A court’s success in saving lives and saving money in Koochiching County has helped garner more funding and a visit by the official that helped get the money.

U.S. Rep. Jim Oberstar met with graduates, team members and court officials involved in the county’s DUI/Substance Abuse Court last week.

The court recently received $100,000 from an appropriations bill, and earlier, Oberstar helped the court gain more than $300,000 from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

The congressman explained that $850,000 in the last two years has been saved in jail costs avoided in Koochiching County.

“And the benefit of human beings restored to dignity and understanding their self worth and helping other people — it’s fabulous. So uplifting,” said Oberstar.

Four of the 64 graduates of the program, which began in January 2005, discussed the role it has played in getting their lives back on track.

Joe Farmer, Staci Bannert, Richard Baron, and Mickey Brackin each told Oberstar about how the team, Judge Chad LeDuc and probation staff worked together to help them overcome their substance abuse and become productive members of the community.

The program takes a holistic approach to helping clients by addressing issues relating to their social needs and skills, health, employment, housing, and spirituality. The team is made up of representatives of the police, treatment councilors, jailers, defense council, social services, victims services, physicians and others.

Drug courts and their success have faced skepticism, said Della Warren, coordinator of drug court here and in Lake of the Woods County. But Koochiching’s drug court has just a 5-percent recidivism rate among its graduates and has a graduation rate of 97 percent. Traditional probation sees a 60 percent to 70 percent recidivism, she said.

Farmer fought back tears as he told Oberstar of his involvement in the program. “My life is 100 times different — better,” he said. “I am home with my kids being a father and a provider. I am there, out of jail.”

Members of the team made the program personal, he said. “These people tell me they believe in me. That they’re proud of me,” he said.

LeDuc said the graduates serve as an inspiration.

“We’ve given them a little push, but they’ve turned their lives around,” he said of the graduates.

Some of that push comes in the form of the Viva E Urinalyses machine that helps determine whether clients in the program are using drugs.

Warren explained that it provides instant, reliable results. “It allows for immediate sanctions if there is drug use,” she said.

Just like in good parenting, Warren said penalties are most effective when doled out immediately after the infraction. In addition, she said the urinalysis takes the pressure off clients in the program because they know they can’t use without getting caught.

“We’ve had a few surprises, in a good way, and some of us call them miracles,” said Warren. “We never thought some families or individuals would ever, ever turn to sobriety.”

Warren marveled that Farmer is actually recruiting for the program, bringing people he knows with abuse issues into the program.

Brackin told Oberstar she’s been sober for 4 1/2 years and graduated from the program three years ago

“I did time in jail, treatment and a halfway house,” she said. “Then I had to come back home, which scared me.”

And while she explained that she learned the tools of sobriety through treatment, she didn’t know how to employ them “in this big bad world. I didn’t know what normal was.”

Brackin said having the team’s support and their pride “is huge.” Now, Brackin is a chemical dependency technician at a treatment center and is working toward getting her practical nurse licensure back.

“I just keep setting goals,” she said.

In most cases, clients are sent to drug court in an effort to avoid long jail terms and high fines. That wasn’t the case with Brackin.

“She didn’t have to come to the program,” LeDuc noted. “She wanted to.”

Probation Officer Troy Rautio told Oberstar that he taught Brackin how to tie fishing lures onto line to give her a hobby that doesn’t involve illegal substances.

“She’s done a wonderful job,” he said of her life after the program.

For Staci Bannert, “not getting high was the easy part; they’re drug testing all the time. The hard part for me was everything else. I was desperate to be happy.”

Bannert’s voice broke with emotion as she explained that she began using methamphetamine on a daily basis at age 12 or 13.

Because of that abuse, she said she didn’t learn social skills that allowed her to easily talk to people and handle her emotions.

“I didn’t know anything about real life,” she said. “People in drug court gave me the tools to do those things. Now, life is perfect.”

She told Oberstar she’s grateful for much, including a son, who has “never had to see me messed up.” She’s attending college, working as a public health nurse and purchased a house.

“I’m grateful for the opportunity to give back,” she said. “I know I would never be here without drug court — ever.”

Baron left International Falls to live in Washington state, where he said he “bottomed out” in substance abuse. Despite his objections, family members brought him back to Borderland where he learned about small town values and caring for one another.

“People didn’t look at me like I felt: a loser,” he told Oberstar. “They were willing to spend the time and funds to make me a part of the community. Coming back here saved my life.”

Baron said he’s been clean for two years and wants to pay the community back.

“I don’t know the cost to run drug court, but what it’s done for me is priceless,” he told Oberstar, encouraging his support for future funding. “It’s an investment in society and the returns are huge.”

The visit by Oberstar was important, Warren said. “It validated all the hard work they have been doing,” she said of the graduates and team. “They got to show that his support is crucial, because it keep us going.”

Funding the drug court program will be an ongoing concern, said Warren.

“In the next biennium we will have to do a lot of leg work and education to make sure our state legislators know we are a valuable service and need to be funded somehow.”

LeDuc said the program is a great community benefit and deserves to continue.

“When we were confronted with a budget crisis two years ago, and then when it just keeps getting worse year after year, reliance on state funding is non existent,” LeDuc said.