WEST ASHEVILLE RESIDENTS SHOW WAY TO SOLVE DRUG PROBLEMS BEGINS WITH HONEST
DISCUSSION

A lot of wonderful things are happening in West Asheville. But like
every other urban area - and plenty of rural areas, as well - West
Asheville is plagued by the problem of the illegal sale and use of
drugs. Some West Asheville residents had a frank discussion about the
subject at a forum earlier this week and their observations are worth
sharing.

Asheville Police Department Officer Mike Godwin, who has worked in
West Asheville for several years, said he and fellow officers displace
drug dealers and keep them on the move but, he told a group of about
50 people who came out on a bitterly cold night to talk about their
community, as long as there's money in dealing drugs and you've got
"morons" who want them, there will be a problem.

Minnie Jones, a longtime West Asheville resident and co-founder of
the Health Center at Pisgah View housing complex, said it is people
from outside the community who bring "this deadly poison to our young
people." Where, she wanted to know, would young African-American men
get the drugs if they weren't supplied from outside? But the dealers
on the street do tend to be young African-American men who "don't have
jobs and can't get jobs." They get arrested, convicted, serve time and
lose their right to vote, said Jones, who has been a precinct chairman
for the Asheville Democratic Party. Being disenfranchised means they
lose their ability to participate in the democratic process, to
influence the laws that govern their lives.

Dr. "Buddy" Corbin, pastor of Calvary Baptist Church on Haywood Road,
said a fellow minister told him, "If your white boys will stop buying
drugs from our black boys, we won't have a drug problem."

Though his church is located in an area where drug dealers operate, he
said, there is respect "on the part of that community" for the church.
Corbin said he's played ping-pong with them and that they wave to him.

"I don't think it's a police problem," he said. ". I think sometimes
it's a family problem. Where are our families in all of this?"

Godwin, who is classified as a master police officer, doesn't believe
the drug problem is any worse now than it was 20 years ago; it's just
different drugs. Godwin, Jones, Corbin and Alice Oglesby, former
president of the West Asheville Business Association, constituted a
panel at the forum, which was sponsored by the Asheville Citizen-Times
as part of its "Day in the Life of West Asheville" project.

"West Asheville is kind of like a little family town. ... It's kind of
like a big old, big old family and I love it," Jones said.

But it's also a diverse community, and the diversity sometimes causes
problems, Godwin said. The veteran officer who was born and raised in
West Asheville and joked that he used to run the streets as a young
hoodlum said there's a lot of prejudice still. With sizable Ukrainian
and Hispanic communities, West Asheville is home to people with
different backgrounds and "sometimes cultures clash," he said.

"We as a community need to open up ourselves more," Godwin
said.

"Some of it is like Mike said. We need to get to know (our neighbors).
Some are just as sweet as we are. I'm sweet myself. I don't know about
the rest of you," Jones added, getting a laugh.

That's a prescription that might solve a great many problems in West
Asheville and elsewhere.

It's easy to demonize those we don't know or understand, from the
mentally ill homeless man, to the family next door with the unfamiliar
habits, to the young drug dealers, hawking their wares on the street
corner.

It's especially easy to see young drug dealers as wholly evil - and
there's no question the substances they market can cause untold human
suffering. But Jones, who uses a cane, said they sometimes offer to
walk her to her house.

The question is more than just "Where are our families?" It's "Where
are our communities?"

The encouraging thing about West Asheville is that a range of issues -
prejudice, mental illness, homeless people and drugs - came up for
discussion at the forum Tuesday night at the West Asheville library,
but the tone was more compassionate than angry. It was about finding
solutions, not pointing fingers.

Drugs are, as Godwin said, a social problem. After all these years of
drug wars, it should be clear that the drug problem will never be
solved by putting more young men in prison. Law enforcement efforts
should be focused on cutting off the supply. But a more powerful
solution will be found in strong communities where all young people
find acceptance and adult leaders willing to teach them skills, offer
them guidance and give them realistic hope for the future.

Listening to the people who live there and love it talk Tuesday night,
it was easy to believe that West Asheville can be such a place.