OXNARD : Honoree Overcame His Troubled Youth

Like many teen-agers who fall in with the wrong crowd, Victor Lopez dropped out of high school and got into trouble. He also fathered a son whom he rarely saw.

Now, five years later, Lopez is an attentive father who is being recognized for outstanding achievement.

The 21-year-old Oxnard man will be honored today by a Ventura County program aimed at helping welfare recipients find jobs. A student at Ventura College, Lopez has maintained a 3.32 grade-point average while raising his son, Johnny, now 5, as a single parent.

“He came to the program motivated, and that’s an inward thing--nobody can give that to you,” said Laura Zavala, a social worker with the program, which is known as Greater Avenues for Independence.

Lopez has equal praise for the program, which requires able-bodied parents receiving Aid to Families With Dependent Children to find a job or take classes that will lead to work.

“Without the program, I would never have gotten my education,” Lopez said. “Now, I have a better chance than the chance I would have had without going to school.”

Lopez plans to receive his accounting certificate this spring, and he hopes that will lead to work as an accounting clerk. But he won’t be on his own. The program offers job search services for participants.

“It still is hard, even with the help” of the program, he said.

Lopez started high school but did not finish ninth grade, he said. He dropped out in 1986 and had a son the next year, but he didn’t help raise the child, and his lifestyle didn’t change, he said.

“I was too busy partying, I guess,” he said. “I just denied everything. I never thought about it.”

All that changed after Lopez spent two months in Juvenile Hall for underage drinking, a stay prompted by a phone call his mother made when he was 17.

“I lost myself somewhere, and Juvenile Hall woke me up,” Lopez said.

The next year, Lopez learned that his toddler son was in foster care. After working to show the court that he could be a good father, the 19-year-old Lopez was granted custody of the boy, then 3.

Lopez lives with his mother, Carmen Lara, who helps take care of Johnny. That and the help of his girlfriend, June Santos, make it easier for Lopez to make the weekday trip to school and find the time to study, he said.

The program has about 1,500 participants, with roughly the same number of eligible clients on a waiting list, hoping to take advantage of the job training and education, officials said.

Lopez was among the program’s best, Zavala said. “Every social worker who has worked with him has commented on the fact that he’s very capable and he can succeed on any track he chooses,” she said.