The use of alcohol and drugs has become a big concern in recent years, and members of different community organizations in Sherburne County are banding together to address the issue.
The Sherburne County Substance Use Coalition is a county-wide collaboration with a mission to prevent substance use among youth by promoting safe and healthy choices among all community members.
Sheriff Joel Brott said the idea for the coalition started after a Safe Schools meeting in Becker in August 2012.
“We have some of the infrastructure in place that facilitated a large scale coalition - support staff to take minutes, finance department to help manage any kind of grant funding or donations, and a facility to hold meetings,” he says. “Really, we already had the relationships and partnerships with stakeholders that would need to be part of the community.”
Coalition Chair Mark Kolbinger, assistant principal at Becker High School, says the issue of drugs and alcohol was already being discussed before the coalition formed.
“About a year and a half ago we were talking about teenage drinking and teenage substance abuse and we talked about maybe doing a more coordinated approach among all the schools in the county,” he says. “That led to us finding out about a grant and kicking off the coalition.”
Kolbinger said the Becker School District has been addressing substance abuse for a number of years.
“We’ve seen an increase in the number of students we’re refering for chemical dependency treatment,” he says. “We review our Minnesota survey data every three years, so that gives us a good idea of what our kids are using and experimenting with. And we talk with other schools as well to see what some of the current trends are.”
The school contracts with a chemical health educator who works with students, staff and parents.
“One of our commitments is parent outreach. We talk with parents about the issue and give them tips about how to talk with their kids about the issue,” says Kolbinger. “Just last month at Safe Schools we had a presentation about drug clothing. An officer from Elk River put together a presentation about different types of clothing what it represents. It helps us educate parents as well, to make them active partners.”
Targeting Youth
Roxanne Schreder of the Sherburne County Sheriff’s Dept., who is also the coalition director/coordinator, says the ultimate objective is to decrease substance use among youth.
“We’re targeting three main substances - alcohol, prescription drugs and marijuana,” says Schreder. “A lot of people start with prescription drugs then go to on heroin.”
She says youth leadership is an important piece of the puzzle. The coalition held a student leadership summit last October at the Elk River YMCA with about 30 youth from all different communities in the county.
“We talked with them about substance abuse. What are their concerns? What do they see in their own communities? We discussed ways to hopefully prevent that and talked about different resources that might be available to assist that,” she says.
The coalition is in the process of developing a youth council where different communities will have feedback from the students and also assist them in positive community campaigns. Schreder says peer pressure is a big part of why many youth get into alcohol and drugs.
“Right now, I think the perception is that everybody is doing it, when everybody isn’t doing it,” she says. “They need to let their peers know that not everybody is using substances, and make it okay for people to say no.”
Kolbinger agrees youth leadership is a key component in making the coalition successful. He says it’s important that kids don’t feel like adults are dictating what they should be doing.
“We want to continue to develop student leadership,” he says. “We want to know what the kids want and what they feel will be effective.”
Drug-Free Communities Support Grant
The coalition applied for a grant from the Dept. of Health in 2013 but was unsuccessful. They are applying for the $125,000 grant again this year. “There is a Drug-Free Communities Support Grant,” says Schreder. “And along with the Community Anti-Drug Coalition of America, they talk about 12 sectors of the community. That’s where we’ve tried to get representation - to have key people in those areas.”
Those sectors are government, business, social services, law enforcement, parents, senior citizens, youth, school, media, medical, religious and service organizations.
“We’re hoping to get those key stakeholders to participate and hopefully, they will be able to promote our efforts among their own sectors,” says Schreder.
“They all realize this is a huge issue, not only for our youth, but as a community because if they start using in their youth they will most likely continue to use when they’re adults.”
If the coalition receives the grant, which is awarded in August or September, the plan is to expand its efforts in community support and provide information to the community as a whole, focusing on youth. Some of the items discussed at the last meeting were expanding the social host ordinance, training for coalition members, mentoring programs and having a booth at business expos throughout the county.
“We’ve worked the past 18 months to get our mission together and common talking points for our communities,” says Kolbinger, “so people will start to see our presence.”
The coalition meets each month at the Government Center to discuss substance use issues and upcoming community events. This week, they met to review their proposed bylaws and guiding documents.
The meetings are held the third Wednesday of each month at 9 a.m. The coalition is always looking for new members. Anyone interested can contact Schreder at 763-765-3579.
