SPECIAL ACTION OFFICE FOR DRUG ABUSE PREVENTION TUESDAY, JULY 27, 1971 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON PUBLIC HEALTH AND ENVIRONMENT, Washington, D.C. The subcommittee met at 10 a.m., pursuant to notice, in room 2322, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Paul G. Rogers (chairman) presiding. Mr. ROGERS. The subcommittee will come to order, please. We are continuing hearings on proposed bills to establish a Special Action Office for Drug Abuse Prevention, as well as other approaches to help handle the drug abuse problem. For our first witness today we have the honor to hear from our colleague from the State of Massachusetts, the Honorable Margaret M. Heckler. Welcome, Mrs. Heckler, we are pleased to have you with us this morning. STATEMENT OF HON. MARGARET M. HECKLER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF MASSACHUSETTS Mrs. HECKLER. Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, I am grateful for this opportunity to comment on H.R. 6732, of which I am a cosponsor. There is no question as to the need for this legislation. The Nation is confronted by a drug problem of increasingly alarming proportions. There are an estimated quarter of a million hard drug addicts in this country and one-tenth that many among our Armed Forces in Southeast Asia. There is every indication that the sickening rise of crime, particularly assault, robbery, burglary, and murder, are directly attributable to drug habits that require criminal acts to support them. Were not the sheer numbers disturbing in themselves, the fact that most of these addicts are young people constitutes a very grave threat to the equilibrium of America. Much is being done now that the Nation's full attention is being focused on the problem. Health and welfare agencies, public and private, are all making some effort at treatment and rehabilitation. The Defense Department has instituted a crash military program. The Veterans' Administration is gearing up to care for addicted ex servicemen. The President won a significant concession from Turkey, one of the largest exporters of opium in the world, when it agreed to halt the planting of poppies after 1972. There are bills pending in the Congress expanding and deepening programs for military addicts. In providing for an Office of Drug Abuse Control, H.R. 6732 complements all these programs and all this effort and is therefore a desirable step forward. It calls for much needed research into the pharmacological aspects of the problem, provides for international control of narcotics, and requires a plan for coordination of the disparate Federal effort in the whole field of drug abuse. I feel that all these provisions will strengthen and expand what must be a national effort, making existing programs more effective and adding its own dimension. Mr. Chairman, there is much need in this country for a broad effort to make whole and preserve the environment. Admittedly, this is an urgent matter that will demand a great deal of time and money. But how much more urgent and important is our need to cure and prevent the personal pollution of drug addiction and to make whole and preserve the natural resource of our young people? I respectfully urge the committee to act quickly and favorably on this legislation so not a minute nor a life will be lost to us. We cannot afford the squandering of either. Mr. ROGERS. Thank you, Mrs. Heckler, for sharing your views with us today. Mrs. HECKLER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, it has been my pleasure. Mr. ROGERS. Our next witness today is the Honorable Frank Carlucci, Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, Executive Office of the President. I understand he will be accompanied by Dr. Carl Smith, Acting Director of the Office of Health Affairs. The committee welcomes you and will be pleased to receive your testimony at this time. STATEMENT OF HON. FRANK CARLUCCI, DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITY, EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT; ACCOMPANIED BY DR. CARL SMITH, ACTING DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF HEALTH AFFAIRS; AND DR. LEON COOPER, DIRECTOR, COMPREHENSIVE HEALTH PROGRAM Mr. CARLUCCI. Mr. Chairman, on my left is Dr. Carl Smith, the Director of our Office of Health Affairs, and on my right is Dr. Leon Cooper, the Director of our Comprehensive Health Program. Mr. Chairman, I have a prepared statement which I can submit for the record, if you would like. There are several parts of that statement that I would like to cover orally. I will try to be brief. Mr. ROGERS. This is a fairly brief statement, and it might be well to read it. Mr. CARLUCCI. I appreciate the opportunity to discuss with you the approaches and activities of the Office of Economic Opportunity in the field of drug rehabilitation. The OEO health program has been aiding local agencies and groups in low-income neighborhoods to develop pilot programs in the drug field since 1967. I understand this committee has previously considered data and reports on the severe impact of drugs among the poor and the substantial disruptive effect of narcotics-related problems in lowincome communities. Recognition of these facts and conditions resulted in amendments to the Economic Opportunity Act in 1967 and 1969 which called upon OEO to give increased emphasis to the development of drug prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation activities. Section 222 (a) (9) of the Economic Opportunity Act authorizes a "special emphasis" program in Drug Rehabilitation. The law states, in part: A Drug Rehabilitation program (shall be) designed to discover the causes of drug abuse and addiction, to treat narcotic and drug addiction and the dependence associated with drug abuse and to rehabilitate the drug abuser and drug adict . . . Such programs shall be community based, serve the objective of the maintenance of the family structure as well as the recovery of the individual drug abuser or addict, encourage the use of neighborhood facilities and the services of recovered drug abusers and addicts as counsellors, and emphasize the reentry of the drug abuser and addict into society rather than his institutionalization.... You will note this language provides a very broad and a very sound. foundation for program development. As a result, the thrust of the OEO program has been to help organize community-based services which are located in poverty areas and are readily accessible and acceptable to those in need. A mix of needed services have been made available, including methadone, outpatient services, day care and residential treatment. Sometimes the mix of service is available through one facility. In other cases, needed services are organized through a network of component activities, with coordinating mechanisms to facilitate the movement of patients from one type of treatment to another. In the last 4 years, OEO grant funds have assisted 22 demonstration projects concerned with drug addiction and rehabilitation. These local projects involve strong community participation in planning and operations to insure that services are organized and offered in ways that are as responsive as possible to the needs and conditions of patients and their families. The training and employment of ex-addicts as staff members of these projects are most important features; more than 500 have been trained and employed to date. About 25,000 addicts have been served by OEO-aided local projects. About 5,000 of them received services for a substantial period of time. Some 10,000 families have received supportive services and 4,000 youths have been served in special outpatient activities. It is estimated that over 100,000 adults and youths have been reached by prevention. and education activities. In June 1967, OEO grants were made to aid pilot projects in New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, Tacoma, San Antonio, New Jersey, and Puerto Rico. These efforts emphasized the organization of outpatient services in poverty neighborhoods for heroin and other addicts. Local community action agencies sponsored and aided the development of these new efforts. Four of these projects are now supported almost entirely from other funds. In fiscal year 1970, $4.5 million was made available in the OEO budget to fund narcotics control projects. In fiscal year 1971, $12.8 Therefore, I would suggest that great emphasis be put on gaining the knowledge that has been gained in New York City and applying that knowledge to other places. The next program I want to mention is the methadone program. I am glad they didn't have it around 13 years ago, because then I wouldn't be cured. I think that is just a reward to offer the GI who has fought for his country, if this is going to be offered as a solution. I think a sixth point I would like to make is that the real, big solution to the drug problem won't be when we tighten up our laws, because we know now and this is a tragedy-if you have enough money you can almost buy your way out of our judicial system. Or, look at the percentage of people who come to trial for dealing with drugs. Most of them who come to trial are those people who don't make enough money to buy their way out. I think the solution to the problem may not even be in negotiating with foreign countries to discourage them from raising drugs, because when we look at the reality of this thing, we don't have a drug problem because they raise drugs. We have a problem because our own American citizenry has been inspired and encouraged to create situations that bring drugs into the country. We are the people who profit from bringing drugs into the country wholesale and selling them to our children. It is not those countries. We don't pay them enough really to inspire them to grow it. We are the ones that make the top dollars off our own people, so what I think needs to happen is we need to launch a massive educational campaign that will inspire our people to behave at a higher level of integrity and morality so that they begin to think differently and not have this idea of profiting from selling drugs to our children. I believe that this can be done. We just haven't tried it yet. I believe that through mass propaganda we can encourage Americans to hate drugs as much as we have encouraged them to believe in things like methadone as being the solution to the problem. All it takes is a massive campaign. I was taught when I was a kid to hate people of German and Japanese descent, though I lived down on a farm in Louisiana and had never seen one, I learned to hate them. Rest assured if one had come close by I would have taken a pitchfork after him. So if people can be taught to hate people, people can be taught to hate drugs. We just haven't tried it. I think the other thing that we must do, is to break down certain barriers that discourage certain addicts to stay cured. In my 13 years of abstinence, there are still some doorways that are permanently closed to me, in spite of what I do in contributing to a better life in my community. Finally, I would like to make this observation. I call it, drugs and the economy. Everybody is uptight because drugs have spread all over the country; that there is no limit where it can go. We were saying this 10 years ago. I think it is important that we know that dope has always been there in the slums and is among the diverse problems of the slums. It is one of the solutions to the problems in the slums that is being used. In my area we have third generation addicts. One-fourth of 200 people in our addicts rehabilitation center facility are second generation addicts. This has been documented by our research people. |