By Carol Pogash
San Francisco Examiner, September 5, 1973
"They can break into a car, drive it to a garage and have it stripped and ready to sell in a couple of hours. These kids are skilled and intelligent." -- Richard Hall, a Mullen Avenue resident talking about his neighbors.
The Brothers and Sisters of Mullen Avenue have never been ordinary neighbors.
Five years ago these Bernal Heights adolescents, related by street address alone, ripped off their neighbors with greater regularity than they sauntered into school.
While classrooms still hold little attraction and sporadic ripping off continues on virgin turf, the teenagers feelings about themselves, their neighbors and their futures have changed.
New Neighbors
The difference was precipitated by new neighbors who shed the classification of stereo and bicycle owners and took on the responsibility of free-wheeling family.
"Today," said 19-year-old David Saunders, "we're a group of kids that just, like, pretty much care about each other like brothers and sisters."
This new-found relationship extends the length of Mullen Avenue, a narrow 15 m.p.h. street that shoots off Alabama Street and makes a drunken S-curve up a steep incline.
"Very Cosmopolitan"
In the 70 or so pastel stuccos and modified gingerbread houses live white, black, Latino, Chicano, Filipino, Cajun, Chinese, and Samoan families in harmony that would make the School District blush.
"We're very cosmopolitan," beams Mrs. Nellie Saunders, David's mother and a teacher's aide.
The Mullen Avenue residents, she said, "eat with each other, party with each other, and when we're in trouble, we help each other out."
"The struggle goes on," explained Richard Hall, a writer and carpenter. "People are constantly in and out of jail. One of our boys was just released from city prison for the eighth time. He spent two days in a half way house and now he's on the streets junking again." But Richard is sympathetic. "These young men are compelled to steal," he said.
Struggle Together
As long as this very heavy problem goes on, Mullen Avenue adults and kids will continue to struggle together.
This sense of caring developed when two families with social consciences and a love of kids bought homes on Mullen Avenue.
Some time after they moved in, the teenagers withdrew from their Precita Park hangout for the warmer security of the Hall home and that of Peter Wiley, an anti-war activist and cab driver, and his wife Carole, a bluegrass singer involved in community projects in Bernal Heights.
At first the relationship was anything but magnetic.
When Richard and his wife Della, a public school teacher, moved in four years ago their three bicycles and two car radios were stolen in a fortnight.
Made Some Changes
"If you went outside and said "'Who stole my s---?' you were met with blank faces," Richard explains. "It was either pick up and move or make some fast changes." So Richard and Della made some changes.
The kids who earlier had cased their house were invited in. The garage of the Hall house was made into the Mullen Avenue club house. Known as B5, after the maximum security college at Juvenile Hall, the club house became the hub of local activity. Two years later it was closed because, according to one member, "Things got too funky."
While coaxing kids to stay out of trouble, the Wileys and the Halls helped those already in it to get out of jail.
"Police Knocking"
"The police used to be knocking on my door all the time," said the sweet-faced Mrs. Margaret Simon. But lately, she said, the neighborhood has become "the way it's supposed to be."
"The boys who used to rip everyone off" don't any longer, because, said Karen Pacheco, 17, "we get down on them if they do."
The Brothers and Sisters provides more than pressure.
A boy with a needle infection who? afraid to tell his parents is taken by friends to the hospital emergency ward; a 19-year-old who never learned how to count is taught how to dial a phone; young women with active sexual lives are given birth control information; anyone who wants it is tutored for free.
"Give a Damn"
This summer the adults found jobs for teenagers.
"We give a damn," said Richard, a gentle man with strong beliefs.
"We recognize them as valuable people even if they don't," he said. "The sheer nerve and determination it takes to do an illegal act is greater than what it takes to do a nine to five job."
The kids appreciate the support. "If you want to get up our steps, two people have to move over," said Della.
"I can trip around The City, but when I come back to my neighborhood I'm coming back to my family," explained Doris Ruiz, 17, who with her girl friend Karen plans to leave home next year and get her own apartment on Mullen Avenue.
This unique familial form of social work "is no accident," said the graceful Carol Wiley. "It's a conscious endeavor."
During the last two years the get-togethers have been regularized and politicized.
"No Accident"
"He's got Mullen Avenue in his pocket," said Mrs. Saunders about her son David's allegiance to the group.
Every Monday night about 20 kids, the Wileys and the Halls get together to plan their next escapade.
The unnervingly democratic event lacks the order of a boy scout meeting. Parliamentary procedure is kept by anyone who wants it. A child's hammer knocked against a brass belt buckle replaces a gavel or conch.
Backpacking
With financial support from the San Francisco Citizens League, the Brothers and Sisters have gone backpacking in Los Padres National Forest, hiking in Olema and tide pooling in Princeton.
Last Sunday 60 kids and parents bused across the Bay to Lake Temescal. For some, it was their first trip to the East Bay.
"Pretty darn great," said Mrs. Marian Howard, a widow and USO volunteer. Sitting beside her diminutive dog Susie, she said her son Daniel was "talking about his next job, something he didn't care about before."
"Mellowest Place"
"Mullen Avenue is the mellowest place I've ever run into," said Manuel "Spain" Rodriguez, an underground cartoonist who lives on the block.
Mullen Avenue fills in where the city leaves off.
"San Francisco has limited activities for teenage kids," said Richard. "They're going through heavy body and head changes, and The City refuses to recognize it."
"It gives me a sense of security," said Doris about her group. Without it, she said, "I just wouldn't be me."