COUNTY FUNDING OF DARE QUESTIONED

Task Force Deflects Issue Of Results

Waukesha - Members of a special task force on Monday questioned
whether county tax dollars should be used to finance a popular drug
and alcohol prevention program that some studies show has had little
success.

"The question that is jumping out at us is, 'Is this a county
program?' " said Sharon Wisniewski, alcohol and other drug abuse
coordinator for the area's Cooperative Educational Service Agency No.
1, which assists local public school officials.

"I don't think it's our role to decide if DARE works or not," she said.

County Executive Dan Finley formed the task force last month to
review DARE, saying "taxpayers demand results" from programs funded
with tax dollars.

Started in 1983 in Los Angeles, Drug Abuse Resistance Education is
taught to fifth- and sixth-graders. Emphasizing the dangers of drugs
and alcohol, the program has been used widely in Waukesha County
schools for 10 years and has the support of Waukesha County District
Attorney Paul Bucher and Sheriff William Kruziki.

The county sends $40 a student - about $140,000 a year - to police
departments to help offset their DARE costs, which are often shared
by municipalities and school districts.

In addition, the Waukesha County Sheriff's Department spends another
$282,000 on its own DARE program, which reaches 3,500 to 3,800
students, at a cost of $75 to $80 a child.

Noel Adams, alcohol and other addictions program coordinator for the
Menomonee Falls School District, said DARE is neither a county
program nor a school program.

"It is clearly a police program," Adams said, adding that perhaps the
responsibility for funding the program should rest with the
municipalities whose police departments administer the programs.

"Philosophically, those people who own the problem ought to be able
to do their part to address the problem," Adams said. "They should be
the ones paying for it and not hoping that someone off in Washington
or somewhere is going to pay for it."

For example, Adams said, "if Menomonee Falls is a municipality that
has a drug and alcohol problem, they should be willing to put
resources into preventing it."

Menomonee Falls has said it will support the program regardless of
whether the county continues to fund it, Adams said.

"But not every community is going to share that opinion," he said.
"The question is, 'Should the county be doing it if municipalities
decide not to fund it?' "

Adams suggested it may be more equitable for communities without
police departments or with small departments to contract with the
Sheriff's Department to provide the DARE program. Those communities
should share in the cost of the program, he said.

Program Criticized

DARE has come under heavy criticism in the past several years, with
several studies questioning the program's effectiveness.

The state Department of Public Instruction last year reviewed 69
national DARE studies and concluded they "showed no convincing
evidence that DARE alone will achieve the stated goal of the program."

Nonetheless, 62% of Wisconsin parents, educators and alcohol and drug
abuse counselors interviewed for the DPI study said DARE was meeting
its objectives. The DPI study also concluded that DARE had many
strengths, including increasing students' knowledge about the risks
of alcohol and drugs and improving their relationships with law
enforcement.

DARE is taught in about three-quarters of the state's 426 school districts.

In the past, some DARE critics on the County Board have questioned
the makeup of the task force, which they viewed as being heavily in
favor of the program.

Focus On County Funding

But on Monday, the task force sidestepped the question of whether the
DARE curriculum is effective in keeping kids away from drugs and
alcohol and focused solely on who should pay for it or similar
prevention programs.

Claudia Roska, executive director of the Addiction Resource Council
in Waukesha, said whether the task force feels "DARE is good or bad
should have nothing to do with" its determination of whether it
should be funded with county tax dollars.

But Bill Beglinger, a Waukesha police officer and president of the
Waukesha County DARE officers association, defended the program. A
task force member, Beglinger said one of the "strongest reasons the
county should be involved" is that government should be an advocate
for public safety.

Noting that the program attempts to steer kids away from drugs and
alcohol, Beglinger said that the "public doesn't want to spend
millions of dollars building a new jail every five years."

Beglinger reminded the panel that Finley gave the group three options
- - dropping the program from the county budget; retaining it at its
current funding level; or modifying it.

Beglinger said that a case could be made for reducing the funding.

"From our perspective, the $40 per student cost was supposed to be
for supplies. It wasn't supposed to go to help pay officers'
salaries. Then, all of a sudden, it came out that that's what was
happening.

"I don't spend $40 per student in supplies. So if we're looking at a
modification, maybe we could reduce the funding and still provide the
service."

Finley said he has not targeted the program for elimination.

He has asked the task force to make a recommendation later this
summer to help him as he prepares next year's budget.

About Dare

*The Drug Abuse Resistance Education program was started in 1983 in
Los Angeles.
*The program, which emphasizes the dangers of drugs and alcohol, is
taught to fifth- and sixth-graders.
*DARE has been used widely in Waukesha County schools for 10 years.
It is taught in about three-quarters of Wisconsin's 426 school
districts.
*Waukesha County sends about $140,000 a year to local police
departments to help offset their DARE costs. The Sheriff's Department
spends another $282,000 on its own DARE program.
*The program has come under heavy criticism in the past several
years, with several studies questioning the program's effectiveness.