S.C. BUDGET CUTS AFFECT DARE

AIKEN - The embattled Drug Abuse Resistance Education program took another
hit this week when South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford released a proposed
budget that would cut DARE officer instruction from the state's Criminal
Justice Academy.

About $200,000 in state funds would be saved by ending the 80-hour
training course for officers who go on to teach DARE in elementary
school rooms. The 10-week classroom course has police officers and
deputies teaching students, mostly fifth-graders, about the dangers of
drug and alcohol abuse.

The Criminal Justice Academy is the primary entity in the state
offering DARE officer training, Department of Public Safety Spokesman
Sid Gauldin said. The Academy started offering DARE courses in 1989.
The national DARE America organization also offers officer instruction
at regional sites across the country.

Mr. Sanford decided DARE should be targeted after hearing from experts
on his panel-level Department of Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse
Services, whose director, W. Lee Catoe, agrees with the assessment
that DARE isn't worth the resources the state spends on it.

"From all the information we have reviewed, the program was less than
effective overall," Mr. Catoe said Friday.

While DARE still exists in some form in roughly 80 percent of the
nation's school districts, it is slowly falling out of favor with some
educators and law enforcement officials in light of studies that
question its effectiveness. One long-term study conducted at the
University of Kentucky said the program made little difference in the
choices students made about drugs as they reached adulthood.

But DARE continues to have its supporters, including Aiken County
Sheriff Mike Hunt, who says parents and local businesses have made it
clear to him they want DARE to stay. His department has four DARE officers.

"When you go to the DARE graduations you see the enthusiasm the kids
and the parents have for the program," Sheriff Hunt said. "It also
builds trust between law enforcement and kids."