7/10/14 - The gears are turning on a new strategic plan to coordinate drug abuse prevention efforts across the county. A series of meetings that began in December was held by the Livingston Community Prevention Project to gather input from the community on how such a plan should be formed. Residents provided input on what sort of drug problems were in the community, what might be causing them, and how the causes should be addressed. With that input in mind, organizers met this week and picked out three different substance abuse prevention models, each of which has been proven effective in communities around the world and could serve as the basis for a local strategic plan. While two focus on alcohol and one focuses on a broader range of abused substances, Catholic Charities Substance Abuse Prevention Coordinator Kaitlin Fink says any of them could be adapted for any substance as needed locally. Any interested parties are invited to a meeting at St. Joseph Mercy Livingston Hospital in Howell August 12th to help pick which model should be put in place. The meeting is open to everyone, including anti-drug advocates, law enforcement, members of the media, educators and interested residents. After they have chosen a program for the plan, organizers will begin looking for corporate, local, state, and federal grants that require a strategic plan to be in place. Those grants will provide the funding to get the planâs programs off the ground. (TD)
↧