Travis County Commissioners Court
May 13, 2008
Item 9
>> we have our cwi court folk here.
that's number 9.
receive briefing on the newly created d.w.i.
court program in Travis County.
>>
>> [inaudible] probation division.
do you mind if I --
>> no, sir, we would love to give that right now.
if you would give Commissioner Davis six copies, he will pass them on down.
if we got seven, let's give john hilly one.
keep him busy.
>> good afternoon.
I'm roger jeffries, executive manager of justice and public safety.
I have to my left dr. Gerald dean nagy, judge elizabeth earl, who is county court of law judge number 7.
vicky ashley, assistant county attorney in the county attorney's office.
carston anderson, a researcher with the probation department.
and finally leon grizzard, a defense attorney and one of the two attorneys serving on the d.w.i.
court and a participant on the steering committee.
and I've just been informed we have our d.w.i.
court officer tanya moncheck
>> good afternoon.
again, I'm elizabeth earl.
thank you for inviting us to come here today and tell you about the d.w.i.
court.
this is a program that we have talked to you about prior, but we just started up and running.
so I wanted to give you a little background out.
I know you just were handed a packet of material and you haven't had a chance to look through it, but I know a lot of you -- I'll be happy to take questions about this program.
this is a joint effort that we have undertaken due to mostly legislation that required us to do so, but also because we know in this community it's important for public safety as well.
this court handles d.w.i.
offenses, mostly subsequent tos, driving while intoxicated cases have increased since 2002 and we're over 14% in this past year.
driving while intoxicated arrests which cost all of us increased resources in the justice system as well as the jail, which you all have heard endless about in the past year about the increase in those type of cases.
the mission statement of the d.w.i.
court was something that we all addressed together sitting around the table talking about what we need to do have in Travis County.
and I believe it's important that I state that to you because it does kind of tell in a nutshell what we're trying to do here.
it's to enhance public safety by providing an intensive judicially supervised program of team based counseling treatment and supervision to alcohol, substance dependence, driving while intoxicated offenders.
we started discussing these and having monthly meetings on the d.w.i.
court back last fall.
we started meeting monthly and that about 20 of us sitting around a table hammering out what we wanted the court to look like, what type of offenders we were going to addressed and roger jeffries' office as well as dr. Nagy and the county attorneys from his office and leon and john has been instrumental in helping us to see how we wanted to identify the type of offenders that would be in this court as well as how we would handle the court's docket.
currently we have just been up and running for about a month so we are just -- we're baby steps along the way.
we felt like it was important to tell you guys about it as we're progressing because this is a joint effort and everyone involved, we're all using our existing resources, everyone is working really hard.
our docket is at nighttime so no one is getting overtime for it.
everyone is volunteering, everyone is giving of their own time to address this need since we have a pilot program.
we have applied with the help of deborah hale, of course, who helps me every day of course, you all know that, to the governor's office for a grant.
now, we don't know about that grant yet, won't know until the next couple of months, but we did apply for that grant and we're keeping our fingers crossed along the way.
the key component of a d.w.i.
court, and these are things that we have researched, a number of us went to a local -- that would be a national association put on for drug court to determine what courts are supposed to look like.
there's one in Williamson county.
other courts around the nation.
and we wanted this to address issues that Travis County has but also give the key components as well as d.w.i.
courts and drug courts.
judge bennett doesn't an excellent job so we wanted to use some of his ideas.
those key components are list understand the background material.
I don't need to go through those unless you need me to.
the potential participants, these are all individually so if there is somebody who has committed a d.w.i.
offense and gets a subsequent, say while that first one is pending, then you know through all the stats we provided knew the past that we have increase in that type of individuals and we feel those are the type of individuals we need to address for addiction and possible addiction issues.
this is what the court is here to address.
those should be residents of Travis County, committed a subsequent d.w.i.
or a subsequent d.w.i.
arrest within a two-year span.
and we're trying to speaks phi clear-cut guidelines, but like I said these are individual cases and they will be staffed with vicky ashley, the county attorney's office with the help of the whole court team to whether or not that person would benefit from this court.
there are no holds or warrants from other jurisdictions, no victim involvement, no unresolved pending cases.
they should have no felony d.w.i., of course, and no violent criminal history.
and these are because this is -- these type of individuals are coming to court once a week to see me at the initial phase.
that might scare a lot of people to come to court once a week but it's intensive and we say that in our mission statement because we want people to realize it's an intensive program.
it's a judicial based program, however they come in once a week initially to visit with the court to make sure they are up to date with their counseling and stuff.
and with the help of probation, and we're lucky to have someone from the probation department to help me know what's going on with this person's life because we're getting to know this person intensely.
we know everything about what they are doing.
they may have scram on their body, the electronic monitoring which determines whether or not the person has consumed alcohol so we're getting reports from them once a week or ignition air lock which is a device they blow into in the car to prevent it from starting.
those are things we get back weekly on this individual.
so I know everything about them, whether they are going to counseling classes or not.
if they are not coming to dort visit with me, they are visiting with a probation officer once a week plus counseling.
if you want to compare it, there is a sheet probation has done comparing what a traditional probation looks look versus this d.w.i.
probation.
and it is -- we're targeting for a 12-week program.
I'm sorry, 12-month program.
big difference there.
12-month program, but you can see of the hours of counseling, 333 hours of counseling versus 78 hours of counseling.
this is an intensive program targeting for people who are in the midst of serious alcohol problems. And we're trying to address them at a quick, early stage.
and if you have a question, interrupt me.
we can look at other courts and how they do around the nation about recidivism.
and so I can't tell you what we anticipate in this court.
however, we can address what we look at from other courts and I think we can -- but we are going to look at this -- we're going to make sure what we're doing is right and if we need to change it, probation is looking at every three months, I want to say.
is that what you said?
>>
>> [inaudible].
>> to look about how we're doing for recidivism and what they are complying with.
but these are -- they are on a short leash.
they have to be there on time.
they have to make sure -- like one person recently we only have right now two people in the program.
we're anticipating getting 40 to 50 people with our pilot program.
from existing resources, we're looking at being able to house -- not house, but to hold in the program, adding about two a week.
and that process, and it should be in here, if it's not, I apologize, is basically if someone, if a judge, defense attorney or, you know, feels like their client -- or pretrial services, finds somebody who just got arrested for d.w.i.
and has this pending d.w.i.
and it hasn't resolved that one, then they may want to address that to the county attorney's office.
and the county attorney's office will look at the person's history, make sure is no victim involvement, no criminal violent background, et cetera, other holes in other counties like I addressed earlier and we'll determine after discussing with the defense attorney whether or not this would be a program for their clients.
and at that point in time, if they do, then they get sent over to evaluation of whether or not they are able to be in the program.
because sometimes we just had one recently who had a problem not necessary will with alcohol, it was drugs.
we're not able to address that at this point.
we're targeting alcohol offenders.
and so the counseling for him would not be appropriate versus somebody with just an alcohol dependency problem.
so that person could not be in the program, unfortunately.
we're trying to figure out other ways we can help him in other programs we have in Travis County.
however, so that person gets evaluated and they say yes, that person is acceptable for the program.
then that goes back to the county attorney's office.
they come up with the exact probation period to be in the program.
then the defense attorney shows up with their client at 5:00 on a Wednesday, and Wednesdays at 5:00 is when we have docket.
4:00 we have staffings which means that we talk about the cases that we're getting ready to see or the cases that have been evaluated by the Travis County attorney's office or through c.e.s.
and then at 5:00, like I said, the attorney will be there, he will plea in or she will plea in and I will take their plea.
at that point in time they are in the program and the staff attorneys that we have, like I introduced earlier, leon and john, will be there if there's any questions what the offenders -- the defendant has while in the program.
but then they will come and meet and we'll tell them exactly what they are responsible for getting completed by the next week's setting when they have to come back and see me.
in a nutshell, that's what we've been working on and it's taken a
>> [inaudible] in this and I think you should all be very proud of all the individuals that work to make this come up and running in less than the amount of time we were targeted for doing.
I think the legislature said we have to have it up and running by next September?
so we are already ahead of schedule.
any questions?
>> so how do we determine the successor failure of the program?
>> we have already have a committee putting together a plan to do several things.
one is to do process reviews at three-month intervals to make sure the program is being implemented as designed.
then we'll do output measures which look at things such as do people attend, how many people, you know, fail in the program.
and then finally out come measures, which include measures of recidivism such as rearrest, number of days in jail, et cetera.
and then finally substance abuse and employment.
and a copy of that outcome evaluation plan is in your packet.
it's the d.w.i.
pilot program process and outcome evaluation.
it's a two-page document front and back to first page, and the first page is the process evaluation.
the second page looks at outputs and outcomes.
very important thing to keep in mind, and this is the third page, this participants who participate in this program will be compared against a control group and they will be matched on demographics, offense, et cetera.
so we can conclusively state whether or not a drop in recidivism is due to the program or if it's due to selection, for example.
so we have a -- we have that plan in place.
we'll have to wait until people complete the program and measure recidivism after a certain point in time to be able to provide those statistics to you.
>> what --
>> other programs that we looked at across the country, other d.w.i.
court programs have shown a pretty dramatic drop in recidivism among this particular group.
we look at information from the national drug court institute as well as the national center for state courts who did surveys of these drug courts across the country.
we're seeing reductions as high as from 40% to under 20% rearrested within the 24-month followup period.
>> so after successful completion of the treatment program, what happens to the d.w.i.
case?
>> well, I'll speak to that if that's all right.
we are looking at each case individually just like we do
>> [inaudible] in tract and working with a defense attorney once we determine through our first looks at the legal eligibility of the defendant and then ces and the probation department looks at their clinical eligibility.
and if that person is then determined by the d.w.i.
court committee to be appropriate for the d.w.i.
court, I or one of my prosecutors meets with the defense attorney and we determine what term of probation is appropriate for that individual.
so we have, I think at this point in time, one person who pled into the program who is on a 12-month probation that judge earl certainly will be able to extend if that person doesn't complete the program within the 12 months and needs a few extra months.
and then we have someone else who pled in at 18 months and I think we have one that's going to plead in soon at 24 months.
it depends on the facts of their case, of their exact history, their clinical assessment, what their level of addiction is, level of alcohol abuse is.
and just like every other case, it's just going to be on an individual basis.
once they graduate from the program, they will be supervised by a probation officer in whatever way the probation department determines is appropriate at that time once they've successfully completed the program.
>> so the carrot in involving themselves in this more intensive program is you will -- if you succeed in it, you will have your community service hours waived, a shorter probated sentence, potentially a shorter probated sentence.
>> if a person completes everything, like the program -- it's a 12-month program.
if every person is pled in at 18 months completes everything successfully in 12 months, I can have --
>> [inaudible] the last six months.
most of you know I can't reduce a probation period.
the legislature has prevented that from happening on d.w.i.
cases.
so I can't early discharge someone from probation because they've successfully completed it.
however, the carrot, like you stated, could be
>> [inaudible], all those different things that could happen or if the person has not completed their d.w.i.
12-month -- extend them out longer.
that's something that we will need to know when we evaluate the program because right now we haven't said it's a 12-month program because that's what research has shown us.
some people -- most people may not be able to complete tonight 12 months.
that's something we need to know when we devise this plan so we know what we're asking for in the future.
it's a pilot program right now.
>> to set it in context, just looking at d.w.i.
first and second, not to say it's set in stone, but what is the garden variety common recommendation on d.w.i.
first and d.w.i.
second?
without this program.
>> well, I think to really try to have more of a apples to apples comparison, I'll talk about the -- most of the applicants we are getting for this program are multiple offenders.
we've got -- the report that I run can only run a snapshot so I look at it on a sing alley day.
on April 30th, we had 484 I believe was the number individuals in Travis County with more than one d.w.i.
pending at a time.
on that day they had two or more pending.
>> and the reason why that isn't a felony is because they haven't been convicted yet of the prior d.w.i., of the prior two d.w.i.s.
>> over the past few years since wee see this number of people are repeat arrests, we've been tracking the numbers and the recommendations we've been making on those have been harsher than they would normally be for even a second d.w.i.
if, say, the first was five or six or eight years ago.
we've typically done something when there's no victim, no physical injury involved, no property damage involved, no extremely high blow or somebody passed out in their car or anything like that, just a real garden variety two d.w.i.
pending would probably be 90 days in jail on one and 30 days probation on the other.
involving some jail time for them.
you are right, one of the ?en I was in this d.w.i.
court program is they have the ability, they are holding it in their hands to avoid jail time.
we sentence them as 30 days as condition of probation, but the judge suspends that 30 days and that can be used along the way, an overnight at a time if need be as a sanction if they have flips.
we've had to wrap our minds around the fact this is a different kind of probation and we expect that along the way there are going to be blips on the radar for those folks and we're not going to have the knee-jerk reaction we sometimes have with a typical probation or if you make one mistake you are good to have a motion to revoke probation.
>> on a d.w.i.
second, without this program, a d.w.i.
second without jail time wasn't really in the cards.
>> probably not.
again, it would depend on the facts of every case, but there would generally be some amount of jail time.
>> unless it was somebody whose previous d.w.i.
was ten years ago.
>> some jail time on top of probation for a d.w.i.
second.
but yes, some jaim time would be involved.
>> some of these people have been in jail when they were first arrested or booked in sometimes as you know when someone gets those recommendations from the county attorney's office on a regular docket, not d.w.i.
court docket, you get back time.
so a lot of that time is just washed to a certain extent.
it may sound like a certain number of days but in actuality they are not spending any actual days in jail.
so what the research has shown is that if we can get them into intensive treatment immediately as of the second arrest, then that would be better.
and some of that treatment may be in-patient.
it depends what the counseling services feels like is important for that individual.
then the accountability of coming back to court once a week to address it.
of course, the carrot along the way is if you do everything you are supposed to do and you finish one phase of your counseling, you get bumped up to come in every two weeks.
you know, once a month.
those kind of things.
and in the end of the d.w.i.
program, they will have a graduation ceremony.
kind of like at the drug court.
if you ever had a chance to look at the drug court ceremony, it's something that's pretty extraordinary.
so the clapping and all those things we're hoping is going to be the same type of program on the d.w.i.
court.
but the stick along the way is the hours of treatment is huge.
and when you talk to madd mothers and I've talked to them about the program along the way and made sure they were supportive of this, and they couldn't believe we had such extreme accountability, they are meeting with somebody once a day counseling, probation, myself, something, it's heavy, heavy, intensive.
not necessarily meant for a lot of people.
that's why we have to be picky and choose who is best for the program.
because like I said, it's not for everyone.
as we all know, they are not getting the counseling in jail and they are not getting anything like that in jail.
so that's not preventing their reoffending.
we're hoping to change behavior as well as making them accountable to us.
>> two other questions I had.
it's my understanding that currently about 20% of our jail population is?
on d.w.i.
or p.i.
is that what y'all -- is that close to right?
>> well, I can tell you that in '07 we had over 7500 bookings into the jail for a-tall of 55,000 bed jail days which if costed out with booking costs and bed costs came out to about $2.4 million.
cost of d.w.i.
>> that's not 20% because we arrested close to 50,000 people.
>> it's jail population on a given day.
the last I had gotten from, I believe, correction was that 19.7% of the population is in on an alcohol-related offense, whether it's d.w.i.
or public intoxication, it wasn't broken out in it.
but that snapshot jail population, not total numbers of arrests over the year.
but my question goes to, it does sound like it's a program that's not for everybody.
certainly this kind of treatment is exactly what we need in order to prevent that kind of resolving door, and that having been said, I'm wondering how we will be able to monitor whether our success is because of the creaming in the population or I hear you all talk about control group.
so I'm trying to figure out how would we assess whether the success is -- is inherent in the program or inherent in the way we're choosing people to participate in the program who might otherwise not have reoffended.
>> we would select the control group based on matching their demographics, age, offense and all the characteristics we think could be relevant and then looking at that comparison, and that should take care of that.
>> coupled with the fact this is a d.w.i.
second.
>> yes, uh-huh.
>> I'm hoping that we'll see such an incredible success here that we'll be able to export what we learn to the d.w.i.
firsts as well where the creaming aspect might be more of an issue.
>> uh-huh.
I did want to mention not only as a treatment very intensive and that come to court once a week, but also they get the same number of contacts in this one-year period with the supervision officer as a person tip ib lig gets in five years of probation.
so it's very intensive not only in the treatment but in the accountability and they get regular drug tests -- not drug testing but blood alcohol content, evaluation, testing to determine if they are compliant.
as they move through the treatment, there's a staffing where everyone has to agree that they have complied and meet the criteria for moving forward to the next phase of treatment.
so there is a lot of input as to how this person moves along through the program that's defined.
>> I have two questions.
so after you complete all of the terms and conditions of probation, you still have -- at the end of the process, you still have a final conviction for d.w.i.
>> yes, sir.
the person pleads --
>> I understand.
so on this scram, the last time we looked at it, it's fairly costly.
>> yes, sir.
>> what do we do for those who otherwise qualify but cannot afford that device?
>> at this point we're just expecting them to pay for it themselves.
>> honestly at this point we don't have anyone on scram.
I think that we're starting each one of the probationers with the device that is much less expensive and scram would be thought of as a sanction if they have repeated failures or don't show up, they have something that gives us a a committee and the judge reason to monitor them for closely and monitor their alcohol content more closely then the scram device could be used.
>> what's the other device?
>> the ignition inter log device.
>> who pays for it?
themselves.
the offender.
>> how much does it cost.
>> I think that's 37 -- no, scram is $37 a day.
I can't tell you exactly off the top of my head.
>> scram is $13 a day.
>> about $50 a month to maintain it.
>> that's a fairly standard condition of any type of probation, so it's not really something that a probationer this program would have over and above what he or she would have if they were just on a regular d.w.i.
probation for a second or subsequent d.w.i.
>> it hasn't been a problem to our knowledge?
>> it has not been.
we have some limitations.
one of the limitations, this is english only at this point.
we don't have the funding to pay for services or to provide these devices for indigent persons, and I promise you the defense bar has pointed that out numerous times to these folks here and so we're looking ahead to when this is a permanent fixture in the county that these concerns that we have with the inadequacies of the program is more available to people in all spectrum of Travis County.
>> actually I want to address that because we have had a chance to speak to the defense bar a couples times and I've encouraged anyone and everyone who feels they have a client that should be in this program to apply for it even if they are spanish speakers just so we can keep stats of who -- we could have -- it would have been possibly a good fit for this program but for the fact they are spanish speaking.
because that's something we need to address for funding purposes, but right now we don't have the financial -- the finances to be able to provide the counselors for spanish speakers, the probation office of a spanish speaker, those kind of things.
those are the things we need to address that we do need to keep those stats if all possible.
>> based on the literature regarding d.w.i.
offenders, and you would think that in this community we would cover that as soon as possible.
spanish speaking.
>> that would be our hope.
>> it's our hope too and hopefully we're going to get the grant from the governor's office.
keep your fingers crossed.
we'll know that in the next couple of months.
>> I would rather do this than a discrimination lawsuit.
seems to me that if the grant application is not approved, then that should be somebody's -- part of somebody's budget request.
>> yes, sir.
>> unfortunately, african-americans and hispanics do get arrested for d.w.i.
in disproportionate numbers, right?
>> yes.
and I don't have the numbers of exactly who --
>> just generally.
I'm not trying to name a big case out of that, but in this community.
>> I fully agree with you and I would hope we do -- when we do make that proposal to you as a budget request since we haven't done so so far, we're using existing resources at the moment, when we do make that budget request we will definitely have that in there.
and I do have -- I wanted to mention one thing.
I do have the ability on certain cases to waive, I have a certain spot for the scram device that I can waive some of the funds for 30 days or whatever it might be.
so if, say, for example, somebody who can't afford scram but they mess up on their ignition air lock, have positive readings, I can order scram on them for a moment and we can absorb it, not us, but I have spots they have provided for us.
scram representatives f that person still offend, I can put them in jail.
there's all different sanctions we can do along the way to hopefully address their alcohol issue.
>> what ability do we have to enforce or to tell someone it is your responsibility to afford it?
it is your responsibility.
it's not the responsibility of the taxpayer.
>> we can put it as a condition of their probation.
we do financial studies to determine if they are indigent and unable to pay.
but generally when something costs money, it is a condition of probation that they pay it if they are able to pay it.
>> well, I mean, I just think that's something we need to try to force.
they obviously had enough money to get in trouble.
>> but it would be legal for us to put in place that discriminates against a race, person of a certain race, and I got a problem with us providing services for only those who are wealthy enough for those to afford them.
this is government.
we can say it's your individual responsibility all we want to and we've been saying that forever.
I've heard it 61 years.
at the same time, we are spending money out the yazoo, at the jail, gardner betts, so we may as well do this sensibly.
I would rather spend it this way up front than pay for lawyers, litigation, et cetera.
I mean that's the reality of it.
I'm not just sitting here wishfully thinking about this stuff.
>> that's the reason I asked how do you legally -- I realize if you can't legally do it, then we have a lawsuit on our hands, but I mean --
>> I'm hoping it would be I illegal for us to have a successful program you could only access if you were wealthy enough.
we hope that's illegal.
>> that's the wrong way to couch it, if you are wealthy enough.
this is not something wealthy enough is not -- doesn't have anything to do with it.
I mean if this thing were $100 a day, I mean, but, I mean but if it costs you $3 a day or whatever it is, $100 to start with and then 50-something dollars a month, it costs you two or three dollars a day.
>> scram is how much per day?
>> $13 per day.
>> I don't think --
>> let me address --
>> more like $35.
>> let me address a bit of this.
if people --
>> we tell people it's your responsibility to pay child support.
you learn that when you go to school for the first day in the first grade.
but a whole lot of folk are walking around right now in Travis County without jobs.
they ain't paying child support, they are not paying utilities, they are not paying a whole lot of other stuff.
and they are committing crimes, some of them not because they are poor but they are committing crimes, they are in the county jail, we feed them, we clothe them, meet medical expenses, et cetera.
that's just a reality that you have in government.
and that's not to say it's right, but I mean --
>> I would like to say one thing.
I do want to say we have a balance here in that if we do screen people, if they are indigent, they would pay one dollar for each hour of counseling.
whereas if they are able to pay the full costs, they pay for the full costs.
if they are somewhere in between, they pay on a sliding scale.
for the pilot we are trying to address those that are unable to pay.
and then have those that truly can pay pay.
and also I think it's important to keep in mind this is a pilot program and we do intend to expand this if it's successful, but given the fact that we're all stretching resources to do this at this point in time we can only have a maximum of 50 go through the program during this one-year pilot program period.
>> what's it cost -- when you see the expression d.w.i., you can't afford it, I mean what does it cost someone, I mean if you get a d.w.i.?
>> I'm probably the best person to answer that.
your lawyer is going to cost you $2,500 to $3,500.
you pay $60 a month as a probation supervision fee.
a fine of $400 or $500.
court costs of $300.
there's a handful of nickel and dime fees, crime stoppers fees.
you pay for counseling, assessment, that will add a few hundred bucks on it.
all that comes tout to $5,000 or $6,000.
if you have a trial, it's more.
>> can you compare what it would cost if you plead out and take the jail time?
>> well, a first offense driving while intoxicated, they will generalry recommend roughly five to ten days in jail or something like that.
you do half of that time, maybe it would be maybe a little more than that.
and you -- if you do that, you get a one-year suspension of your driver's license.
so you can get out cheaper if you are willing to spend a few nights in jail.
>> so the bottom line is there's an economic disincentive to get treatment.
>> absolutely.
absolutely.
>> and if one were to try and purchase this kind of treatment on the open market in advance of getting a d.w.i., what would that cost and what would be its availability?
>> it's about $3,800.
>> and how readily available is it?
>> well, I can't really answer that question, but it's probably not that readily available.
I don't know the specific statistics.
>> and the waiting list in those programs is pretty substantial.
>> in our outpatient, regular outpatient treatment program the waiting lists could be up to six months or a year.
>> so given those statistics, I think -- I think it's a reanl assumption that mental health issues and substance abuse issues have parallels and there's not a great deal someone can avail themselves of, and unfortunately the criminal justice system can serve as a portal to actually treating people and ending the individual's problem.
that's a sad statement that we use the criminal justice system as a identifier of need, but the docket is a ridiculously accurate identifier of our community's needs.
>> but our problem is that in urban settings today, you have an increasing number of arrests for d.w.i.
and drug offenses.
and those in government, progressive governments, I guess, have concluded that it's time for us to try to do something more on the front end.
and that's what caused you all to look at this initiative.
and I'm assuming it's working fairly well in some places.
>> it is.
>> and we believe we can achieve the same beneficial results here.
>> yes, sir.
>> otherwise you all wouldn't have done it and we wouldn't be having this discussion.
>> that's exactly right.
>> I'm just saying that sauce that's good for the goose is good for the gander and I personally want us to reach out and help all those willing to commit to try to help themselves.
long term it helps us.
they stay out of trouble, they take care of themselves, hopefully they take care of their families too.
and so having access to a safety net is reduced.
otherwise I agree this doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
but it's helping them and helping our community become much better.
that's my final say.
>> I like it.
I like it a lot.
>> thank you very much for inviting us.
>> thank you all.
keep up the good work.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, May 14, 2008 8:51 PM