- Welcome to Inland Edition, where this season we're having conversations [light background music] with people who represent nonprofit organizations working to make the Inland Empire a better place.

My name is Joe Richardson.

I'm an Inland Empire resident, an attorney, and your host.

And today, we're gonna chat with Chris Burns, the CEO of Boys Republic.

Boys Republic and Girls Republic are private, nonprofit, non-sectarian schools and treatment communities for troubled youth, with campuses located across Southern California, including Chino Hills.

Founded in 1907, it has helped more than 32,000 at-risk teenage boys and girls find, within themselves, the resources and skills to lead productive, fulfilling lives.

Chris Burns joined Boys Republic in 1993 as a caseworker and became the executive director in 2010.

He is an avid proponent of the nonprofit's "Nothing Without Labor" philosophy, firmly believing it fosters responsibility and accountability, and resulting in the youth served by Boys and Girls Republic taking ownership and responsibility for themselves and their lives, including their past actions and their futures.

Let's meet him and learn more about the Boys Republic mission and its effect on our community.

[soft piano music] ♪ [gentle upbeat music] ♪ ♪ ♪ - [Joe] Alright!

And doing the community well, I've got from Boys Republic, Chris Burns.

How are you today, sir?

- I'm great.

Thank you for the invitation.

- I'm glad that you're here.

We're real excited about these nonprofits that we get to focus on.

So, what is the first thing that you would want someone to know about Boys Republic?

- Oh, gosh.

There's so many things.

I'd probably say, Boys Republic?

We're actually boys and girls.

So, I usually want folks to know that we serve both.

But, it's mostly that we're trying to make an impact with at-risk teenage youth and propel them in a much more positive direction than the manner in which they came to us.

- Now, you have been there for a minute!

- I have.

- [Joe] 31 years?

- Yes.

I'm in my 31st year right now.

- So, how did you guys converge?

- [Chris] So, yeah.

I've gotta be honest.

It was a bit of an accident.

I grew up in Chino Hills before it was a city, so I knew of Boys Republic.

And my employer, as I worked through high school and college, knew the organization and the executive director, and he knew what I was studying and thought, you know, he pushed me and nudged me that way.

I started working there while I had my master's degree and was working on a doctorate.

And, thought it was gonna be a step on the way to private practice or something along the way.

But, I got hooked.

I just-- I found that what we were doing in a 24-hour residential setting, I wasn't seeing replicated anywhere else.

I'd worked in college counseling centers and private practices and hospitals, and there wasn't the amount of change and the amount of impact anywhere I was learning like I was experiencing at Boys Republic.

- So, 24-hour residential setting.

Tell me how Boys Republic comes across its "clients?"

Is that what we call them?

How did they come across them?

- Yeah.

We say clients; we say students.

So, the youth that come to us, they come from a variety of backgrounds, essentially in need.

They've been struggling academically.

There might be some family turmoil.

But, the single unique factor that gets them specifically to us is they made a decision that got 'em in front of a judge.

So, judge made-- makes the determination that they need more than they can, that they can be served within the community.

So, they're given the opportunity to go into a residential placement like ours, where we've got schooling, and counseling, and vocational training, and family work, and things designed to really repackage, you know, their life and their choices in a way that they can go back home and be far more successful.

- Okay, great.

And so, give me a sense for the age profile.

Who is the profile of the person that ends up being your client/student?

- We're essentially high school age.

So, we'll go a little low to 13 and they can be in our main program.

They can turn 19 there.

And then, we have some transitional housing programs for youth that they can go into their early 20s.

Ultimately, because kids in the child welfare system historically have been at greatest risk for ending up homeless.

So, I've been fortunate to be part of an organization that's been-- had great deal of foresight and willing to do things that weren't already in the system.

So, 25 years ago, they built a transitional housing complex before the world became as aware it is right now of just how big the homeless problem is, especially for child welfare youth.

- So, tell me about your site.

It sounds like you've got some other things and it sounds like to me that the girls component is at a different site, but you still use the main site with them.

So, let's talk about the sites.

- Okay.

We're blessed.

Our founder found this little piece of property, 200 acres in Chino Hills, back in-- we were founded in 1907 and came to that property in 1909.

On that property is a full public high school.

Necessary small school, so only a hundred to 150 youth there at any given time.

Cottages that the students live in?

A variety of just sort of functional administrative buildings.

One of the real unique aspects is we really focus on vocational training, career technical ed.

And so, in the last few years we built a teaching culinary center there.

There's a indoor and outdoor masonry classroom and a variety of things.

We're blessed with athletic facilities that we share with the local community; let folks come in when our kids aren't using it.

And then, the entire surrounding 130 acres is farmland that we grow crops for the 200 head of cattle that we still have on the property from the days when we were entirely self-sustaining.

Our girls program and a couple other programs are scattered throughout Los Angeles County, but the vocational experiences are unique to the campus.

So, we bring them out and give them a full opportunity to experience and learn in those, as well.

- So, tell me about your onsite capacity.

How many kids do you house?

- So, at any given time, we can have up to about a hundred on that main campus.

A few things have changed federally over the last few years that tightened it up a little bit.

It used to be larger than that.

But, with that we've got a variety of programs that we're always trying to make sure our students become graduates who are employable.

So, besides just the academic education, the counseling, we really focus on career technical education.

Our most recent addition to that was the construction of a culinary center that included a teaching bakery, and a full culinary training classroom with a bistro where they're doing live events with the community on a daily basis.

So, they're learning both "front of the house" and "back of the house."

We're fortunate.

We've got a local rotary group that meets there weekly in a business roundtable.

So, the kids are not just like, say, learning to prepare the food, but they're in the front and getting all the soft skills of being out in the front of the house, as well.

- Do you actually help them with job placement, as well?

- We do, we do.

We've got three aftercare staff whose job it is to essentially hold the hands of our young men and women when they go home, and help them present themselves in the strongest light.

You know?

Potentially deal with some barriers that exist because of choices that they made prior, but always job placement.

It's, you know, the nice thing about the economy right now is that people are seeking out our students.

They recognize the training we're providing and they're asking for them on a constant basis.

We had to work harder 10 years ago to open doors for our youth.

- [Joe] How is it that you guys are governed?

You have a board?

Or-?

- [Chris] We do.

We've got a governing board of directors that I report to.

Got a board of advisors that are just experts in the field that just help with the mission and with development and fundraising, and things like that.

But, generally folks that have been very successful in their own right and bring wisdom to the governance of an agency that's been doing something for 115 years, but can still learn from the expertise of folks from the community.

- How are you funded?

- It's a combination of things.

We partner with local government, and take referrals from various counties of students that are in their child welfare system.

That covers probably 60% to 80% of the budget on any given year.

We have two major fundraisers along with an annual appeal that really help sort of supplement in the areas.

Probably 80% of what we do vocationally we fund out of our own pocket.

We built a transitional housing complex for our graduates and sustained that for about six or seven years, before state funding became available to support that in the same way.

So, the private support so that we can identify needs that exist out there and be there to address them and meet them before the public systems are there to do it themselves.

- So, you talked a little bit and we were talking a little bit about this offline, about how there's a daytime component at one of your other campuses.

- [Chris] Yes.

- Talk about that and, you know, it sounds like at least as of now the people on the main site are 24-hour folks, not necessarily people that come in to be served during the day.

- That's true.

About 90%, 95% of what we do is 24-hour residential.

We've always had a heart for day treatment where we-- we work with youth that are still living in their homes.

They come in for the school, the counseling, and maybe a small piece of the vocational component.

We do that at our Monrovia facility and have historically had some of that on the main campus in Chino Hills, as well.

It's always something that we would do more of.

'Cause ultimately our goal, even when we take them in residentially, is to bring them home and send them home successfully.

So, if we can make it so they never had to leave their home, that's a win.

- Tell me about how, and you've done it for 31 years yourself.

And so, I'm sure you're very cognizant of the history of the organization and the institutional knowledge related to it.

How, in your view, have needs changed over the years and how has your organization evolved to meet those challenges?

- So, I think the fundamental needs of youth, children, adolescents, are similar.

Especially, those that are coming from families that are challenged, whether they're challenged economically or they're challenged because the-- you might have an incarcerated parent.

You might have parents with substance abuse issues.

Those situations produce very similar looking adolescents for us to work with.

I'd say the biggest change in the last decade or so is, is the type of substances that our youth are struggling with and the prevalence of mental health diagnoses.

I would say especially our specialty is working with kids in the juvenile justice system.

- Mm hm.

- And historically, while they may have had a variety of issues around delinquency and poor choices, and who they were spending their time with- gang membership and affiliation, things like that- we're seeing the lion's share of everybody referred now has that in addition to a more serious mental health diagnosis than we saw for the first hundred years.

- Wow.

So, tell me about day-to-day structure.

Take me through an average day for, you know, someone that is just getting on to the campus, just coming into the program.

- So, the "republic" part of Boys Republic is intentional.

So, we have a functioning student government.

We, in a different way than a normal high school, we really believe that the kids need to have ownership of decisions and choices.

So, that starts from "wake up".

In the morning, they have responsibilities around the cottage that they need to take care of every day beyond just their own room.

Go down, have breakfast, then go to school.

You got a break in the middle.

They'll go through the end of the day, lunch in that culinary center, vocational things throughout the day.

And, in the afternoon, we-- they'll move into an intramural program or variety of other just sort of learning opportunities.

In the midday, one of our absolutes is we do group counseling on a daily basis.

Where-- this is where that "republic" component comes in.

So, it's not simply reliant as, say, me as the mental health professional working one-on-one.

They're sitting daily in group with their peers and staff who are helping facilitate conversations that move them towards better choice-making down the road.

And then, they'll have dinner.

Some may have jobs that are kind of mixed in throughout that.

Kids that are doing well in vocational learning environments might be offered paid work to do something.

Then in the evening after that, there's gonna be some other kind of counseling component, substance abuse component.

There's not a lot of free time in there, is what you're kind of pickin' up from my conversation!

We keep them extraordinarily busy.

Try and get 'em on the phone with their families as much as we can so they remember what they're working for.

- Tell me about a success story that keeps you going.

- You know?

(sighs) I've got two I'm gonna tell ya.

- Sure.

- The one that I learned?

This is early on.

When I was coming in, I had my master's.

I was pretty certain I was just this incredibly effective therapist.

I was working with a young man who was there because he had murdered his father.

It was in self-defense.

He was abusing his mother, but he stabbed him in the chest in order to stop that from happening.

And, he may have been the most serious person we had taken into the program to that point.

He and I had worked together for months and months and months.

And, I worked the late nights 'cause I had mornings off for school.

So, we would spend time playing dominoes.

He was incredibly smart and we would talk through the kinds of things, the traumas, that he had lived with and trying to move him forward.

Few weeks before he graduated, he got into a fight in the program, which was uncanny, had not had happened.

And, did a pretty good job in group discussing it.

But, later came to me and said, "Chris, you know?

I owe you an apology."

Said, "I'm not sure why."

He said, "Well?

For, you know, that fight last week."

And, I said, "Okay, you dealt with that in group.

You don't owe me an apology."

He said, "Well, no.

The reason why--" and he confided that basically while we were working in that environment, that his peers had learned that he had my attention pretty well.

So, they were able to get away with some things during, while I was focused on him that I should've been doing a better job supervising- - Wow.

- at that point.

The impact part of that was that our relationship had gotten to the point that the fight was because he told them he couldn't do it anymore and that he was gonna come clean in group for the fact that, "look, you know, "you guys have been gettin' away with this stuff, "while, you know, Chris and I have been talking about my things."

It told me a lot about the power of relationship, the power of how far we could come with him in terms of feeling a loyalty to a staff member that he'd only known for eight months as opposed to folks he was sort of connected to by virtue of how they'd gotten there.

Another one was just watching a graduate from the program become strengthened to the point that when she had a child diagnosed as being on the spectrum, that the tools were there.

She'd learned how to problem solve, she'd learned how to make friends with a system that was trying to help.

And, the difference between the phone call where she called me in tears asking for help and the one, three years later, where she said her child had been mainstreamed, were just amazing.

- And so, as they say, the proof is in the pudding.

And so, I think we might have a testimonial or so, to testify as to the great work that this organization is doing.

Let's go to those.

[light upbeat music] ♪ - I came to Boys Republic in 1998.

I was 16 years old.

You know, basically was a street kid just runnin' around the streets.

Very limited parental guidance or anything like that.

Eventually committed, you know, a crime, and was sent to Boys Republic.

So, growin' up I knew I had some positive qualities.

I really enjoyed sports.

I kind of excelled in the sports that I did play.

I always thought that would probably be my out, you know, but my parents didn't see that.

They didn't feel like that was an important kind of step in my life.

I don't think they've ever attended one of my football games or baseball games, or anything like that.

So, for them not to see any kind of potential, I kind of gave up on myself, gave up on sports, and that's when I really started getting into trouble.

And then, coming to Boys Republic?

And then, you know, people seeing just the little glimpses of hope and acknowledging that.

And, pushing you to get outside of your comfort zone and to continue to push and strive.

And then, encourage you the entire time.

That wasn't just my staff; that was also my peers.

My peers, we did a lot of encouraging each other and pointing out some things that we need to continue to work on, but also acknowledging the potential that we had.

So, yeah.

My experience at Boys Republic, I'd probably sum up as transformational, and if I had any advice for anybody that was, you know, having to go through a place like this, I would say your mentality is everything.

Your open-mindedness to try stuff that is new and ultimately, see this as an opportunity and not a punishment.

If you can have that mind frame, then the world's, you know, you're oyster.

I mean, Boys Republic has so many opportunities for young men and women.

If you could just get past that initial thought of doing time.

- When I was 16, I got in trouble at school.

I made some decisions that got me put on probation.

And, my mom gave me an option of either coming to Boys Republic and receiving treatment, or my other option was Mexico.

I graduated in my program, my Boys Republic program with honors in 1997.

And then, went back to my regular community high school and then graduated high school from there.

It's become my second family.

They've always been there when I've needed anything through the years as a student, and now on the flip side, as an adult and as a staff member for now 25 years.

There's nothing that Boys Republic hasn't always been available to help with.

And, I do consider a lot of the people in Boys Republic, like my family, like a second family.

I'm closer to a lot of people here than I am even outside of here that, you know, I've known forever.

And, I am the person I am now because of Boys Republic.

[light upbeat music] ♪ - [Joe] So, you've heard the terminology, "the more things change, the more things stay the same?"

- [Chris] Yes.

- We're gonna take advantage of the fact that you have 31 years of experience.

- [Chris] Right.

- Tell me the things-- you've talked about it some, but tell me the things or maybe the one thing or two that you've seen really change about the kids that you serve?

- Mm hm.

- [Joe] And, the things that seems to hold true that hasn't changed at all.

- Sure.

So, I'd say the things that stay the same is no matter how rough the edges are, no matter how many traumas that the kids have been through, and how against the system they may seem when they walk through the door, they're kids.

- [Joe] Right.

- [Chris] They-- They're resilient.

They're able to receive the benefit.

One of the things I learned early on was, I couldn't just make a difference because I wanted to.

I had to earn it.

Much the way I described with that particular young man.

The kids doubt the staff that are there when they first come in.

It's like, "Aw, you're just here for a paycheck."

They learn pretty quickly that, A, it's non-profit.

The paychecks aren't that big.

So, the people that are here really want to make a difference.

But, especially as a Caucasian male working with a population of largely brown and Black students for the majority of the time I'm there, the thing that has really stayed the same is this sense that relationship is the key to everything.

- [Joe] Right.

- [Chris] They will trust staff and they will move forward with whoever's there to help them, once they've put in the time to earn their respect and not just simply demand that "you need to change because you're the one that got yourself into some trouble."

- Right.

- So, I think that's just a constant.

I would say-?

You know, the-- One of the big societal changes that is really different and why we're even more convicted about the importance of the career technical education is, is just "18" is not what it used to be.

- Mm hm.

- And, we-- you know, 50 years ago, Steve McQueen days?

We get 'em to 18, and we get 'em into a job or into the military and they're set.

They're on a pathway where they're not gonna fall back in this.

They're gonna be-- we always say, a success is a tax-paying citizen.

They're doin' their thing to be part of society at that point.

Now?

They're, you know, the world isn't ready to give them a chance to be fully self-sufficient at 18.

And so, our continued care, how long we continue to support kids, goes much longer than it used to.

- Mmm.

How do people that are moved by what they're seeing here get more information and potentially help?

- So, simplest way?

You know, we welcome folks to come onto the property.

We think it's transformative.

We give tours just for the asking.

But to get a little bit easy knowledge, you know, our website, they can get to, you know, just www.BoysRepublic.org and get an idea of exactly who we are and what we are.

But, we use events like the car show, like, you know, holiday-related bake sales to invite in folks for a chance to see.

We actually have a barbecue coming up on March 2nd for anybody that wanted to see the program.

That, specifically, the car show guys that are throwing that one to try and build more interest for support.

But, we'll engage and show the program to anybody who wants to learn a little bit more about it.

- [Joe] So, from Boys Republic, I want to thank you Chris Burns, for being with us and please continue to keep up this wonderful work.

- [Chris] Absolutely.

Thank you.

- So, we want to thank you for joining us on Inland Edition.

Please continue to join us while we highlight the life-changing work done here in the Inland Empire, one conversation at a time.

Till then, see ya.

[uplifting music and vocals] ♪ ♪ ♪ [music fades]