Troubled Venice Center Seeks Site to Resume Lunch Program

The St. Joseph’s Center in Venice is searching for new headquarters for its free-lunch program, which survived a firebombing earlier this year only to be closed because of health code violations reported by angry neighbors.

Rhonda Meister, the co-director of St. Joseph’s, a Catholic charity organization, said the center will resume its lunch service as soon as it finds a building or a vacant lot fairly close to the beach, where much of Venice’s homeless population lives.

“We’re searching for a facility that will participate with us, or a vacant lot to put a trailer on so people can come in and eat with dignity,� Meister said. “People who used our program are coming back and telling us that they’re hungry and they’re eating out of garbage cans.�

Meister said the center, which has closed its doors voluntarily in June, provided the community’s biggest free-lunch service. Under the 3-year-old program, about 150 needy people a day received brown-bag lunches consisting of peanut butter-and-jelly sandwiches, fruit and coffee.

Most of the food had been prepared at area churches and homes since February, when St. Joseph’s food distribution center, at 370 Rose Ave., was gutted in an arson fire. By allowing unlicensed volunteers to prepare the food, however, St. Joseph’s violated county health department laws.

One of the people who reported the violations was Pearl White, a community activist and leader of the Oakwood Community Center. White said she opposed the service because it drew undesirables into the neighborhood.

“People were using our yards for bathrooms and sleeping in the street,� White said. “It was making the neighborhood angry and it was setting a bad example for our young. Some people around there are downright criminals, and they’re going over there to get handouts.�

The opposition of White and other neighbors touched off a stormy controversy in Venice. In a series of meetings held before the center’s closure, a small group of neighbors charged that the free-lunch program was detrimental to the community, and even racist.

Council Sides With Center

“I feel that white people have come in and taken over,� said White. “They’re busing people in and dumping them on Oakwood. All we’re trying to do is give our black people a break. We want to help poor people, but we want poor people to help themselves too.�

The Venice Town Council, a resident organization, sided with St. Joseph’s in the dispute. In a recent editorial in the Free Venice Beachhead, council member Patrick McCartney accused White of exaggerating the problem and said the feud threatened to “deprive the poorest in our community of food and health care.�

Also Runs Thrift Shop

Others are also supporting St. Joseph’s, an organization that runs a thrift shop and a women’s center in Venice in addition to its food service.

Vera Davis, the director of the Low Income and Elderly United-Community Assistance Project (LIEU-CAP), said St. Joseph’s problems have been caused by a “disruptive� element in the community. She disputed the notion that the program attracts undesirables to the Oakwood area of Venice.

“Each community needs services for the poor,� Davis said. “And I think most people in the community feel that this is a good service. Also, it’s not drawing people from that far away. You’re not going to have someone come from downtown to get a peanut butter-and-jelly sandwich.�

“Some people just frown on the poor. They say that poor people are lazy and they steal. The fact is that nobody stopped to realize that these people are human, and it’s an age-old problem. . . . When people give of themselves to help others, I don’t see how anybody can oppose that.�

Davis’ organization has been handing out a limited number of lunches since St. Joseph’s closed. But most community leaders agree that the Venice area, a magnet for homeless people and transients for many years, sorely needs a large-scale service such as the one St. Joseph’s provided.

Mary Lee Gray, the senior deputy to Supervisor Deane Dana, called St. Joseph’s “one of the finest� agencies she has worked with. Gray said Dana’s office has offered the center $10,000 to purchase a mobile food unit. Like Davis, she blamed a small faction for the center’s problems.

‘Unique Service’

“The St. Joseph’s Center provides a unique service to the Venice community,� Gray said. “If these services were not provided, the homeless people would be preying on the residents in the area. There would be more begging because the services they need to get back on their feet would not be available.�

Gray added that her office is working to ensure that any future center meets county health codes. Robert Snow, the district director for the department’s western health division, said St. Joseph’s problems are minor. Snow said the center could reopen within a couple of weeks if its new facility meets the health code and building and safety standards.

White said she would continue to oppose the center’s policies, but would not try to have it closed again if it meets health and building standards.

Meister said St. Joseph’s is anxious to resume the free-lunch program. She said the center had acted “in the best of faith� in response to community’s concerns, but would not abandon its commitment to helping to homeless.

“We believe there must be a space where we can distribute lunches to people and we’re looking for city lots that meet our specifications,� Meister said. “The problems of the homeless are not going to go away just because we don’t feed them. Trying to close the facility down so that these people won’t be attracted to the community is irresponsible and naive.�