's especially proud of the Pride Committee and its work cleaning up graffiti all over the area. ``The worst year was '93. We were going day and night. Now there are enough volunteers, and we have it pretty well under control.''

Carrying a sand blaster, paint and chemicals in his truck to be prepared for graffiti removal on any surface, Tom says he's ``caught more graffiti guys than anyone in the community.'' And he has lots of awards to show for it.

An irregular sleeper, Tom takes advantage of nighttime to patrol the area on his bike, ``I love the night up here. There's no traffic and I ride the bicycle trails and look for graffiti and vandals.''

Asked who the typical graffiti vandal is, Tom replied without hesitation, ``your next door neighbor.'' The first vandal he ever caught was a 10-year-old girl who lived in his neighborhood. Wearing skates, she had a paint spray can and was spraying cars and fences as well as the playground of the local school.

When Tom finally caught her, she denied her actions. Debating whether to contact her parents or tell the school janitor, he decided on the janitor, and school officials took action by calling her parents.

Graffiti is also popular with gangs, and some have threatened Tom when he caught them. He remembered photographing one young man as he was painting graffiti for his gang on electric power boxes. Tom took the photo around his neighborhood and it turned out the vandal was one of the neighborhood kids.

It took two jail sentences for the young man to learn his lesson. When he finished his first yearlong sentence, he came back and did it again. Tom likens it to a ``dog marking his territory.'' The young man was sent back to jail, and this time, he straightened out.

The Canyon Climbers is a search and rescue club that helps the Sheriff's Department. Tom likens the group to the eyes and ears for the department out looking in the mountains and canyons ``when people get lost or trapped in the snow, or sometimes when there are jailbreaks.''

Being a licensed ham radio operator has enabled Tom to help others. ``Ham is really growing. There will be 30 to 40 of us working the weekend of the cowboy festival,'' he said, referring to this weekend's Cowboy Poetry Festival sponsored by the city of Santa Clarita. ``There's only one phone line at Melody Ranch. If someone gets hurt, we can get word back to the proper authorities.''

Tom was born in Kentucky and grew up in Evansville, Ind. During the Korean War, he served as a Marine and afterward decided to stay in California. A graduate of the L.A. Trade Technical School, Tom became a mechanic and got a job working on fire trucks for the Ventura County Fire Department and later joined the Los Angeles County Fire Department. By 1978, Tom was the manager of all the L.A. County operations in charge of keeping Sheriff's and Fire department vehicles in shape.

In 1982, he retired to a quieter life in Santa Clarita, where he, his wife, Dorothy, and four children had lived since 1968.

In the late 1980s, as he was driving down Soledad Canyon Road, Tom spotted a fellow walking up a hill with a 100-pound sack of sand. ``He'd slip and fall and sand would fall out,'' Tom remembers. It turned out the man was Joe Hiltner, a lieutenant with the LAPD and one of the original members of the Pride Committee. They were working on removing graffiti.

``I had no idea what graffiti was back then,'' Tom recalled. He decided to give him a hand. ``It started then, and I haven't stopped since. Pretty soon, I was a member of so many organizations that I didn't have time for anything else.''

This grandfather of three wouldn't change anything. ``I have everything in life that I want. I want for nothing,'' Tom said. ``I can do anything I want and go anywhere I want. I look forward to everything I do.''

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Photo: (color) Volunteering for the Arson Watch is just one of the ways Tom Haner gives time to Santa Clarita.

John Lazar/Special to the Daily News