King County Sheriff's Detective Joe Gagliardi told participants in a Burien gang awareness seminar on Nov. 13 that the gang problem in King County is growing, but something can still be done.

"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 where Gagliardi was the key speaker.

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 city of Burien Police Department. The unit includes Gagliardi, Detective Aaron Thompson, Detective Todd Miller, and Detective Kurt Litsjo. The gang unit was formed after a gang member killed 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, according to Gagliardi.

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, Gagliardi added.

"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," one Seahurst Elementary School teacher said.

The information provided at the seminar will be available on the Burien city Web site at http://www.ci.burien.wa.us.