Chronic drunks' treatment costs S.F. big bucks

San Francisco has paid at least $150,000 for Kenny Walters in the past year. He isn't employed, has an arrest record as long as his hair, and can often be found passed out in a doorway on Haight Street.

Kenny Walters' job is to get drunk.

He's certainly not alone. "Chronic inebriants" are a grim and disturbing fact of life in San Francisco. They also cost the city millions.

The frustration is that the public service network - police, fire and medical professionals - doesn't seem to make a dent when it comes to people like Walters. There are suggestions, like a pilot program for high-impact users at the Department of Public Health, or the Community Justice Center to target frequent users, but nothing seems to get traction.

A five-year study found that 225 high ambulance users cost the city an average of $13 million annually, said Maria X. Martinez, a deputy director at the Department of Public Health.

'A lot of money'

That may be low. Martinez's study calculated an ambulance pickup at a cost of $725 in 2007; for 2009-10 the cost is $1,458.

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"No matter how you calculate it," Martinez said, "it is a lot of money."

There should be a way to address this. Martinez's study also found that fewer than 300 individuals account for 80 percent of the ambulance runs for alcohol treatment. That kind of focus is exactly why the Community Justice Center was created. Apparently, in screwy City Hall logic, saving a few hundred thousand dollars by dumping the Community Justice Center trumps the loss of millions.

Recently Walters, who came from Arizona a year and a half ago, was curled up in the fetal position on the sidewalk near Masonic and Haight. Tourists with a camera walked past him; some peered down to see if he was breathing.

"Basically he comes out here and drinks himself to this point every day," police Officer John Andrews said. "It's like the movie 'Leaving Las Vegas,' " in which where Nicolas Cage's character goes to Las Vegas to drink himself to death.

Happy camper

Walters, who was decked out in a red, long-sleeve Spider-Man shirt, isn't homeless or broke. The 41-year-old happily shared his story with me. He sat up, pushed his blond bangs off his face, and blinked his striking blue eyes until his surroundings came into focus.

"I do get caught for drinking out here every day," he said affably. "I wish I had another beer right now."

He said he gets $953 a month in Supplemental Security Income for disabled and aged citizens and pays $650 a month for a hotel room in the Tenderloin under the city's Care Not Cash program.

With free meals available from local charities, that leaves $300 a month for booze. Walters says he doesn't do hard drugs, just pot. He just drinks, usually "40 ouncers," big, cheap bottles of beer.

"He probably gets picked up two or three times a week," said Andrews, who pointed to two plastic hospital bands Walters had on his wrist from previous visits. "I've seen him with four or five hospital bands at a time."

Too drunk to walk

Walters is usually too intoxicated to walk, which makes him ineligible for a sobering center. But regardless of where he goes, Walter's isn't bothered about the expense.

"Doesn't cost me a thing," he said cheerfully.

But the city is on the hook. It isn't just the money. Each pickup means an ambulance and a fire engine are out of service for other calls.

"One guy had 49 pickups in a month," Martinez said.

Walters says he has "probably gotten 100 tickets in a year and a half, but I just don't go to court. ... My tickets just don't seem to show up."

Actually, they are either dismissed or a warrant is issued. But because he ignores those, too, nothing happens.

Andrews says he continues to cite Walters, but "he's in such bad health there isn't much we can do."

It is a sad story on every level. While it is infuriating to hear that "frequent fliers" game the system to get free care, everyone knows how this story ends.

"These guys show up in somewhat good health and then deteriorate," said Andrews. "Eventually we find them under one of the bushes in Golden Gate Park - dead."