"The Heart's Explosion on the World"

In light of the Seltzer scandal, if you're hankering for good news on L.A. gang intervention programs, see the latest post by Luis Rodriguez, whose memoir of having been an actual member of an actual gang is called Always Running:  La Vida Loca:  Gang Days in L.A.  It looks like real community-based intervention alternatives--including education, job training, re-entry programs, spiritual/faith opportunities, and arts programs--have been approved by the L.A. City Council and will soon be implemented in poor and working-class communities of color in L.A. 

Check out Rodriguez's lovely book Hearts and Hands:  Creating Community in Violent Times, which Rodriguez wrote "to convey the complexity of working with youths . . . most people would rather write off, but who are intelligent, creative, and quite decent. . . .  Given other circumstances, these young people might have been college graduates, officeholders, or social activists." 

I love it that the Community Engagement Advisory Committee included the arts in their model.  "Art is the heart's explosion on the world," writes Rodriguez.  "There is probably no more powerful force for change in this uncertain and crisis-ridden world than young people and their art."