Pacoima Needle Exchange Launched : Addicts: Program that targets spread of AIDS virus lets users exchange dirty syringes for clean ones.

Drug addicts picked up sterile needles in an alley Thursday as the first public needle-exchange program in the San Fernando Valley got under way in an effort to slow the spread of the AIDS virus among injection-drug users.

The exchange, funded with a $52,000 city grant, attracted only about half a dozen hesitant addicts, who traded used syringes for new ones and collected cotton, sterile water and other drug paraphernalia from staffers of a Tarzana drug rehabilitation group.

Numerous studies have shown that such needle exchanges can reduce the transmission of the AIDS virus and many cities, including New York and San Francisco, have had such programs for years. The Pacoima exchange is the third program to crop up in Los Angeles in recent years.

Those who appeared Thursday in the alley off bustling Glenoaks Boulevard hailed the availability of free needles.

“They should have had this a long time ago,” said Al, a onetime news photographer whose arms were covered with scars from 38 years of injecting heroin and cocaine. “It’ll help, especially in places where people don’t think about AIDS.”

An estimated 14,000 addicts in Los Angeles County are believed to have been infected with the human immunodeficiency virus as a result of using narcotics with contaminated syringes. About 190,000 county residents take narcotics by injection; many continue to share needles despite the risk of AIDS, according to a UCLA study.

Maurice Weiner, an administrator with the Tarzana Treatment Center, which operates the Pacoima exchange, said there is “a great need and demand” for clean needles among drug addicts in the Valley. He estimated their numbers at about 80,000.

Weiner said an addict must turn in a dirty needle for each new one received. He said that under the terms of the city grant, his group can use the money only to pay salaries and other administrative costs, but not to buy needles. A consortium of private agencies that support needle exchanges provided another $1,000 grant for actual needle purchases, he said.

Despite the health benefits, needle exchanges have sparked intense political controversy. Gov. Pete Wilson has twice vetoed legislation that would have created pilot needle exchanges in California cities.

Last fall, angry Hollywood residents made citizen’s arrests of three volunteers trading syringes on local street corners. Just a week earlier, Mayor Richard Riordan had declared AIDS a local health emergency, ordering police not to interfere with exchange workers, even though furnishing needles without a prescription is a violation of state law.

LAPD Capt. Ronald Bergmann, commander of the Foothill Division, whose area includes the Pacoima exchange site near Paxton Street, said police would take no action unless local residents complain about the exchange.

If that happens, police will try to mediate, but will arrest exchange workers if an offended resident insists, he said.

Tarzana Treatment Center members carefully reconnoitered about half a dozen possible sites for the exchange before picking the alley in a low-income, mostly Latino neighborhood near the Simi Valley Freeway where neighbors said drug traffic is common.

Staffers spoke at length with local residents, explaining the need to combat AIDS and how they planned to refer addicts to local treatment agencies. Mario Perez, the treatment center’s AIDS prevention coordinator, said his group “has support from every resident around here.”

But several local residents and business owners interviewed Thursday were sharply divided over the needle exchange.

Pedro Palma, a janitor who lives near the alley with his 12-year-old son, said he supported the exchange because Latinos need to get more information about how needle sharing and unprotected sex can lead to AIDS.

He added that exchange organizers also cleaned up numerous discarded needles in the alley, keeping them out of the hands of his boy and other children.

But Angela Gutierrez, an office manager at a nearby business, said she worried that the presence of drug addicts would hurt business at the small car-sales lots, auto body shops and markets near the exchange.

“As a social problem, (AIDS) concerns everybody,” she said. “But as business people it’s not good for us that they’re doing it on the street. We have to keep an eye open because we don’t want drug people all around us.”

Weiner said the city grant will keep the exchange running for only a year. It will be continued only if Tarzana Treatment Center can secure more money, he said.

Perez said despite the light turnout Thursday, more addicts will appear once word spreads about where the exchange is.

“I had a hard time finding this place,” said Al, whose mother drove him to the alley to collect clean needles. “I’m 52 years old and I still have to have my mother drive me.”