DRUGS WILL DESTROY DREAMS, RALLY TOLD

LACOMBE - Olympic silver medallist Lascelles Brown threw his weight
behind a big anti-drug cause.

The bobsleigh brakeman, who competed for Canada at the Turin Winter
Olympics in February, joined more than 300 residents marching
through town on Saturday.

"Drugs is not the way to go," said Brown, after signing an autograph
during the second annual Anti-Drug March in Lacombe.

Brown offered a message of hope and determination to those who
attended the march and rally that followed at the community arena.

Brown was a member of the Jamaican bobsleigh team from 1999 to 2004
before joining veteran pilot Pierre Lueders in Calgary. The pair
finished with silver in the two-man event at Turin.

"I've gotten tested (for sports-enhancement drugs) maybe 25 times in
two years," said Brown, 31. "And I'm happy with that, knowing that I
got the silver medal and I was clean.

"You have to stick to your dreams. Taking street drugs can take away
your dreams."

The Theology Club at Canadian University College organized the march
from the Terrace Ridge School to the arena.

Spectators watched as the Red Deer Royals Marching Show Band led the
placard-waving marchers.

Sarah Picknell and a friend walked down the street with a banner
that read Winning the Fight Against Drugs.

"I support a drug-free lifestyle," said the 21-year-old CUC student.
"I know of people who have taken marijuana and it's not done them any good."

Lance Penny, a representative with AADAC in Stettler, told the arena
crowd that 85 per cent of young people aren't using illegal drugs.

But there are still risks out there, he said.

"We need to educate people of all ages," Penny said.

Wanda Johnson, a counselling director at the Christian-based
college, said individuals with strong religious morals can get
themselves in trouble as well.

"We know there are students at the college who are using drugs,"
said Johnson, who has counselled some of them.

She helps out with the IMPACT drug awareness program, developed in
1990 at the college. The Christian-focused program reaches out
mainly to elementary school students.

Lacombe Pentecostal Church youth pastor Tonya Swift carried a banner
of photos of drug addicts she had retrieved from the Internet. A
poem, written by a young crystal meth addict before she died, was
also displayed.

"Drugs are not just a social problem, but a spiritual one too,"
Swift said. "People have pain in their past. They try to escape it
by drugs or in other ways."

She recently went on a mission trip with 17 local teens to
Vancouver's East Hastings Street, where substance abuse is rampant.
They met a 28-year-old crystal meth addict, who was yelling and
screaming at the time.

They noticed his leg was bandaged up.

"He thought there were insects running up and down his leg, so he
totally scratched up his leg," said Swift, 31.

She was told the man had a wife and a young son.

"Their lives are completely destroyed. It was a huge eye-opener for
me and the rest of the group."

Theology Club president Mathew Feeley, 24, knows of a young woman
who is trying to get off crack cocaine in Lacombe.

"She said it could take her five minutes to get the drug. No
community is immune to it," he said. "We need everyone's support to
win the war against drugs in Central Alberta."