KIDS of El Paso has been the focus of a yearlong battle between people who hail the program for saving lives and people who blast it for destroying lives. Those who believe that extreme hardships call for extreme remedies are opposed by those who say the rights of young people are being trampled in the program. The battle between the two sides is over whether the methods used by KIDS of El Paso County Inc. to treat adolescents are excessive or not. Parents whose children are strung out on drugs or who have behavioral problems say they have the right to discipline and care for their children as they see fit. ***, the mother of an 18-year-old woman in the program - like many parents of teen-age drug addicts said KIDS was her last resort, a "last ray of hope." "Anguish . . . is sleeping with a deadbolt on your bedroom door to keep out your own child. But above all, it is the abject terror, the pain and the utter helplessness that engulfs you as you sit by your daughter's bed in the intensive care ward after another suicide attempt..."Only those of us who have lived this kind of life - the life of a parent of a chemically dependent child - can understand what we parents of children of KIDS of El Paso have gone through," *** said. On the other extreme is attorney ***, one of KIDS' strongest critics. In a recent letter to the editor, *** described the center on 6500K Boeing Drive as a "windowless torture chamber" where young people are abused. "So long as this evil exists in our community I for one shall resist it. Can it be said that a program that diverts a child's dependency from drugs to itself nevertheless precluding the child's viability as an independently thinking, psychologically healthy adult is a program that works.” *** said. This week, a district court judge in Austin handed the parents of about 90 KIDS clients a victory, even after the parents' attorney admitted in court that parents may be breaking the law. Judge *** declined to issue a temporary restraining order that would have put the program out of business until the matter of its license is resolved. The Texas Commission of' Alcohol and Drug Abuse revoked the program's license last month, and KIDS has appealed. State Sen. ***, D-El Paso, the attorney representing 122 parents and KIDS clients, told *** that parents who enroll their children in this program might be violating their children's rights, but that "the end justifies the means." "What is the alternative? To let them hit the streets ... go to Juarez to drink and buy drugs?" he said. ***, the father of two teenage girls with drug problems, wept as he recounted how he once saved his oldest daughter's life after she overdosed in the maid's bathroom in his home. "*** ... would be dead now if not for KIDS of El Paso," he said. ***, a local businessman and civic leader, also said he turned to KIDS as a last resort to cure his daughters. In the past two years, he has contributed $530,000 to the non-profit treatment program. In the last six years, before putting *** in the KIDS program, *** spent more than $400,000 cash on his daughter's treatment at several other centers, none of which worked, he said. "In my opinion, there is no other program that I know of like KIDS. I have the means. I could have taken her (***) elsewhere,'' he said. His youngest daughter, ***, graduated from KIDS on June 10 after undergoing treatment for 22 months ***, 18, ran away from the program March 4, 1988. *** was one of several former clients and parents of former clients who told the judge that KIDS abuses, and neglects clients. ***, who filed the first complaints against KIDS last year, said he has answered the outcry of some of these young people. He now represents 10 former clients of KIDS of El Paso who say they were physically, emotionally and psychologically abused by the program. His first client was ***, who in March 1987 told police he and his sister were kept in the center against their will. *** went to the police to file a false-imprisonment complaint, and *** walked out of the building later the same day escorted by two police officers. *** said some of his clients have been physically restrained, beaten and forced to strip to their underwear and sleep on the floor. *** said he believes that even though KIDS won the first battle, it ultimately will lose its license and shut down. Clients in the initial phases of the program are not allowed to talk unless they are spoken to, and cannot use the telephone or receive mail. Clients also lose their privacy. They are escorted everywhere they go, including the bathroom and shower. Most recently, KIDS has been known to treat diabetics and homosexual boys with drug-abuse problems. The 2-year-old program is styled after Alcoholics Anonymous and uses reverse peer pressure to turn young adults around. ***, president of the KIDS board of directors, said that while the program is effective it is not for everyone. He added, "The program is not perfect. Nothing is. KIDS is not harsher than prison. If it was, we would be shut down.”*** emphasized that even though the program “is not summer camp, or Sunday school it is saving lives.”
