SENDING A MESSAGE

Drug-sniffing dogs are coming to the Evergreen District's high schools to
root out illegal substances in lockers and cars.

Here's a cheer for the effort, and here's hoping the dogs don't find a
thing. That would make school administrators perfectly happy.

The program, which was vetted during months of decision-making and
preparation, will be explained to students at each of the district's high
schools this week. While the Vancouver Police and Clark County deputies who
bring the dogs will be prepared to make arrests, the primary goal is to
keep drugs way from schools altogether, more than it is to nab users on
school campuses. And that, for the most part, is fine with "clean"
students, who should not have to walk into a school restroom and find
classmates smoking marijuana, or be witness to drugs changing hands in the
parking lot.

We don't buy the American Civil Liberties Union's stance that such searches
are "heavy handed" and are tantamount to treating "students as suspects,"
as an ACLU spokesman in Seattle told The Columbian's Howard Buck.

We wonder if ACLU officials, or any other critics of the drug-sniffing-dogs
program, consider it "heavy handed" to be required to pass through a metal
detector before boarding a plane? Isn't it better to require that procedure
for everyone in hopes of deterring or discovering contraband that could
threaten the safety of all on board?

Likewise, drugs on campus are a threat to the learning environment and
safety of all students, as well as other motorists and pedestrians who
might become victims of drug-impaired drivers en route to or from high school.

Evergreen's program is apparently the first such ongoing effort in Clark
County, although drug-sniffing dogs have been brought into some high
schools on a spot basis in the past. There are numerous districts around
the country where dogs are used to sniff out drugs. In some, there have
been complaints and even legal action. But it appears those cases stem from
instances of dogs sniffing out students themselves and/or backpacks in the
students' possession, with no clear reason to suspect drugs. In Evergreen's
case, that concern should be a nonissue because the dogs will check out
unattended lockers and cars.

In the end, as Evergreen Deputy Superintendent John Deeder, said, " We will
send a strong message that we will have zero tolerance for drugs in our
schools."

The TV ads say, "Talk to your kids about drugs." This is the school
district, and by extension the public, talking to the students, and their
message is a good one.