HONOR YOUR PLEDGE, GOVERNOR

It's a safe bet that Willimantic leaders never dreamed they would be
competing in a "My Town Has A Bigger Drug Problem Than Your Town"
sweepstakes to get their fair share of help. Yet that is their plight, for
which they can thank Gov. John G. Rowland.

After a Courant series was published in October chronicling a 30-year
heroin scourge in Willimantic, Mr. Rowland, running for re-election at the
time, was Johnny on the spot. He took advantage of a previously scheduled
visit from John P. Walters, director of National Drug Control Policy, to
travel with him to the Quiet Corner. Amid a flurry of flashbulbs, the
governor pledged, in addition to other support, $100,000 to boost drug
enforcement in this section of Windham that has unusually virulent drug
problems for its size. Mr. Rowland has yet to make good on his promise.

What's worse, the measly $15,000 the city normally receives for enforcement
was eliminated because of the state budget deficit. Instead of $6.4 million
to be divided among towns, the state grants were reduced to $2 million
total and divvied up among so-called entitlement cities. Willimantic was
left out.

To compound that insult, budget cuts also prompted the closing of the state
Department of Social Services branch in Willimantic that offers referral
services to addicts.

State Rep. Walter Pawelkiewicz, who represents Windham, had asked for a
reasonable change in the formula the state uses to allocate anti- drug
grants that would make this small community with big-city drug problems
eligible for more funds to combat its heroin problem. Instead of basing the
grants on population, the number of drug arrests should be factored in.
That would give Windham about $100,000 instead of the paltry $15,000 that
it didn't even get this year. Plus, it ought to have the extra $100,000
that the governor offered.

Mr. Rowland had better find a way to make good on his word. Otherwise he
looks less like a leader and more like an opportunist.