ANTI-METH TASK FORCE LEADS WAY

White County Group's Effort Pays Off

CLEVELAND -- When Sharon Lee and her mother decided to go public with
their struggles of having a methamphetamine-addicted family member,
the response in White County was immediate.

What started with an article in the local newspaper about her
brother's six-year addiction to meth became a mandate for change.

"Over the next two to three weeks we got so many calls from people who
had the same story as ours," said Lee, a local chamber of commerce
member and co-owner of America's Best Storage in Cleveland. "We said,
'We can't just let this go. If that many people have the same problem,
we need to do something.'"

That "something" became the White County Meth Task Force, a volunteer
nonprofit group with some 75 members representing a cross section of
the community, from law enforcement and treatment providers to
recovering addicts.

In the year and a half since its January 2006 formation, the task
force has been recognized as a model for the state and received the
National Rural Institute On Alcohol and Drug Abuse's Exceptional Rural
Community of the Year award.

The nomination for the national award came "from someone who didn't
know us," but took note of the group's efforts, Lee said.

"That to me makes it even more gratifying," she said. "They saw the
change we were trying to make and the potential we had."

The task force focuses on four areas in spreading its message and
offering services: education, prevention, treatment and enforcement.
Members have given more than 100 presentations to civic clubs, schools
and prison inmates, reaching thousands of people, many whom have their
own stories to share.

One is Teresa Nash-Jones, a 36-year-old mother and Web page designer
who started using meth to lose weight and quickly became hooked. She
reached rock-bottom in 2002 and is celebrating five years clean and
sober as a member of the task force's prevention committee.

"I was not educated about meth when I started using it, and I think
there's a lot of other people who are not educated about it," Jones
said.

This week Jones huddled with members of her committee during a regular
monthly meeting of the task force as they brainstormed for an October
drug awareness campaign.

In the education committee, Sid Brangham, 76, tossed around ideas with
others about a future presentation for teens and their parents.

"We're not going to give them a graduate degree," Brangham told other
committee members. "We want to smack 'em in the head with it. If they
need more information, they can get it."

Brangham, a recovering alcoholic who has been sober for 33 years,
started a support group for families with drug-addicted members. He
said his involvement in the task force stems from wanting to wake
people up to the growing problem of methamphetamine addiction in the
North Georgia mountains.

"When we first started, everybody thought we didn't have a problem in
White County," Brangham said. "It was like, 'not in my back yard.'"

White County Sheriff Neal Walden can attest to the problem. A "large
percentage" of the inmates in his jail landed there from meth or other
substance abuse issues, he said.

The task force, Walden says, gives voice to a problem that he couldn't
effectively address by himself.

"I have been trying for years to get the message out through
education," Walden said. "But people think I'm just trying to put you
in jail."

For substance abuse treatment providers like Bonnie Lockwood of
Cleveland's Cornerstone Counseling, the task force affords people in
her profession a chance to meet and exchange notes.

"It gives us a forum to sit together and talk about who's got what
covered, so that we're not duplicating services, and so we're
providing services every day of the week," she said.

Indeed, a big role of the task force is steering those who need help
to places that can provide it, through the group's hotline, Web site
and informational pamphlets.

The task force "bridges the gap for all these different resources,"
said Melisa Fincher, White County's public health nurse and a founding
member of the group. "When someone is arrested on a drug charge, a
deputy will give them our business card. They may take them to jail,
but they will tell them where to get help."

The group has made such a mark that other Northeast Georgia counties
are turning to it for guidance on how to start their own task forces.

Fincher said White County's task force is glad to help, but it won't
dictate how others should run their operations.

"We tell them, 'if you like what we do and how we do it, fine. If you
don't, do it different.' Hopefully it will just keep spreading like
wildfire, so that we can make a difference."

Said Lee, "Behind any organization like this is a passion. When you
have that passion behind you, you are able to make a change."