VIRGINIA BEACH -- The city's drug court, which won a major award last year
and has served as a national model, will close next month because of the
state's budget problems. General District Judge Virginia L. Cochran said
this week that her innovative court specializing in the treatment of
drunken-driving offenders will meet for the final time Dec. 16.

"I'm very disappointed," Cochran said Thursday. "In the future, I am
optimistic we can start up again. But for now, we are going to have to shut
down."

Cochran's court provides extensive treatment programs instead of jail for
drunken drivers with multiple convictions. More than 160 people have
entered the program since it was launched in 1997.

Funding for the court officially dries up Dec. 31.

It will mark the end of a roller-coaster year for Cochran's court, which
was honored in June 2001 at a national conference in New Orleans.

Last winter, as the state budget deficit deepened, the General Assembly
killed funding for drug courts, said Dan Catley, chief of the correctional
services section at the state Department of Criminal Justice Services.

But Gov. Mark R. Warner stepped in, providing money to support drug courts
at 80 percent of the original funding through the end of the current fiscal
year. Cities were required to contribute an additional 5 percent of the
revised figure, either with cash or in-kind services such as office space.

Cochran's court looked like it would survive.

But as Warner realized the seriousness of the budget shortfall, Cochran
said, the governor "took back all the state grant money."

In its place is federal money that comes via the Byrne Grant Program.

The federal program would provide significantly less money than Warner was
setting aside. Cities would make up for some of that with a larger,
strictly cash contribution.

"We thought this was the best way to give them a chance to make this a true
local initiative and to survive," Catley said.

Under the new terms, Virginia Beach would have to provide about $22,600 to
stay in the program for the second half of the fiscal year, said Catheryn
Whitesell, the city's management services director.

That's a significant increase from the $10,300 of in-kind contributions the
city previously agreed to provide.

But Virginia Beach has a policy preventing the City Council from
supplanting dried-up state funding with local money. That will likely make
obtaining the federal money impossible.

There is one other possibility that would allow Cochran's court to get the
federal money.

A city official is working with the Alcohol Safety Action Program to see if
the agency will assume funding of the court, Whitesell said.

Cochran said she is hopeful that with such outside help her court
ultimately will be able to get federal money.

But that won't happen any sooner than October, if at all, she said.

Meanwhile, other drug courts in the region appear to be surviving.

In Portsmouth, the felony drug court was awarded a $500,000, two-year
federal grant.

"We're in good shape," said Portsmouth Circuit Judge Johnny E. Morrison,
who added that the court's first graduation will be Dec. 4.

Norfolk Circuit Court Judge Junius P. Fulton III said he expects the city
to replace the lost state funds.

Even the Virginia Beach Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court plans to
continue preparing for the launch of a drug court in 2003.

Judge Winship C. Tower said a team planning to implement the court recently
completed training. Tower said a federal grant application also is in the
works that would secure funding for three years.

More than 1,000 drug courts operate across the country.

Most allow those charged with drug and alcohol offenses to be spared
convictions if they agree to undergo intensive treatment. Many drug courts
have recorded outstanding results, with success rates approaching 100 percent.