From the front steps of the Chicano Youth Center in the heart of Fresno, director Javier Guzman sees the harsh realities of a growing dropout problem every day.

"Half the Latino kids are dropping out, and half of those dropouts are committing crimes," he said. "The Fresno Unified School District has become a feeder for the California prison system."

Two years ago, an alarmed Guzman drew up an action plan that called for the formation of a city dropout commission that would bring together every segment of the community. The commission would focus not just on Hispanic youth but on the high dropout rates among black students and Hmong boys.

"My idea was to have everyone in the same room -- elected officials, business leaders, community leaders, police, teachers, school administrators, parents, the kids themselves. The plan wasn't to blame anyone. The plan was to attack the problem like you'd attack an epidemic."

Guzman, who runs after-school programs for kids, said he enlisted the support of the mayor, police chief and several members of the City Council, who agreed to take up the matter in a vote. Two teenagers at the Youth Center helped him put together a PowerPoint presentation detailing the depths of the dropout problem -- and its roots in poverty and family and school dysfunction.

But he said there remained one roadblock: Fresno Unified Superintendent Michael Hanson.

As hard as Guzman tried, he couldn't get Hanson to give his blessing to the dropout commission, he said. When he attempted to go around Hanson and give his presentation to the school board, Hanson refused to place him on the agenda, Guzman said.

On the eve of the City Council vote, Guzman got a call from then-Council Member Henry T. Perea, a supporter. Hanson had sent one of his top aides to City Hall to lobby against the proposal. One by one, Perea told Guzman, the mayor, city manager and five council members now stood in opposition.

The dropout commission died before it ever got off the ground.

"What it came down to is Mr. Hanson didn't want anyone from the community highlighting the problem or stepping on his turf," Guzman said. "Instead of seeing me and others on the front lines as part of the solution, he saw us as threats to his power. So he killed the whole idea."

Hanson did not respond to repeated phone calls and written requests for an interview to explain his stance on the dropout commission and what steps the school district is taking to address the growing dropout crisis.

But interviews with civic and elected leaders and a review of public documents support Guzman's version of events and raise larger questions about the superintendent's willingness to work with community and nonprofit groups to find solutions.

"The first step to solving the problem is to admit how big a problem it is," said Hugo Morales, the Harvard-educated founder of Radio Bilingüe. "You need an outstanding superintendent who is willing to acknowledge the extent of the problem and outstanding principals who can inspire staff and communicate with parents, teachers and kids. And you have to have an enthusiastic set of teachers who really care about the kids. That's a tall order. To make it happen, the community has to be involved."

Everyone agrees the factors that cause a student to drop out of school are a complex brew. So many thousands of children arrive each year at the doorstep of Fresno Unified lacking the basics: proficiency in English; the presence of two parents; the steady income of a wage earner. Add a parent who may be addicted to drugs or involved in crime, and you've got a child whose diminished chance of success rests almost completely on the school system.