WEST VAN POLICE SAY MONEY IS WASTED ON DARE PROGRAM

Department Cancelled $500,000 Elementary School Program Last June Amid
Protests

The West Vancouver police department says a popular program that it
delivered in elementary schools for a dozen years was a waste of money and
it's urging others to take a hard look at Drug Abuse Resistance Education
(DARE).

The department cancelled DARE last June, amid protests from parents
and schools, saying its review of the research led it to conclude that
the $500,000 it was spending annually on the program wasn't having any
impact.

Cpl. Fred Harding described DARE as "one of the most studied school
prevention programs on the planet" and said most research questions
its value. Yet the U.S.-based, international program is endorsed by
the RCMP and embraced by 56 of B.C.'s 60 school districts as well as
24 independent schools.

Harding, the department's spokesman, said he was a believer once, too
- -- until Kash Heed was appointed West Vancouver's new chief constable
in 2007 and demanded a review. "Once I'd looked into DARE myself ... I
couldn't believe that this program had ever been started," Harding
said in an interview.

The program was founded in 1983 by a Los Angeles police chief and is
taught by uniformed officers to millions of students in 43 countries.
Targeting the middle grades, the program strives to give pre-teens the
skills to resist peer pressure and avoid drugs, gangs and violence.

Critics say a quick glance at drug-use statistics is enough to show
the program isn't working, but proponents insist there is great value
in having uniformed officers talking to students about drugs and
giving them the skills to make wise choices.

"Is it the be-all and the end-all? Of course not. Is it going to keep
kids off drugs for the rest of their lives? Of course not," said Cpl.
Richard DeJong, media officer for the RCMP's drugs and organized crime
awareness service. "It's part of a continuum.... It's a piece of the
solution. Parents are still the No. 1 prevention message, if you will."

There are 300 DARE officers in B.C. delivering the program to about
21,000 Grade 5 students in 472 schools. DeJong says the program has
been growing steadily in B.C. and the goal is to deliver it to all
Grade 5 students.

DARE had a good reputation in West Vancouver and many parents were
upset when it was terminated, school superintendent Geoff Jopson said
in an interview. The district is now developing a replacement program
that will be delivered by teachers following training in January and
February.

"It's a big social issue and I think our parents were very concerned
[about the cancellation]," he said, adding that the research is
divided on DARE. "It's not a perfect program but, frankly, there
really isn't any one program that's going to make the
difference."

Andrea Flintoft, chairwoman of the parent advisory council (PAC) at
Ecole Pauline Johnson, said parents at her school were so unhappy with
DARE's cancellation that they tried to hire a retired police officer
to deliver the lessons, but the board of education said no.

Harding said he couldn't explain DARE's popularity and he was careful
in a recent interview not to criticize the RCMP. But he said he thinks
the community has accepted the decision, adding that he is absolutely
convinced it was the right one.

Resources should be spent where they are needed most, he said. One
problem with DARE is that it delivered the same message to all West
Vancouver students when only about 70 students are considered at risk.
Although DARE put police into schools, it did nothing to help those 70
students and that must change, Harding said.

Police need to work with students from K-12, not just in the middle
grades, in order to find those in need of help, he added.

DARE B.C. said it couldn't name the four school districts that do not
deliver the program, but Vancouver said it decided not to offer the
program based on advice from the Vancouver police department.