VAN NUYS : Disabled Helpers Target Scarred Areas

Angela Myers may not be able to move the fingers on her right hand, but she proved Wednesday that her green thumb can help remove the pain of last year’s riots.

It was the first project of the new Urban Greening Project, which provides job skills for disabled people while beautifying areas blighted by the riots. Myers was one of several people who grabbed a spade and planted flowers Wednesday outside the Le Fun Cafe on Van Nuys Boulevard in Van Nuys.

“I’m hoping to get a job in horticulture,� said Myers, 25, of Burbank, who was partially disabled on her right side from a stroke in 1991. “It makes me feel so wonderful to go out and do things for other people.�

More than 25 sites along Van Nuys Boulevard have been targeted for either indoor or outdoor landscaping as part of the yearlong program, funded by a $15,000 grant from the U.S. Forest Service. It is staffed by volunteers such as Myers from the Independent Living Center of Southern California in Van Nuys, which helps people with disabilities become self-sufficient.

“This particular program was a direct response to the civil unrest from last year,� said John Ronald, a forestry program leader based in San Francisco. “What we’re in the process of doing is analyzing the whole thing and seeing how it would work in other large, urban areas.�

Tom Paniz, owner of the Le Fun Cafe, welcomed the volunteers.

“That’s one thing this area needs is a little more beautification and cleaning up,� Paniz said. “Maybe that would bring more people to the area.�

Evelyn Frye, a trainer for the Independent Living Center, said the landscaping work can be particularly satisfying.

“It’s a therapy in a way. It’s a motivation. It’s satisfying because they can actually see themselves creating something,� Frye said.

For volunteer Gary Sexton, 45, of Burbank, the satisfaction was finding a way to focus his motivation. He was a former power-line worker before he suffered brain damage in a 1980 car accident.

“This gives me a foresight of what I can do,� Sexton said.