FUNDS TO FIGHT METH GIVE AGENCIES A BOOST

More than $400,000 in grants and public money will fuel a focused fight
against local methamphetamine use.

About $215,000 was awarded Thursday to drug-treatment agencies, Kids
Unlimited and the Southern Oregon Child & Family Council. Recipients are
working with the Jackson County Meth Task Force to enhance treatment and
support for meth addicts and education for at-risk, middle-school students
and Head Start families.

The remaining funds have been pledged by Jackson County.

"We are taking back our community, and we have done the first mile," said
Carin Niebuhr, county alcohol and drug program manager and task force
coordinator.

Created last year to target meth, the task force will focus over the next
two years on rehabilitating meth users, stabilizing families affected by
meth and increasing public safety and prevention. Locally, meth is blamed
for overburdening public resources, including jails, courts, social
services and schools.

Advertisement OnTrack Inc., a local drug and alcohol treatment provider,
received the largest grant of $97,491 to enhance the existing Community
Family Court program. The money also will provide legal services to resolve
addicts' landlord-tenant disputes, restraining orders, divorces and other
civil cases, all of which can hamper addiction recovery, said Rita
Sullivan, OnTrack executive director.

Addictions Recovery Center (ARC) was granted $43,880 to expand meth
treatment into a yearlong program and to provide transitional housing for
female addicts. Meth users need longer terms of treatment than other drug
addicts because some of meth's effects only subside after one and a half to
two years, said Christine Mason, ARC executive director.

"Wrapping our arms around them for the first year will really give folks
the support they need," Mason said.

Kids Unlimited received $39,632 to take Project Alert -- a nationally
recognized drug-prevention program -- into Medford and White City middle
schools. Kids Unlimited will add a component specific to contemporary meth
use with the help of ARC, said Executive Director Tom Cole.

Southern Oregon Child & Family Council will use $33,997 to educate Head
Start families on the dangers of meth use and to help them obtain drug
treatment. All grants were funded by the Reed and Carolee Walker Fund of
the Oregon Community Foundation.

Jackson County has pledged an additional $200,000 taken from its Health and
Human Services and general fund budgets. The money will provide intensive
services over one year for 20 families in the grip of meth use, said County
Administrator Sue Slack. The program will fill any need, including
employment, food and housing, to help families kick the meth habit, she said.

"We think that this radical approach ... will make a difference," Slack said.

Oregon meth use is six times higher than the national average, said Bryan
Johnston, interim director of the state's department of human services.
Johnston commended the cooperative efforts of the county's meth task force,
which, he said, is leading the state's fight against the illegal drug. He
predicted Thursday that the problem will soon gain the attention of Congress.

"As the nation looks to Oregon on how to solve this, Oregon is going to be
looking to Jackson County," he said.