King County Sheriff's Detective Joe Gagliardi told participants in a gang awareness seminar that the problem in King County is growing, but there is hope.

"We are not Los Angeles," he said. "It's still at a point where we can work on it and make it better."

The seminar was held at the Washington State Criminal Justice Center in Burien.

Gagliardi is widely regarded as a gang expert and came from the San Francisco Bay area in California where he was a gang detective.

His presentation gave the crowd of around 300 people an overview of gang activities, gang structure, and active gangs in the south King County area. After his presentation he also fielded questions from the audience.

In 2007, a gang unit was formed within the Sheriff's office and the unit includes Gagliardi and two detectives. It was formed after a gang member killed White Center Deputy Steve Cox in the line of duty.

Gagliardi would not speculate on how many gang members there are in King County, but did say that his unit has contacted 94 different street gangs in the past year. He said some of the gangs have only a few members, while others have several hundred.

Gagliardi educated the crowd on gang terminology and how to spot members of certain gangs, including the type of clothes they wear. He also told the crowd that the battle starts at home with kids and their parents.

"Be involved in your kid's life," he said. "Know what is going on."

Some of these youths being targeted by gangs are as young as five or six years old, and others are growing up in the atmosphere from birth, he said.

Gagliardi also said it is important to spot at-risk youths and intervene before they can get involved in gang activity. He stressed an importance on communication between the community and the police to keep track of gang activity.

Everything from new graffiti to spotting gang members hanging out in certain areas and around businesses is all-important intelligence for his unit to have.

"This has got to be a community effort, this is something that takes an entire community to address," he said.

The crowd included teachers from many schools that expressed interest in how to control the problem and how to help kids before they can become involved in gang activity.

Some teachers thought the parents were part of the problem.

"A lot of our parents come to school dressed like this," said an elementary school teacher.

Aaron Lommers is a freelance writer who may be contacted via wseditor@robinsonnews.com