The Contra Costa Times
July 30, 1998
SIX HOUSE DEMOCRATS CALL FOR PROBE OF BOYS RANCH
SIX HOUSE DEMOCRATS CALL FOR PROBE OF BOYS RANCH
By Mareva Brown And Sam Stanton
SCRIPPS-MCCLATCHY NEWS SERVICE
SACRAMENTO -- Six key Democrats in Congress called Thursday for a sweeping new federal probe into the death of Nicholaus Contreraz at the Arizona Boys Ranch, as well as a full-scale look at such privately run programs nationwide.
The request for the probe, made to the General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, brings to at least half a dozen the number of investigations being conducted in the wake of the March 2 death of the 16-year-old Sacramento boy.
It also adds to the pressure being placed on states such as California that use out-of-state programs to rehabilitate troubled youth.
"We wish to know promptly whether federal funds are being utilized contrary to federal law and precedent to finance the placement of children in facilities where brutal treatment and other forms of abuse have been well documented," members of Congress said in their letter to the GAO, which routinely conducts such probes when asked.
Word of the probe left Contreraz's grandmother, Connie Woodward, "grateful" to see so many agencies stepping in to investigate, she said.
"None of it's going to bring Nicky back," Woodward said. "But, my God, at least he didn't die in vain. Maybe they'll save some other children."
But the president of the Arizona Boys Ranch said he believed the move was politically motivated. "I just wish we could put this behind us," he said.
"The only people who are losing now are the kids," said Thomas, whose program once had roughly 80 percent of its 550 beds filled with California youth.
The request for the GAO probe was spearheaded by U.S. Rep. George Miller, D-Pleasant Hill, who also has initiated a probe into the matter by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
An aide to Miller said the congressman was motivated by a three-day series of stories in The Sacramento Bee published June 28-30 that revealed a system in which California youths are routinely sent to such programs with virtually no oversight from state officials.
Miller, the ranking Democrat on the House Committee on Resources, has been heavily involved in policing such programs and led a probe in 1986 that cost California's state government nearly $500,000 when it was found the state had improperly used federal funds to pay for placements to such agencies.
Miller was joined in his letter by ranking Democratic members of several committees, including Reps. Charles Rangel, New York, of the Ways and Means Committee; Henry Waxman, California, of the Government Reform Committee; Pete Stark, California, of the Ways and Means Health Subcommittee; David Obey, Wisconsin, of the Appropriations Committee; and John Conyers, Michigan, of the Judiciary Committee. A seventh member of Congress, Rep. Barbara Lee, a newly elected Democrat from Berkeley, also signed the letter.
Miller aide John Lawrence said the GAO will be asked to look at whether there is adequate oversight of youths in such programs.
The investigators also will be expected to study how the costs of enrolling in those programs are paid.
Miller wrote the 1980 law that created a federal pot of money for abused and neglected children. Probation officers said those funds are being used to pay part of the cost of sending delinquents to a variety of programs that had included the Arizona Boys Ranch, and Lawrence said it is illegal to use those funds for court-adjudicated children.
Thomas said that his program receives such funding properly and that the Boys Ranch was cleared several years ago to receive such funding.
He added that more than a dozen youths who were returned home after Contreraz died have come back to his campus voluntarily to complete work for diplomas or vocational programs that make them job ready.
Friday is the last day California will pay for youths to stay at the ranch and still receive reimbursement from the state.
Thomas said he has scheduled a meeting of California judges and probation officers on Aug. 6 -- the day the state's remaining youths are to graduate -- to unveil plans for a new orientation program at Oracle, the camp where Contreraz died. It has since been closed, but Thomas said it could reopen next spring.
The request to the General Accounting Office comes as such programs, particularly the Arizona Boys Ranch, find themselves under increasing scrutiny.
Earlier this week, the U.S. Justice Department confirmed that it and the FBI were investigating the death of Contreraz at a mountainside camp north of Tucson.
An earlier probe conducted for California's Department of Social Services sparked the state's decision to cut off funding for placement of youths in the program.
The program also faces a criminal probe from Pinal County, Ariz., prosecutors, as well as pending investigations in Arizona by Child Protective Services and the state's Department of Economic Security, which licenses it.
The controversy over California's practice of sending youths to such programs -- some of which use physical restraints and other practices not allowed in California -- also has spawned a reform effort in the Legislature, where lawmakers are considering a bill to restrict such placements.
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