Richard Vasquez, the mentor coordinator for the San Benito
County Probation Department, is seeking out community members who
want to have a positive impact on the lives of local youths.
Richard Vasquez, the mentor coordinator for the San Benito County Probation Department, is seeking out community members who want to have a positive impact on the lives of local youths.
Vasquez, who retired as a Hollister police captain in June, started working on the foundation of a mentor program last summer and set up for the first pairings in September. Now he is looking for more mentors to expand the program. The goal of the program is to increase the number of positive role models juveniles on probation have in their lives and to offer support to them in making positive decisions. He is looking for men and women from a variety of career fields who are willing to make a six-month to a year-long commitment.
When he worked with the police department, he was involved with a program that offered a mentoring component to at-risk youth.
“During my time doing impact, I noticed a lot of kids raised by single parents,” he said. “I had Brent (Cardall, chief probation officer) look at the stats and we saw 50 percent (of students on probation) are raised by single parents – a mother, a father or even a grandparent.”
Parents or guardians will be involved in the mentor program, and Vasquez said the goal is not to replace parents, but to offer assistance to them.
“It’s not that the parents are doing a bad job,” he said. “Just a lot are struggling to put food on the table. If the kids don’t get help from positive people, they will look for it from peers. They sometimes turn to negative sources.”
The mentoring program is voluntary for the juveniles and will not be court ordered. Instead probation officers will talk with kids about the program and recommend it as an option for them.
“Sometimes when it’s court ordered, kids are resistant,” Vasquez said. “If they have the opportunity (to choose it), they are more willing to listen.”
Vasquez said the students selected for the program are kids who have made a mistake. They are not problem kids or terrible kids, he said.
“They can use another voice other than a parent,” he said.
Since September, Vasquez has paired up a handful of students with mentors, mostly people in the field of education. He is recruiting more mentors to expand the program and said it is open to those in a variety of different careers or jobs. He needs both male and female mentors, and those from all around the county. One of the key things he likes to do is pair students with mentors based on career interests.
See the full story in the Pinnacle on Friday.
