GROUP OF PARENTS REQUESTS DRUG-SNIFFING DOGS IN SCHOOLS

A small group of Monarch High School parents plans to petition the Boulder
Valley School Board to allow drug-sniffing dogs to search lockers in school
hallways.

The idea was spawned at a meeting between parents and Louisville police
Wednesday night that was meant to discuss drug problems in the wake of the
death of a 16-year-old girl after she took ecstasy. A dozen parents
attended the meeting.

Louisville police officers Jane Patten, a school resource officer, and
Detective Brad Dore expressed to the parents their frustration that dogs
could not be used in Boulder Valley Schools.

"I think it is a pro-active approach," Patten said. Dore said he believed
in the need for a dog so much that he would personally invest in one.

Patten said the idea was discussed a year ago with school officials, who
rejected it.

Joe Sleeper, Boulder Valley School District director of secondary
education, said he recalled that the request was for a training exercise,
not for a search of schools.

He said any decision to allow police to use drug-sniffing dogs in schools
would first have to be discussed with the school district's highest
administrators, including the school board and lawyers.

"It is definitely what I would call pretty invasive," Sleeper said. "That
is a real challenge on the (students') individual rights."

Monarch parents Leslie Halladay, Claudia Kessack and others said they plan
to set up a table at high school sporting events to collect petition
signatures from other parents who support the use of dogs in schools.

"We would like to organize a group and go to the school board meetings
until we get something accomplished," Halladay said.

Kessack, like some other parents at the meeting, expressed surprise that
the school district was not already supporting the use of dog searches in
the schools.

"I think it would be excellent," she said. "If you got nothing to hide,
then what is there to lose?"

Monarch Principal Bill Johnson said he was taking a neutral position on the
searches.

He said he has allowed dogs to do drug searches at high schools he worked
at outside of Boulder County, including Ft. Lupton High School, and that no
drugs were ever found despite police suspicions that they were prevalent in
the schools.

"It was a big eye-opener for the local police," he said.

Wednesday's meeting was held on the same day that results of a national
survey on drug use by teenagers were released. For the sixth straight year,
teenagers surveyed said drugs were their greatest concern.

The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University
conducted the survey.

Teenagers found it harder to buy cigarettes but easier to purchase
marijuana than cigarettes, according to the survey.

At least 28 percent of the teens surveyed said they knew a friend or
classmate who has used ecstasy, and 17 percent knew more than one user. Ten
percent of the teenagers said they have been to a rave and that ecstasy was
available at 70 percent of those parties.

On Feb. 2, Brittney Chambers was removed from life-support, six days after
taking ecstasy at a party in her mother's Superior home. The Boulder County
Coroner's Office said she suffered from water intoxication triggered by her
use of ecstasy.

Her death has spurred concern about the use of drugs in the school. Boulder
County Sheriff George Epp is planning to put together a community-wide
symposium to raise awareness about the effects of designer drugs.