cannabisnews.com: Anderson Calls DARE A Fraud





Anderson Calls DARE A Fraud
Posted by FoM on June 22, 2000 at 09:56:47 PT
By Kirsten Stewart 
Source: Salt Lake Tribune
  Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson has set his sights on the most widely used drug-education program in America.   Calling DARE "a fraud on the people of America," Anderson says he would like to see the city's program dismantled. A great promotional tool for police, the Drug Abuse Resistance Education program does little to stop teens from using drugs or alcohol, the mayor said Tuesday, citing studies that have called into question the program's long-term effectiveness. 
 "We have frittered away opportunities to put in place in our schools programs that actually work," he said.   Since the 1999 mayoral campaign, Anderson has pitched his own ideas for after-school and summer youth programs at city schools, and he has two full-time staffers dedicated to their development.   Anderson met with Salt Lake City School District Superintendent Darline Robles and DARE officials June 6 to express his opinion. He is reviewing the DARE program with the Salt Lake City Police Department and will make a final decision in a few months.   Salt Lake City has four officers assigned to DARE, each working with about 10 schools. Anderson has threatened to stop funding the city portion of their salaries. The department also stands to lose $40,000 in grant money awarded by a private foundation exclusively for the DARE program.   The police department spends about $289,000 annually on the officers' salaries, vehicles and equipment, according to police spokesman Cory Lyman.   Should Anderson pull the plug on DARE, however, these officers won't lose their jobs, he said. "We would see them redeployed to other programs," which already happens during slow summer months.   "We have felt like DARE has been a successful program. That's why we've continued to do it," Lyman said.   But like any program, DARE should be periodically reviewed, he said. "We have given all our information to the mayor and will abide by any decision he makes.   Launched 17 years ago in Los Angeles, DARE reaches more than 30 million children in 10,000 American cities and 49 foreign countries. The program came to Utah public schools in 1987. Today, almost half the state's public and private schools have implemented the program. In Salt Lake City, the program is taught in most of the 28 elementary and five middle schools.   In DARE's defense, Tibby Milne, who runs the program for the state, said it doesn't claim to be a silver bullet. It is part of a coordinated approach to the problem of drug abuse, and its strength lies in the bonds that develop between the children and DARE police officers, she said.   "Officers spend 17 weeks with those kids," and their street experiences often carry more weight than the best advice from parents, teachers or counselors, Milne said.   Tracey Lash, a mother of two children who went through Indian Hills Elementary's DARE program in the fifth grade, has mixed feelings about it.   "From my experience, yes, it certainly was worth it. Any discussion that you have with a child to inform them about drugs and alcohol is going to be beneficial," but the program's results are hard to quantify, she said.   While in the program, Lash's children practiced saying no in various scenarios and were given tips on how to avoid drugs and respond to peer pressure. But to Lash's knowledge, her children never have faced a real-life situation where the tips came in handy.   "I suspect that the impact is nominal in this area," said Scott Howell, a parent of a DARE student. Howell recently protested holding a DARE graduation celebration at a Draper restaurant that serves alcohol.   For children from troubled homes who might not get the kind of moral support the program provides, DARE is probably effective, Howell said. "But this community already has strong values and anti-drug behavior and probably doesn't need that kind of reinforcement."   Still, "it was a nice program," he said. "We'll encourage all of our children to go through it if it continues."    Tribune reporters Rebecca Walsh and Heather May contributed to this story.   NewsHawk: Thomas  Published: Thursday, June 22, 2000© Copyright 2000, The Salt Lake Tribune Related Articles:How Dare Mr. Kubby?http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread5782.shtmlCannabisNews DARE Archives: http://cannabisnews.com/news/list/DARE.shtml
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Comment #4 posted by hupert on March 20, 2001 at 13:03:15 PT:
dopers are being dopy again
Where in the world do they find people like this Mayor?According to the rest of the world anything you do to get cops to look like human beings has got to be better than portraying them as wild men in shows like COPs.
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Comment #3 posted by Dan B on June 22, 2000 at 23:57:47 PT:
D.A.R.E: Idiocy in Action
The problem with DARE is that kids eventually learn to have a healthy disrespect of the police. They eventually see the crimes committed against their friends in the name of enforcing the law, and they eventually learn that the nice police who talked to them at school were lying to protect their own selfish-interests. And when that hapens, they throw everything they have learned about drugs from police out the window. Those who try marijuana and recognize its relative safety suddenly begin to believe that all drugs are just as safe. Goodbye marijuana; hello heroin and maethamphetamine! I can think of only one informed group, outside law enforcement, that would want the DARE program to continue: dealers of hard drugs.
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Comment #2 posted by Thomas on June 22, 2000 at 12:28:50 PT
Conservative (Fascist State)
Salt Lake is the only place where someone left of right-wing-thinking has a chance to get elected in this state. I feel disgraced that we are represented by the likes of Hatch and Bennett, and don't forget our three stooges in the house.
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Comment #1 posted by kaptinemo on June 22, 2000 at 12:15:53 PT:
Unintended Irony
This in a nutshell illustrates the flagrant, unconcious stupidity of the antis. It shows the incredible depth of blind hypocrisy endemic in nearly everything they do:"I suspect that the impact is nominal in this area," said Scott Howell, a parent of a DARE student. Howell recently protested holding a DARE graduation celebrationat a Draper restaurant that serves alcohol.'Of course, by the DARE cop's view, there's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with children getting the not-too-subtle message that alcohol is *not* a 'drug' because our brewery and distillery supporters of DARE and PFDFA *say* it isn't.People don't drink to get high, they drink to be, uh, ...'sociable'. (God knows how many times I had to dodge the slurred, sprayed epithets and wildly flailing fists of such 'sociable' people.)And people who are ethanol addi- oops, 'have a drinking problem', are *not* the same as someone shooting up heroin, oh no, kiddies, don't think that! Just wave the magic cops' truncheon, say the secret incantation, and Presto! That juicer suffering from cirrhosis is not a drug addict, he's, uh, uhm, he's ... something else. Because if the kiddies thought he was a drug addict, that just might confuse the poor little tykes. And they might start narking on Mom and Pop to the Nice Policeman (like they teach in the DARE program to do) for having a drink, because alcohol is a 'drug', and drugs are bad, bad, bad!As more and more school systems realize they've been had, and more of them abandon the DARE program, we can expect to witness even greater examples of this blind stupidity in action. Like someone suffering simultaneously from tourette's syndrome and a short term memory loss, the police are totally unaware of what they sound like. They've gone about, blathering their nonsense for years, hoping a uniform and a badge would screen them from criticism of their precious, useless programs.That day is over, and none to soon. 
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