00:00:08.770 - 00:00:24.060

The board is being asked by the Alameda Probation Department to add the Synanon Foundation to a list of 35 private agencies already receiving tax money for the custody of various types of juvenile offenders. A probation judge would then be able to send young, hardcore drug addicts

00:00:24.060 - 00:00:42.640

to Synanon instead of less specialized agencies. Chief probation officer James Callaghan admits the county has failed to rehabilitate young addicts and endorses the Synanon idea as a last resort. Synanon medical director Dr. K. J. Deisler: I think it would be ridiculous not to utilize

00:00:42.650 - 00:01:06.570

Synanon as an outstandingly known, successful, and highly specialized organization in the handling of this problem as long as it is available and especially since the issue is not whether Synanon should get juveniles through the courts, which now would go nowhere else, it is

00:01:06.570 - 00:01:36.730

just shifting them from a less suitable environment, from a non-specialized environment into a highly-specialized environment. You certainly wouldn't want to put a confirmed drug user, a drug addict into a group of youngsters who have minor offenses like car theft or curfew violation or truancy

00:01:36.730 - 00:01:55.190

or whatnot. You contaminate the good apples by the rotten apples. Board members seemed eager to move ahead with the program, but supervisory Emanuel Razeto demanded some kind of guarantee the probation budget would remain intact. This set off an exasperating exchange of views. Now, if we give

00:01:55.190 - 00:02:09.910

the judge the discretion to spend all kinds of money in every direction, I certainly will not be for it. After all, it's our expenditure of county funds is our responsibility. We have to raise it by taxes. Therefore I want to know if there's a ceiling on

00:02:09.910 - 00:02:31.110

this expenditure or if there's not. That's all I want to know. Mr Razeto, you've been on the board for 12-16 years, and in every one of those years you have done what you just said you wouldn't do because you have given

00:02:31.110 - 00:02:49.230

the judge the discretion without a mandatory limit to commit boys to institutions with no guarantee that he would never exceed that budget. And you've been doing this for every year since you've been on the board of supervisors. Known me except two years. The first time I

00:02:49.230 - 00:03:07.550

mentioned when you came here, you've never been here before. How do you know what's taken place before you got here? Well, I happen to know how the budget is put together and you have voted for it for every year since I've been here. Nevertheless, Razeto called for more studies

00:03:07.550 - 00:03:21.740

and invoked the board's one man privilege of delaying the matter until the next meeting. So the board will take another crack at the criminal drug problem next week. And unless Supervisor Razeto's logic somehow prevails indefinitely, it looks as though Synanon will soon be eligible to

00:03:21.740 - 00:03:28.150

treat young drug addicts with local tax money. Mike Lee, Eyewitness News at the Alameda County Courthouse.