CITY TEENS USE POT MORE THAN U.S. PEERS

Study Shows Climb In Last Decade

Milwaukee high-schoolers light up marijuana more than their peers
nationally and in such urban centers as New York and Los Angeles,
according to a new report from the federal Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention.

[INSET: Marijuana Usage

Quotable

What made Milwaukee famous? Part of it is our culture: We're the
beer-drinking capital of the world. We're the party state. The overall
mentality is, 'It's OK to mood alter.'

- - Ladd White, an alcohol and other drug abuse counselor at the Child &
Adolescent Center

I think it's stupid and a waste of money. It's not worth all the
risks.

- - Mike Phillips, a 16-year-old student at Kettle Moraine High
School]

Nationally, nearly one-quarter of today's high-schoolers regularly
smoke marijuana, the study says. In Milwaukee, nearly one in three say
they currently smoke it, and more than 50% say they've tried marijuana
at least once.

The statistics remind Bob Helminiak of the 1970s, the heyday of
hippies and an emerging drug culture, when 37% of high school seniors
surveyed nationally said they had recently smoked marijuana, according
to data from Monitoring the Future, a long-term research project at
the University of Michigan.

"It's almost like we're back in time," said Helminiak, curriculum
specialist for health and physical education at Milwaukee Public
Schools. "It's real strange."

Experts say drug use among Milwaukee's teens is especially high for a
number of reasons, among them the city's history.

"What made Milwaukee famous?" said Ladd White, an alcohol and other
drug abuse counselor at the Child & Adolescent Center, a residential
program at Rogers Memorial Hospital in Oconomowoc. "Part of it is our
culture: We're the beer-drinking capital of the world. We're the party
state. The overall mentality is, 'It's OK to mood alter.' "

Fifty-two percent of high-schoolers surveyed in the Milwaukee school
district said they have tried marijuana at least once. That compares
with the national average of 40% as well as 37% in Boston, 30% in New
York City and 43% in Los Angeles.

And 29% of Milwaukee's teens reported being current users, compared
with 22% nationally.

The margin of error for most of the survey results was 3 or 4
percentage points with a 95% confidence of accuracy.

The survey questioned nearly 1,500 MPS students as well as more than
15,000 students in public and private schools across the country in
2003.

Thirty-two states, including Wisconsin, and 17 other large school
districts also participated. Students were scientifically selected,
participated voluntarily and were allowed to remain anonymous. It was
the first year Milwaukee was included in the survey, which the CDC
conducts every two years. Many don't see pot as a drug

"The trend is to put whatever you can inside of you to see what
happens," said Kathy Sorenson, program director and founder of Project
HUGS (Helping us Grow Safely), a non-profit Madison-based drug
intervention and parent advocacy agency. "Kids don't even think of
marijuana as a drug anymore."

A 17-year-old senior from West Allis Central High School didn't
hesitate recently to accompany her boyfriend to a Kmart parking lot to
buy a bag of weed.

"I didn't think anything of it," said the teen who described herself
as a "good girl" who has never gotten into trouble. "It's just like
drinking. Everyone does it. It's the straight-A students. It's not
just the ghetto kids."

Then she got busted. Police had been watching the dealer who sold the
bag to her boyfriend. They got her license plate and showed up at her
door.

"My parents were just, like, shocked," she said. "It affected all my
friends. My little sister, it really affected her, and my older sister
was really upset about it."

The girl was sentenced to do 22 hours of community service.

Michael Myszewski, director of the narcotics bureau with the Wisconsin
Department of Justice's Division of Criminal Investigation, said the
availability of drugs in Milwaukee and around Wisconsin makes it easy
for teens.

"It's an agricultural state," he said. "There's a tremendous amount of
homegrown marijuana here." Smoking on the way to school

Milwaukee Police Officer Malcolm Morgan sees kids walking to school in
the morning smoking joints and recently arrested a middle school boy
at a parochial school in possession of a "very large quantity" of marijuana.

"It just blew me away," Morgan said. "You look at this kid and you
never would have thought (he would deal drugs). He came from
supportive parents."

What really shocks Morgan, a six-year school squad veteran for
District 7 on the city's northwest side, is the young age at which
kids are now starting to use marijuana, he said.

"These kids are so young you can't even write them a ticket," he said,
noting that the minimum age to issue a ticket is 12.

Statistics support Morgan's observations.

The percentage of students who report smoking marijuana before age 13
jumped to 9% in Wisconsin in 2003 from 5% a decade ago, according to
the CDC survey. And again, more Milwaukee-area kids - 14% - said they
smoked the drug before their 13th birthday.

Kids also report they are being offered drugs in school more than
ever. Nationally, 29% of students surveyed in 2003 said they were
offered, sold or given an illegal drug on school property in the last
12 months. One in three students in Milwaukee said the same.

Despite the apparent rampant use of marijuana among teens, some swear
they never touch the stuff.

"There is still a good number of people who won't, who are clean,"
said Mike Phillips, a 16-year-old student at Kettle Moraine High
School in Wales, including himself in the bunch.

"If you're into it or not, most people respect that. They still hang
out with me just the same," Phillips said at a skateboard park in
Brookfield. "I think it's stupid and a waste of money. It's not worth
all the risks."

Sherry Martin, an alcohol and other drug abuse counselor with the
University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics adolescent intervention
program, said some problems stem from parents being absorbed in their
work and paying too little attention to their teens. Acquiring mass
amounts of money isn't worth it, she said, and in fact, affluence can
contribute to drug abuse.

"If you give your kids $70 for spending money," she said, "you might
as well go out and buy them a bag of weed."