Responses Flood Drug Treatment Program

A Compton drug treatment program regarded as one of the nation’s most novel and successful residential recovery operations has been flooded with offers of financial and other support.

SHIELDS for Families Inc., the nonprofit organization that runs Keith Village, received calls from about 700 people in the past few days, offering money or donations of books, toys and clothing. The facility for drug-dependent women and their children was profiled last week in The Times’ series “Orphans of Addiction.”

Meanwhile, Los Angeles County authorities said daytime calls to their child abuse hotline were up 43% Friday from the number logged a week earlier. The county Department of Children and Family Services said the line received about 400 calls from citizens reporting child abuse and neglect Friday between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., compared with 280 calls during the period on the previous Friday.

At SHIELDS for Families, Executive Director Kathryn S. Icenhower said she was stunned by the community outpouring of support for Keith Village, where women find redemption from lives warped by drugs and learn to become mothers to their children. The program’s premise is that to make families whole, they must be mended as a unit through intensive counseling for mothers stunted by years of addiction and children brimming with anger from the neglect they have endured.

After the two-part series ran, offers of help poured in from throughout Los Angeles and Orange counties. The first batch of checks to arrive at SHIELDS contained $7,500 from 20 donors. One person gave $5,000. Others asked if they could make small monthly payments. Two sisters said they wanted to give $200 for a Thanksgiving feast.

Some promised to launch toy drives and show up at Keith Village’s doorstep before Christmas. Others asked that the program simply fax a wish list.

On Thursday, 10 cases of baby oil, lotion and other items were delivered by Johnson & Johnson, Icenhower said. Another caller planned to donate a truck full of books to start a library at the facility.

Donations came from rich and poor--from a Beverly Hills law firm to people of more meager means who had struggled with substance abuse in their families and wanted to pass along $5 or $10 to help others.

“This is wonderful,” Icenhower said.

“It’s nice to know that people out there, when presented with the issue, are responding,” she said. “They understand people can overcome substance abuse and be responsible with their children.”

Icenhower said she hoped the community response would allow the program to continue to provide services to the women and children. Keith Village’s primary source of funding, a $1.2-million annual federal grant, is set to expire next September.

But she also hoped the public’s enthusiasm would translate into more support nationwide for drug treatment geared to women and children. Most programs are focused on men or won’t allow mothers to bring their sons and daughters into treatment with them. The result: Only one in four people who go into drug treatment in the U.S. is a woman, a recent study showed.

Keith Village senior counselor Patricia Wallace said programs that make mothers out of addicts are cost effective for taxpayers because they cut down on the number of children in foster care.

Ennis Howell, another counselor at the facility, agreed. “The drugs will always be here. The drugs will always get into this city,” she said. “We have to work on the demand for these drugs. We need to put more money into drug treatment.” Currently, the federal government allocates about two-thirds of its drug funding to interdiction efforts and about a third to drug treatment.

On Friday, a graduation ceremony for women in Keith Village and other SHIELDS programs showed the transformation many had undergone in treatment.

Crying, many spoke of their journeys from being longtime crack addicts, spending their lives in alleyways, to becoming productive members of society. One graduate, Venita Washington, now gets up in the middle of the night to take a 3:45 a.m. bus from Compton to her Hollywood telemarketing job. “I like it,” said Washington, who earns $6 an hour plus commissions. “I do well.”

Graduate Stephanie Glover, who had tried six other programs but relapsed from all of them, has been off drugs for a year and a half. “It feels good,” said the mother of three, who thanked Jesus and her mother at the ceremony. Glover plans to begin computer training courses next month and is looking for secretarial work.

“I see myself having the world in front of me--being able to conquer anything,” she said. “I have my peace of mind and sanity back.”