VOLUNTEERING A WAY OF LIFE IN VALLEY.

Byline: Lisa Van Proyen Correspondent

Armed with steel-wool pads and five-gallon buckets of paint, 80-year-old Panorama City resident Lefty Blasco scales walls, roofs and telephone poles in the early-morning hours each weekend to wipe out unsightly graffiti.

In nearby Van Nuys, Barbara Ausburn stocks a food pantry, Loaves and Fishes, to feed about 550 needy families monthly through generous contributions by Valley businesses.

Both of these Valley residents have a common goal: To give back voluntarily to the community in which they live.

Making volunteerism the heart of the area, they are among thousands who do such service in San Fernando Valley communities. It's no wonder that there is no shortage of nominees for the Valley's prestigious Fernando Award for volunteerism.

I can't believe how much time people give here, said Nancy Hoffman, who heads the Mid-Valley Chamber of Commerce in Van Nuys, which helps nominate Fernando Award recipients. They'll tell you no; yet they'll do it. It's almost a way that people are brought up to live.

They set examples for the whole community, not just their own family.

The annual award was created in 1959 to honor outstanding civic accomplishment in the Valley.

If you wait for somebody to pay to do things, it's not going to get done, said Rose Goldwater, 71, of Woodland Hills, who received the Fernando Award last year for her three decades of volunteer service to the Valley.

If we don't carry these traditions on, who's going to help the kids? The volunteers are the ones who roll their sleeves up and get their hands dirty.

Goldwater voluntarily oversees programs at the West Valley Boys & Girls Club. She is also a trustee on the West Hills Hospital and Medical Center board, where she helps make budgetary decisions. She also donates time to the foundation for Pierce College.

For her, volunteerism has been a way of life since she was a childhood immigrant in the United States. When she was about 9 years old, she sold U.S. defense stamps in World War II.

I really felt like the world is my family, so I wanted to give back to the world. I thought about how lucky we were to be living in this country, and it followed me through life, said Goldwater, whose family came to the United States after facing persecution of Jews in Europe.

For Blasco, the 80-year-old graffiti buster, volunteerism came with determination 15 years ago to bring respectability back to his gang-plagued neighborhood. He and two buddies battled the graffiti 16 hours each weekend.

Today, they're down to less than half that time, but their crew has grown to five who begin work at 6 a.m. Years ago, Blasco begged for paint. Today, paint contractors stop by on the road to offer it for free.

I feel terrific. I'm happy to see the place clean, he said.

In Van Nuys, Ausburn voluntarily spends about 15 hours a week searching out sources to feed and clothe hundreds of homeless and needy people each month at a food pantry off Keswick Street.

We serve however many people are there, she said.

The Mid-Valley Chamber chief executive praised Ausburn, Blasco and all the Valley volunteers for their work.

They don't just work here; they live here, Hoffman said. It's community ties. It's almost like they're an extended family. I like that small-town feeling.

CAPTION(S):

photo

Photo:

(color) Panorama City volunteer Lefty Blasco, 80, is out by 6 a.m. on weekends to paint over graffiti in his neighborhood.

David Sprague/Staff Photographer