PROPOSED CUTS TO SOCIAL SERVICES COME UNDER FIRE

Programs For Addiction, Youth and Mentally Ill Prisoners Are At
Risk

TALLAHASSEE - Florida lawmakers opened a budget-cutting special
session Monday with anti-crime and social service advocates warning
that dollars saved could cost the public's safety.

Reduced spending on juvenile crime programs, drug addiction and
mentally ill prisoners are all parts of a far-reaching package of
budget changes the Legislature is considering to help erase a $2.3
billion deficit in the state government's current budget, brought on
by collapsing state revenues.

But advocates argued some cuts would be shortsighted.

"Gangs are creeping in everywhere," Key Biscayne Police Chief Charles
Press warned.

Press told lawmakers during a hearing that reducing juvenile justice
programs would make it harder to steer young people away from crime.
He also said city police departments would be hurt by a cut in state
aid to help with investigations of drug rings.

Budgeters said that $1.5 million reduction represented the cost of 22
Florida Department of Law Enforcement agents.

"Losing 22 agents fighting drugs for FDLE is a big kick for us," said
Press, representing a statewide chiefs association.

Scores of other cuts were on the table in committee rooms across the
Capitol, as both House and Senate panels launched into a two-week
process designed to balance the state's $66 billion budget as revenues
plummet with the weak economy.

"There's no secret or surprise that we have a difficult task ahead of
us," House Speaker Ray Sansom, R-Fort Walton Beach, told colleagues.
"Each of us was elected to legislate in good times and bad times.
We're not alone in this."

Some combination of spending cuts and money taken from trust funds
will be used during the remaining six months of the state's fiscal
year.

Gov. Charlie Crist outlined a package of possible cuts just before
Christmas, but some lawmakers are uncomfortable with parts of those.

"We're talking about people's lives," said Senate Minority Leader Al
Lawson, D-Tallahassee. "We're talking about children, We're talking
about the elderly."

Instead, Lawson said legislators should examine a wide range of tax
breaks for businesses, arguing some aren't justified when the state is
broke.

"Our economy would be in a lot better shape, and our budget ... if we
look at closing these loopholes," he said.

Sansom and Senate President Jeff Atwater, R-North Palm Beach, agreed
to allow discussion of minor changes in some state fees but ruled out
wholesale rewrites. A push to raise cigarette taxes by $1 per pack to
finance health care, rejected earlier by the two leaders, failed on a
voice vote in the House.

Although vast changes are needed to balance the books, getting that
done will involve debate about countless relatively small pieces of
the big picture. A suggested $7 million cut in drug treatment programs
for criminals became a magnet for second-guessing in one hearing.

"We're getting rid of treatment, and treatment works. We know that,"
said Rep. Darryl Rouson, D-St. Petersburg.

An advocate for such treatment picked up that theme minutes
later.

"We believe that savings will immediately turn around and may cost you
four times as much," argued Mark Fontaine, executive director of
Florida Alcohol and Drug Abuse Association.

He said tens of thousands of criminals have some type of substance
problem.

Many of those can be managed outside of prisons through programs that
are cheaper and allow criminals to hold jobs and pay court-ordered
restitution to their victims, he argued.

A $1 million cut in money to treat mentally ill convicts was
challenged by a representative of the people guarding those inmates.

"It's unreal how many people who've been incarcerated have mental
health problems," said James Baiardi, president of the state
corrections officer chapter of Florida's Police Benevolent
Association.

"On a daily basis, the officers in state prisons deal with inmates who
are mentally ill. They are the hardest ones to deal with," Baiardi
said.

Rep. Sandra Adams, R-Orlando, who chairs a committee on justice
appropriations, said no one has requested or used any of that $1
million since the budget year started six months ago.