FEARFUL COUNCIL KILLS DARE

Looming Budget Crunch Prompts City Leaders To Cut Program Funding.

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."