Proposed Cuts for Poor Draw Protests : County: Social workers, activists in Canoga Park, Pacoima assail recommended reductions in health, welfare services.

Proposed budget cuts in health and welfare services triggered separate protests in the San Fernando Valley on Thursday, with social workers staging a brief walkout in Canoga Park and community activists and nurses marching in support of a Pacoima health clinic targeted for closure.

Chanting “Save the Children--They Need Doctors” and “No Layoffs,” the protesters called on the Board of Supervisors to approve Los Angeles County’s budget next week without following recommendations that include Draconian cuts in services to the poor, 5,000 layoffs and an average pay cut of 8.25% for county employees.

Also on the chopping block are 24 of the county’s 47 health care centers and clinics--including four in Pacoima, Van Nuys, Burbank and Tujunga--that would be closed if the budget proposal is approved.

County residents visited the Pacoima Health Clinic 27,000 times last year for free or low-cost pre-natal and birth control services, health officials said. If it closes after more than 40 years in the neighborhood, clients would have to visit one of the six clinics remaining in the San Fernando, Santa Clarita and Antelope valleys. The nearest one is 1 1/2 miles away in San Fernando.

Short as the distance may seem, the trip there would be a hardship for many clients who do not own a car, said Sandy Tilsen, head nurse at the Pacoima clinic.

“I walk here from five blocks away right now,” said Maricela Chavez, 21, who marched in the noontime protest despite her eight-month pregnancy. “I guess I would have to take a bus.”

But many clients would stop seeking preventive health care altogether, costing the county more in the long run to treat catastrophic health problems, such as premature births, Tilsen said. Those who do visit other clinics will wait longer for service, said Bob Frangenberg, director of the north county health network.

County officials say the cuts are necessary to patch a $600-million hole in the $13.1-billion budget, a shortfall that came about when state legislators approved plans earlier this month to transfer hundreds of millions of dollars from local governments to the state treasury to balance its budget. County officials then proposed making deep cuts in benefits and services to the poor in order to fund the Sheriff’s Department and the district attorney’s office.

Many of the 75 protesters, including attorneys from a nearby legal aid agency and members of neighborhood associations, said health care should be the county’s top priority.

“It’s more important than funding the police,” said Rev. Zedar E. Broadous, president of the Valley chapter of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People, who picketed outside the clinic with representatives of nearby homeowner associations.

The protesters gained the support of newly elected Los Angeles City Councilman Richard Alarcon, who represents Pacoima. Alarcon wrote a letter to the supervisors urging them to keep the Pacoima clinic open or face “unwanted pregnancies, lower standard of living for families, increased poverty and increased unemployment.”

Earlier Thursday morning, about 150 of the 400 employees at the Canoga Park welfare office walked out for 15 minutes to protest the proposed layoffs and salary reductions. The walkout dovetails with a countywide campaign by Local 660 of the Service Employees International Union in which workers at all 30 welfare offices leave their desks for a quarter hour on Tuesday mornings until the budget is approved.

“There is a general climate of unrest, uneasiness here,” said Mark Dunne, a union steward at Canoga Park. “What they’re proposing is an inordinate hardship.”