PROGRAM HOPES TO SELL ADDICTS ON BIRTH CONTROL

A C.R.A.C.K. billboard on Armitage Avenue offers $200 to drug addicts who
undergo sterilization or long-term birth control procedures. In an attempt
to reduce the number of drug-exposed babies born in the U.S., a
controversial program that offers cash to drug-addicted women who can prove
they were sterilized or given long-term contraception will be unveiled
Monday in Chicago.

Chicago is the first site for expansion of a California-based project that
has drawn fire since it began in late 1997. Various groups, including the
American Civil Liberties Union and Planned Parenthood, have objected to
what they deem drastic tactics.

C.R.A.C.K. -- an acronym for Children Requiring a Caring Kommunity -- is
the brainchild of a California mother, Barbara Harris, who has adopted
drug-addicted children and wants to stem such births.

So far, 57 women have been paid for getting permanent birth control through
the Anaheim, Calif., C.R.A.C.K. program. Altogether, those women have been
pregnant a total of 423 times, according to the agency's Web site.

Generally, clients receive government aid to pay for sterilization or
contraception and are given $200 upon verification of the procedure.

The program has emerged as a startling approach in a larger national
debate, primarily played out in the courts, that seeks to prevent women
from harming their unborn children. Women in Illinois and other states have
been charged with abuse or neglect -- even involuntary manslaughter in a
Rockford case a decade ago -- if they used illegal substances while
pregnant. But most cases have not stood up in court.

The Chicago program is headed by Lyle Keller, a social worker and therapist
who is a consultant under contract with Governors State University to train
and instruct social workers in Chicago for the Illinois Department of
Children and Family Services. At the start, he said, the program will
receive funding from the Los Angeles branch, but he hopes to raise
independent funds through private donations.

"I've seen the problem up front and face-to-face," said Keller. "We want to
prevent new children being delivered with the cards stacked against them."

A national survey estimated that 5.5 percent of all women delivering live
babies had used illicit drugs at some time during their pregnancies.

Referrals to the program are expected from word of mouth as well as from
community social service organizations, Keller said. Clients will receive
the cash when they present written verification from a doctor that the
procedure has been done.

Already, billboards have gone up in West Town and Logan Square, and fliers
have circulated at health clinics enticing drug addicts with $200 if they
submit to sterilization, such as a tubal ligation, or get a long-term
contraceptive, such as Norplant.

A billboard recently erected at Chicago and Francisco Avenues, in a
predominantly minority neighborhood, reads: "If You Are Addicted to Drugs,
Get Birth Control, Get $200."

On Monday, the non-profit program will officially open here. There is no
office for the privately funded program, just a local phone number and an
Evanston post office box for written inquiries and donations. All
transactions will be conducted by phone or mail, including receipt of the
physician's statement, Keller said.

Valerie Boyk, 29, of the Bridgeport neighborhood, plans to be one of the
program's first clients.

Boyk says she is recovering from cocaine addiction that began when she was
a teen. She has been pregnant seven times and will give birth to her fourth
child in a few weeks. She has had three abortions. In 1994, twins born to
Boyk tested positive for cocaine and were taken into state custody.

Boyk said she doesn't want to have any more children. After giving birth,
she plans to get a tubal ligation, which ties a woman's fallopian tubes.

"I just thought 'no more' -- and that $200 is just a little more, you know,
push," she said one recent afternoon.

Boyk said she has been drug free for three years, with the exception of one
relapse during the pregnancy with her 1-year-old daughter. But the daily
battle to keep away from cocaine remains.

"I just don't want to go through that again," she said, recalling
surrendering her twins to the state's child welfare agency. "I just let
(DCFS) have them. I had the drugs and I was in an abusive relationship, so
I just let them go. It doesn't mean I don't think about them. I do, every day."

Boyk said she learned about the C.R.A.C.K. program when she was contacted
by Keller -- but he says Boyk learned about the agency through a nurse at a
community clinic.

Keller discovered the California program last year after listening to a
national news report. He says his work with DCFS is separate from his work
with C.R.A.C.K. Chicago and he would not seek out clients through his
consulting. He already has clients interested in the program's services, he
said.

Several men have inquired about California's C.R.A.C.K. program, which
provides the same incentive for vasectomies, but none has followed through,
officials said.

Normally, clients contact the agency through its hot line, Keller said. If
a caller says he or she is a drug addict, the program takes them at their
word. A C.R.A.C.K. representative arranges for the client to sign a
contract and a release form that will allow C.R.A.C.K. workers to verify
that a physician or surgeon has performed a birth-control or contraceptive
procedure. Only after verification is the client sent a check.

Keller said it is solely up to the client to choose permanent or long-term
birth control. He said clients are instructed by volunteers on the phone
and in writing that this is a serious decision that must be made individually.

The new program is part of a broader debate over how to curb the number of
drug-exposed babies born yearly.

According to Priscilla Smith, deputy director of litigation for the New
York-based Center for Reproductive Law and Policy, in 20 of 21 states,
efforts to prosecute women for using illegal drugs during pregnancy have
failed. The exception is South Carolina, where the Supreme Court ruled that
viable fetuses -- those that could survive outside the womb -- are
protected by state child abuse laws. One woman, Cornelia Whitner, was
imprisoned after such a conviction.

Smith said that the C.R.A.C.K. program "smacks in particular of old cases
of forced sterilization which were targeted against people who were indigent."

Local organizations are concerned about the strategy of the C.R.A.C.K.
organization, particularly when drug treatment programs aimed at pregnant
women are scarce.

"Coercing women into sterilization by exploiting the condition of their
addiction is just plain wrong," said Steve Trombley, president and CEO of
Planned Parenthood Chicago Area. "You are essentially bribing women with
what will be used to buy drugs. You are supporting their behavior."

Trombley said that although his organization supports the idea of not
bringing unwanted children into the world, it doesn't support C.R.A.C.K.
Chicago's approach, particularly since it appears to focus on minority
communities, where drug treatment and health services are lacking.

More typically, drug treatment facilities, such as Haymarket Center on
Chicago's West Side, provide treatment to pregnant woman with alcohol or
drug problems in hopes that they will deliver babies free of addiction.
Public aid in Illinois does cover tubal ligations, vasectomies and
long-acting contraceptives.

Catholic Charities, a social service organization in metropolitan Chicago
that often provides referrals and counseling to mothers after they've given
birth to drug-exposed babies, believes the C.R.A.C.K. program exploits a
vulnerable population.

"Birth control may prevent conception, but it will do nothing to protect
women from dangers they face in their daily lives, including sexually
transmitted diseases, rape, other exploitation," said spokesman William
Sullivan.