WHEN the War on Poverty was declared by President Johnson and Congress in 1964 most Americans believed money could win the war. Trillions of dollars later our social statistics are far worse than before. Child and Family Service
in West OahuThe idealism that failed in America failed in socialist countries, too. Yes, they created jobs for almost everyone but so inefficiently that overall living standards dropped way below the Free World. Worse yet, their governments bankrupted themselves or came close (as China did) before they, too, shifted toward profit-driven market economies.
Today we have to ask if the poor and disadvantaged will be with us always. If this is a new reality, what can we do about it?
Recently I drove to the West Oahu Center of Child and Family Service on Fort Weaver Road, Ewa, now open almost seven months.
My hunch is more campuses like it may be the wave of the future.
There, on one site, are some 20 help services combined with a community center with a commercial grade kitchen and a sports site to come. These can serve residents from Ewa to Waianae for gatherings of all types. It reminds me of the role Palama Settlement played before World War II in making Honolulu better through character and family building.
At West Oahu Center a young mother came in one day to seek employment training. Within an hour it was determined she also should move into the spouse abuse shelter on the same campus.
Being able to move so easily from one help office to another, without a lot of paperwork, without even crossing a street, and within one's own community, seems tremendously attractive. Hopes are it will prove effective at combining private and public services for people who are called "customers" rather than "clients" and often pay fees.
Hopes, too, are that it can promote social wellness in the same way our Kaiser-Permanente health system promotes physical wellness by heading off as many illnesses as possible before they take hold. Ideally, both can offer more bang for the buck -- better results at lower cost.
West Oahu Center is on the site of the old Ewa Plantation Hospital. It replicates the hospital's overhanging roofs, gracefulness and soft colors. It has a goal of being even more of a community center than the old hospital.
The campus houses Hale O Ula for special education upper-grade students, Kamaaina Kids for ages 18 months to five years, support for families caring for frail adults, Healthy Start and Parents United contacts, Kapiolani Pediatric Care, employment and spouse-abuse help and a state Health Department branch office. Dialing 681-3500 can bring more details on its services.
Child and Family Service has just undergone a top-level reorganization. The new president is Geri Marullo, a registered nurse fresh from a Washington, D.C., stint as executive director of the American Nurses Association. She formerly was with the Hawaii Health Department in child-oriented programs.
CFS Board Chairman Paul Yonamine, managing director of KPMG Peat Marwick, says no major policy changes are foreseen. Rob Welch, president from 1990 until March 31, helped CFS grow from a budget of $5 million to one of $15 million and reach out to the neighbor islands. CFS now has a staff of nearly 500 plus some 250 volunteers.
Welch, a psychologist, is setting up his own private mental fitness center but remains as part-time clinical director for CFS. Yonamine says CFS wanted to keep Welch but acceded to his urge to set out on his own. "He will be a hard act to follow," Yonamine says.
My hunch is the path being blazed by the West Oahu Center will be carefully watched and widely copied if the results are as good as hoped. A mini-version already is operating at Lihue, Kauai, as Nana's House under the CFS umbrella.
A.A. Smyser is the contributing editor
and former editor of the the Star-Bulletin
His column runs Tuesday and Thursday.