SPENDING OF LAURENS DRUG MONEY UNDER FIRE

DUBLIN - A group of citizens is claiming that fines collected in Laurens
County for drug abuse treatment and education may have been misspent. A
state law passed in 1996 mandated an additional fine for drug offenses to
fund education and treatment programs. Several residents, who have pushed
since January for a county-funded rehab program, confronted the Laurens
County Commission on Wednesday about how the drug money here has been spent.

"I can't seem to find anything on it," said Mike Haywood.

The law requires that the money collected for the fines be deposited in a
"County Drug Abuse Treatment and Education Fund." Until this year, when
Laurens County set up its fund, the drug fines were deposited into the
county's general fund.

However, officials say that money and more was spent on programs to fight
drug addiction, such as DARE, Drug and Alcohol Prevention Advocates and the
Twin Oaks treatment facility at the Community Mental Health center.

"One problem we had here was that money was co-mingled in the general
fund," said finance officer Scott Bourassa. "We stopped that. What we spend
for drug education from the general fund was more than we've taken in for
the drug fund."

Bourassa, who was hired last year, estimated that the fund has a current
balance of about $12,000. The separate fund, he said, "takes out that gray
area on what we've been doing."

The commission is expected to vote next week on a committee's
recommendation for a drug and alcohol rehab program that would provide
weekly meetings for addicts and their families. However, members committed
Wednesday only to consider the recommendation.

"We are given the responsibility of how the money is spent," Commission
Chairman Clinton Lord said.

Haywood, who was arrested for drugs several years ago in neighboring
Bleckley County, has been attending rehab meetings there each week.

Haywood said he occasionally takes friends from Laurens County with him to
the meetings. The drive to Cochran keeps most of them fromcoming back, he said.

"Every county is supposed to have it," said Haywood.

County officials, however, say the purposes for which the drug money is to
be spent are not so clearly defined in the law.

Haywood said he and others concerned citizens only want to see that the
money is spent properly and that people who need help can get it.

"They say drug awareness and drug prevention start in the home," he said,
"But you've got parents out there who are using drugs who would love to get
off them. Their kids are getting exposed to active drug use every day."