Fearful council kills DARE

Paul Clinton

City Council members finally cut the funding thread to the Drug

Abuse Resistance Education program, which is popular but also has

raised questions about how effectively it kept children from using

drugs.

On a 4-3 vote, the council eliminated DARE on Monday, two months

after halving the amount provided to send two police officers into

local schools to preach the negative effects of drugs and violence.

Huntington Beach Police Chief Kenneth Small recommended the move,

saying his department needed the two officers on patrol.

“It’s not that we don’t support the program,” Small said. “We just

don’t have the money [to fund it].”

After three newly elected members mounted an effort to postpone a

decision whether to kill the program and allow supporters to raise

private funding to keep it alive, a majority of council members

elected to pull the plug on DARE.

The city has had the drug-prevention program since 1983.

“We need to vote tonight and give some people some direction,”

Councilwoman Debbie Cook said.

Mayor Connie Boardman, Councilwoman Pam Julien Houchen and

Councilwoman Jill Hardy joined Cook in support of the move.

Councilman Gil Coerper, a retired Huntington Beach police officer,

led the charge to save the program.

“I think it’s the most important thing we can do for our

children,” Coerper said about DARE. “I would do anything in my power

to make sure that it continues.”

Coerper proposed bringing back the item at the council’s next

meeting, on Jan. 6, an idea that died on the wrong end of a 4-3 vote.

In September, the council scaled back DARE, cutting it from an

18-week program to a 9-week program. The program will end early next

year.

Small said the program would cost the department $77,320 for the

spring semester.

During the public comment period of the council meeting, a handful

of speakers criticized the program as ineffectual.

Resident Norm Westwell said the program has failed to effectively

keep children away from drugs.

“I do not advocate drug use,” Westwell said. “[But DARE] is just

as effective as if we did nothing at all.”

Edison High School senior Hillary LeBail spoke in favor of the

program. LeBail, 17, is a member of the city’s Children’s Task Force,

an advisory panel.

“You could really lose the opportunity to help some children,” she

said of canceling the program. “If it helps one child to not do

drugs, it’s a success.”

A coalition operating under the name Substance Abuse and Violence

Education, or SAVE, has fought for the program. Shirley Carey, a SAVE

member and Huntington Beach City School District trustee, said she

hoped to raise as much as $35,000 by February to resuscitate DARE.

Carey said the group is still weighing whether to apply for

federal or state grants. She also acknowledged she has a long road

ahead.

“I’m very disappointed [by the decision to eliminate DARE], Carey

said. “I think it’s going to be very hard to fund a program that has

been officially discontinued.”

* PAUL CLINTON is a reporter with Times Community News. He

covers City Hall. He may be reached at (714) 965-7173 or by e-mail at

paul.clinton@latimes.com.