ASSEMBLY PASSES BILL ON TEEN DRUG TESTING

Measure Would Give Parents Power To Check Children Against Their Will

Madison - The state Assembly voted Thursday to give parents the
authority to make their teenage children take alcohol and drug tests
without their consent.

The bill, passed on a voice vote and sent to the Senate, would rewrite
current law that says minors who are 14 through 17 must consent before
they can be tested for illegal substances. Children 13 and younger can
already be given those tests without their consent.

"Parents should be put back in charge of their children," said Rep.
Rick Skinrud (R-Mount Horeb). "Why do we put kids that are high on
alcohol or drugs in control of their own destiny?"

Because parents "are responsible for everything their children do"
until they turn 18, Skinrud added, they also should be able to decide
when to have drug or alcohol tests done on their children.

But opponents of the bill, citing the constitutional guarantee of
freedom from searches, warned that a parent-ordered drug or alcohol
test may be an illegal search.

"This is an intrusion into a child's body, which is a search," said
Rep. Marlin Schneider (D-Wisconsin Rapids).

"All parents are not created equal," said Rep. Spencer Coggs
(D-Milwaukee). "Some are good, some are bad, and most are in between."

Coggs offered a compromise that would have allowed parents to order
drug or alcohol tests for their teens if the family had attended one
counseling session.

Requiring a counseling session would offer parents and children a
chance to talk things out and solve family problems together, Coggs
said. His alternative was killed by a 61-37 vote.

The Assembly also gave preliminary approval to two other
family-oriented bills Thursday, although Democrats blocked final votes
on them. The bills would:

Require schools to install computer software that filters out Internet
sites with pornography and instructions on how to commit crimes.

Opponents said the measure would cost school districts about $450,000,
but the bill's sponsor, Rep. Mike Huebsch (R-West Salem), said schools
could pay that out of state aid to rewire schools for computers, buy
computers and software, and train teachers in how to use computers in
the classroom.

"We have a serious problem with the Internet," said Huebsch, who
distributed copies of sexually explicit and violent materials he found
on the Internet. "Is this information our children have to have?
Certainly not."

But Schneider said local school officials - and not state legislators
- - should decide whether to censor the Internet, which is becoming
harder to monitor with 40,000 new Web sites created every day.

Require school districts and county social service agencies to provide
more records to parents about their children between 14 and 17 unless
a judge blocks release of those reports.

Under the bill, a teen's treatment records for mental illness,
alcoholism or drug dependency also would have to be given to a parent
- - a disclosure that may mean fewer teens would seek treatment,
opponents warned.

Opponents also said the bill, if it becomes law, would mean fewer
teens would seek HIV tests out of fear that their parents would be
told the results.

The Assembly also debated but finally returned to committee a bill
that would prohibit public schools from distributing any surveys that
ask about a student's political beliefs, mental or psychological
problems, sexual behavior, income or religious beliefs without written
approval from a parent or the student, if he or she is a legal adult.

Sponsors of the bill said some past surveys of students, especially
elementary school students, have invaded family privacy and
embarrassed students asked to complete them.

The bill was killed, at least temporarily, after legislators couldn't
agree on what form of consent would be required of parents.

In other action Thursday, the Assembly passed and sent to the Senate a
bill making it a crime to contaminate with bodily fluids food or
beverages someone is consuming or will consume. The bill would apply
to contamination by blood, saliva, urine, feces and other substances.

Rep. Frank Lasee (R-Bellevue) sponsored the bill after a
Manitowoc-area woman discovered that a male co-worker repeatedly
urinated in a soda she was drinking.

Prosecutors charged the man, who lost his job, with disorderly
conduct, but a judge ordered the charge dropped. Lasee said his bill
would close a "loophole" in current law that allowed the man to go
unpunished.

Lasee said his bill would make the crime a misdemeanor punishable by
up to nine months in jail and/or a fine of up to $10,000. The same
bill passed the Legislature in the 1997-'98 session, but Lasee asked
Gov. Tommy G. Thompson to veto it because of a change made by the
state Senate.