Chasing death in the violent 1990s became too much for former Pulaski County Coroner Steve Nawojczyk.

Now he's focused on a dual position North Little Rock Mayor Patrick Hays created this summer with Nawojczyk's special skills in mind.

Known nationally as an authority on juvenile crime and gang cultures, partly because of his previous tenure as coroner during heightened street violence, Nawojczyk now helps youths before they need a coroner.

"I'm real pleased that he's a resident of North Little Rock and is interested in doing some of what he does on a national basis here," Hays said when he hired Nawojczyk back in July.

His job involves a lot of talking, something he's done in 30 states on a subject for which he seems to have developed a calling: young people and their discontents, major or minor, depending upon your point of view.

Take one evening last week, Nawojczyk, 49, sat on a concrete planter scarred by skateboards at Lakewood Village Shopping Center talking with three skaters who keep getting booted because of merchants' complaints.

The center's flat, hard-surfaced, open-air pavilion, the skaters said, is perfect for the skateboarding it bans, and they're not interested in the lighted skateboard park on Main Street. The three teenagers--two from the Lakewood neighborhood and one from Sherwood-- said they "feel safer" skating in the well-to-do Lakewood area than in the small downtown park perceived, as one said, as being "right in the ghetto."

Telling them the city wants to move the park to another site, Nawojczyk offered to set up a meeting between the teen-agers and Lakewood Village owners to help find a more suitable location until that move happens.

"Otherwise, it's a cat-and-mouse game," he tells them.

As the city's new juvenile services coordinator and supervisor of a drug treatment program at Eastgate Terrace Housing Project, Nawojczyk spends part of his time listening to concerns, the other part trying to broker solutions. His job tilts toward helping the young avoid the juvenile rap.

"Providing an alternative is the key," he said. "That's why 'Just Say No' [the anti-drug message of the 80s] didn't work. It didn't give kids anything to say 'Yes' to."

To him, the need to give young people something positive to embrace isn't theoretical. As Pulaski County's coroner from 1983-1994, a period when gangs proliferated and juvenile violence shot into state and national headlines, Nawojczyk took to the streets more and more on his own.

He chronicled the lives and actions of gang member and tried to set them straight. In 1994, a controversial Home Box Office documentary, "Gang War: Bangin' in Little Rock," featured much of his work.

He resigned at the end of that year. 1994 was bad, in terms of murders just in Little Rock, 63; but it wasn't as bad as 1993, when the city set a record with 76.

"I burned out on death," said Nawojczyk, who drove around the city through those years with poster boards filled with photos of murdered youths in the trunk of his car.

"After you meet the kids and you know they're going to end up either dead or in jail...I just got worn down," he said, admitting he did not follow all the professional rules.

"The first rule of a good crime investigator," he said, "is you don't get involved personally with your cases."

His experience as a streetwise investigator and educator of the pitfalls of juvenile crime will be helpful to the North Little Rock Police Department, Police Chief Danny Bradley said.

"Steve is very knowledgeable in areas of crime and, in particular, gang crime and violence," Bradley said. "I think his knowledge in that tells him what to be aware of and what to watch for, and that adds a credibility and value to information he can supply to us."

Nawojczyk sees his current job as much more than providing information to police. His job now, to his delight, requires getting personally involved.

"I'm happy this opportunity came along," Nawojczyk said, driving through the back streets of North Little Rock one day last week, mindful of the strange but fitting shift in his roles.

"You learn while coroner that everything you do studying death, you do to help the living," he said.

As for those skateboarders in Lakewood Village Shopping Center, Nawojczyk is trying to set up a meeting between them and management. But the teens themselves will have to prepare their arguments, get more support and do the persuading.

"You've got to get kids involved in the process," Nawojczyk said. "And years from now, when they see a skate park here, they can say, 'I had something to do with that.' "