READY OR NOT, THE WAR ON DRUGS HAS ARRIVED

MADISON -- Schools Superintendent Lawrence Feinsod took the call while
planning an anti-drug program that included talks by teen addicts.

"You just single handily lowered the property values in Madison," Feinsod
was told by a man who identified himself as a local Realtor.

Feinsod said he responded that educating the public about drugs makes for a
better community. With that, Feinsod said the caller hung up, but not
before hurling an invective the superintendent's way.

Despite the gripes of the real estate salesman, Madison's anti-drug seminar
attracted about 1,200 parents and students, the highest turnout for the
"Family to Family" program run by John Dangler, the Morris County prosecutor.

Dangler's crusade against drug use last year took him to about 25 schools
with a program that revolves around users from Daytop Village, a Mendham
Township substance abuse center for youths, telling their stories.

Parents sometimes can be in denial

No school bluntly tells Dangler, who will continue the program this school
year, not to come. However, he says he senses that in some places, school
officials, parents -- or in the case of Madison, a real estate salesman --
do not want to talk about drugs openly.

"I think it's human nature to want to believe that you don't have a
problem," said Montville Superintendent Richard Bozza, who has welcomed
Dangler to township schools.

"Sometimes, you have to fight with the parents to make them believe their
child has a problem," said James McNasby, the superintendent of schools in
the Morris Hills Regional District.

Dangler refuses to identify parents or schools by name who sometimes give
his program a chilly response. But he's full of anecdotal examples.

He recalls when a high school principal sat down with the mother of a
student school officials feared was using drugs.

"The principal suggested he get help," Dangler said.

The mother's response, according to Dangler, was, "Maybe I need to get a
lawyer."

Dangler said the comment left all in the room bewildered. Was the mother
trying to protect her son from a possible police investigation? Was she
hinting she would sue, asserting the school had defamed her son?

Dangler doesn't know.

"That's your 1998 parent in many cases," Dangler said.

He also recalled when school officials confronted a father with the news
that his daughter had a drug problem. "He wanted us to keep it quiet
because he thought it would hurt her chances to get into a good college,"
Dangler said.

At about the same time Feinsod got his angry call from the Realtor, he also
got them from about six parents upset that the drug program was mandatory
for all junior high and high school students.

Their beef: how dare the Madison school system force students not involved
with drugs in any way to attend such a forum?

"My retort was that I felt it was my job as an educator to do just that,"
Feinsod said. "It's got to go beyond reading, writing and arithmetic. Part
of our curriculum was extended that night."

The superintendent since 1983, Feinsod said only a handful of students a
year are caught using drugs in school itself. Fear at what can happen at
night and on weekends drives him to make students listen to Daytop addicts
whether they want to or not.

"If anything, I believe I increase the property values (in town) because
any prospective buyer would want to locate in a community that is willing
to tackle this problem," he said.

Feinsod's comment that few students are caught using drugs in school is
borne out by annual reports districts must file with the state Department
of Education detailing the number of drug incidents in schools the previous
year. The reports typically cover the number of students caught with drugs
in school.

The Morris Hills district, which includes Morris Knolls and Morris Hills
high schools, reported 19 incidents of drug use or possession last school
year, the most of any district in the county. McNasby said that's not
surprising because with 2,250 students, the district has the largest high
school population in the county.

Some 20 of 36 county districts reported no drug incidents in school last
school year and of the 16 others, only Mount Olive, Morris Hills and
Parsippany reported more than 10 incidents. Besides Morris Hills' 19
incidents, Mount Olive reported 16 drug incidents, including the sending of
two students to Daytop, and Parsippany, 13.

The number of drug incidents in Morris Hills breaks down to one per every
118 students. The 16 incidents at Mount Olive High School, which has 955
high school students, breaks down to one incident for every 59 high school
students.

Those ratios could be misleading however, because some offenses can be
counted twice. For instance, if a student is caught selling drugs, an
offense of one student can be reported as two incidents: distributing drugs
and selling drugs.

The state report system relies on school administrators to candidly report
all drug incidents.

Do some schools not report incidents because it would look bad?

"They may not want to shine a spotlight on it because it really isn't
positive information," said Rene Rovtar, the Morris County superintendent
of schools. "But I think everything is pretty much on the up and up."

Rich Vespucci of the state Education Department said that district reports
are done on the honor system.

"Sometimes, I think I'm cutting my throat," McNasby said when he fills out
reports detailing drug offenses.

But he said there's other ways to do it: if students are caught with drugs,
they take the consequences.

"We're not opposed to (police) taking the kids out in handcuffs," he said.
"So people can see what happens."

`You can hear a pin drop'

This school year, Dangler's anti-drug program will drop into the lower grades.

Plans are for Daytop students to visit Copeland Middle School in Rockaway
Township and to talk to sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders.

One of the originators of the idea is township Councilman Les Wexler, who
says his daughter had been a friend of Sean Haulbrich, a township youth who
died earlier this year of a heroin overdose.

Wexler has heard no complaints so far from anyone about exposing children
as young as 12 to the problem.

"If I did, I'd be sort of scratching my head," he said.

Margaret Fischer, the superintendent of schools in Dover, which hosted
Dangler's program last winter, is a proponent of the idea.

"You can hear a pin drop," Fischer said. "It almost had the magnetism of
being in a confessional."

Checked-by: Mike Gogulski