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D R A M A++Q U E E N Did a gorilla ever spit on your videocam? Send your worst outing tales to
dramaqueen - - - - - - - - - - T A B L E++T A L K Do mothers love all their children the same? Or do they pick favorites. Join mothers and children in a discussion of the nuances of mother love in Table Talk - - - - - - - - - - R E C E N T L Y The demise of discipline: Second of three parts Global baby warming Mulan through the looking glass Boho/professional goddess seeks modern man Your show of shows BROWSE THE FEATURE ARCHIVES - - - - - - - - - - Mamafesto
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_______C Ra c k i n g_..d o w n
BY JEFF STRYKER | "They're having litters. They are literally having litters." Barbara Harris is not talking about puppies or kittens, but about addicted women who have given birth to five, 10 or 15 drug-exposed children, despite being unwilling or unable to care for them. And Harris is not just mad as hell -- she is trying, almost single-handedly, to do something about it. Last year, she founded CRACK (Children Requiring a Caring Kommunity), a nonprofit organization in Anaheim, Calif., that offers $200 to any drug-addicted or alcoholic mother who agrees to be sterilized or have Norplant implanted, or to any male drug addict or alcoholic who has a vasectomy. "I'm not saying these women are animals," she hastens to add. Nevertheless, her words can't help but evoke images of animal shelters that offer pet owners a few dollars to encourage them to spay or neuter their animals. The idea also seems uncomfortably close to population control efforts such as Peru's program to sterilize poor women by offering them small gifts as bait. Harris' proposal is certainly in a similar vein: Why not see if money will convince parents addicted to crack, heroin, alcohol or speed not to bring any more children into the world? "I've never taken on anything else like this," says Harris, an engaging woman in her mid-40s, as we sit in her office at CRACK's utilitarian headquarters, a couple of rooms in a medical office building nestled in a vast expanse of strip malls. "When I was in high school, I wouldn't even get up in class to give a report, I would rather get an 'F' -- that's how shy I was. People who know me can't believe I am doing this." Harris got involved when she and her husband, Smitty, parents of a blended family of six boys, decided they wanted a girl and opted for the one sure-fire method: foster care. That is how Destiny, the 8-month-old daughter of a crack-addicted mother, came into their lives. Destiny soon had a new baby brother. Would the Harrises be interested in taking him in too? And so it went until Barbara and Smitty Harris had adopted Destiny, Isiah, Taylor and Brandon -- babies No. 5, 6, 7 and 8 from the same mother. The idea that Destiny's mom "was allowed to just visit her local hospital yearly and drop off her damaged babies and nobody would even give her a slap on the hand" rankled Harris, who says that several of the children were born addicted and had to suffer through withdrawal as infants. Harris never met Destiny's birth mother, but as she took more and more of the woman's children into her home, the plight of babies such as Destiny became her cause. In a flannel shirt and jeans, this day Harris looks more soccer mom than working mother, although her life gives new meaning to the phrase "second shift." On a typical business day, she fields press calls, raises money, juggles a board of directors and plays social worker, all between the hours of 8 and 10:30 in the morning, then bolts home to take care of the children. Harris began her crusade by asking nurses, police and social workers if she could do something, anything, to break this cycle of despair -- even if it meant making a citizen's arrest. When she was told there was nothing she could do, she became a "faxing fool." Shy no more, she convinced a California state Assembly member, Phil Hawkins, to introduce a bill to make it a crime to give birth to a drug baby. When the bill died in committee, she took her plea to the media, making her case in the Orange County Register and the Los Angeles Times. She appeared on "Oprah" and became a darling of talk radio hosts and newspaper pundits across the nation -- among them San Diego radio personality Rick Roberts, now a CRACK board member, who had gained national attention for reading the names of Megan's Law sex offenders on the air, and Dr. Laura Schlessinger, who has donated $5,000 to the CRACK coffers and frequently touts the program on her radio therapy show. In the center of an emotionally charged issue, Harris is an effective advocate, all the more so because she has "walked the walk" with her adopted family. The reaction of Orlando Sentinel columnist Kathleen Parker is typical. "Everybody complains ... Then one day, somebody actually does something," Parker wrote in her syndicated column last December. "Not a bureaucrat, not a politician, not a social worker. Just somebody who is sick and tired of watching the tragedy unfold while everybody else comes up with reasons why we can't do anything. Barbara Harris of Stanton, Calif., is my hero." Conservative radio host and Denver Post columnist Ken Hamblin was equally impassioned. "[Harris'] words of wisdom and tough love seem to be lost on the bleeding heart feminist liberals," he wrote in December. "I say 200 bucks is a minuscule sum to spend if it will prevent a junkie from contributing another baby to the junk heap of urban poverty and human misery."
N E X T+P A G E: Is she playing God?
ILLUSTRATION BY KATHERINE STREETER
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