Part IV: Underage Use of Alcohol

Background of the Discussion

The working group on the underage use of alcohol reviewed current innovations, identified significant needs, and generated recommendations for OJP that address:

• The kinds of interventions and initiatives that effectively address the underage use of alcohol and its negative consequences,
• The complex relationship between alcohol abuse and illicit drug use;

• The need to more sensitively and competently address the relationship between alcohol abuse and crime in tribal communities;
• The importance of collaborative partnerships between and among those who are committed to effectively addressing alcohol-related crime and its negative consequences; and
• The importance of effectively responding to victims of alcohol-related crime.

Although the group identified dozens of recommendations, they felt that it would require more focus and examination to develop them to a point that will allow OJP to make best use of them. During the working sessions, the group expressed a collective desire to participate in another structured and organized opportunity for collaborative discussion on this issue and in particular, to refine their specific recommendations. The group, therefore, perceives the recommendations which follow as representing the first of many important steps in initiating effective and competent change; and looks forward to the possibility of engaging in another series of intensive working sessions in the near future.

The youth representatives who participated in the group brought broad perspectives, keen insights, passion for the issues, and willingness to actively engage the adults in the group. They played a pivotal role in the group's discussion and development of recommendations.

Targets for Change

There are three inter-related guiding principles upon which the group's work was premised. These principles were unanimously endorsed by the group and provide an overview of the targets for change which the group identified if we are to make progress in reducing underage alcohol use and its consequences.

Collaboration Emphasizing Substantive Youth Involvement

Participants felt that he need to address alcohol abuse and crime, including the underage use of alcohol, will require significant collaboration. This working group emphasized the importance of substantive involvement of youth in these collaborative efforts. The creation of a truly collaborative strategy will require support and assistance from OJP to bring all of the relevant parties together to participate (i.e., representatives from the law enforcement, treatment, research, policy making, and juvenile justice arenas), to begin to develop a shared vision, to identify common values, and to develop linkages to carry out shared work. Opportunities for collaboration must exist at the local, state, and national levels as well as in Indian Country.

Competent and Effective Approaches to Dealing with Issues of Race and Culture

Participants also felt that programs to address the underage use of alcohol and its negative consequences must be tailored to sensibly respond to the specific cultural needs of those they are targeting and affecting. This can be achieved only if individual communities and their members are given the opportunity to actively participate in the development of initiatives that will directly impact them.

Commitment to Environmental Change

The working group discussed at length how underage persons in our communities receive very conflicting messages about alcohol consumption. In order to reduce the underage use of alcohol, the group asserted that OJP must be committed to developing policies and initiatives which send clearer, more consistent, and direct messages to youth about the dangers and potential consequences of alcohol use.

Recommendations

The group's recommendations fall into a number of areas and in several instances, include a brief list of innovations and promising practices/programs that the participants identified. The group recommended that OJP research the effectiveness of these innovations and promising practices/programs. IF their value and utility can be documented, OJP should explore ways in which it can encourage other communities to adopt the lessons emerging from them.

The following recommendations are listed (in each area) in rough order of priority as determined by votes taken during the discussion. The categories around which the group organized its recommendations are:

• Community Mobilization;
• Enforcement;
• Intervention;

• Marketing, Public Education, and Community Awareness;
• Prevention;
• Training and Technical Assistance;
• Victim Issues; and
• Youth Involvement.

Community Mobilization

Participants felt that OJP should support and promote:

• A national initiative to encourage weekend underage community service projects to encourage positive community activism among and partnerships between young persons and adults.

The participants recommended that OJP examine the following innovations and promising practices/programs which focus on community mobilization:

• The "Fighting Back" Program in Gallup, New Mexico;
• The "Community Systems of Care Approach" used by the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians and the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe;
• CSAP's DREAM Community Partnership in Forrest County, Mississippi;
• The "Assets Project" in Bridgeport, Connecticut;
• The "Community Readiness Model" from the University of Colorado;
• NANACOA's "Community-based Intensive Training;
• The Saving Lives Program in Massachusetts; and
• CMCA's community organizing program to reduce youth access to alcohol.

Enforcement

Participants felt that OJP should support and promote:

• Efforts by communities to consider restrictions on the number of alcohol outlets in areas frequented by underage persons (i.e., schools and community centers);
• Consistent, regular, and mandatory compliance checks of alcohol outlets in communities that are interested in and equipped to conduct them;
• A substantial increase in the consistency and severity of penalties for both individuals as well as liquor license holders who sell alcohol to underage persons;
• The consistent and appropriate enforcement of zero tolerance laws/statutes in all jurisdictions;
• An immediate change in federal statutes which currently prohibit tribal police departments from apprehending non-Indians who distribute alcohol to underage persons on tribal lands;
• An increase in the use of administrative license revocation laws which target underage persons who are arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol in communities that are interested in this enforcement approach;
• The expansion of community policing initiatives to include the enforcement of underage drinking laws and statutes;
• The use and consistent enforcement of conditional liquor licenses; and
• The possibility of using the ignition-interlock system on underage DUI/OUI offenders.

The participants recommended that OJP examine the following innovations and promising practices/programs which focus on enforcement:

• The Adolescent Offender Program (AOD) in Mississippi that is associated with Mississippi State University;
• The STOP Program in Naugatuc, Connecticut;
• The Use and Lose Program in Virginia; and
• The Community Policing Program in Columbia, South Carolina.

Intervention

Participants recommended that OJP should support and promote:

• Peer justice and youth empowerment intervention programs including alternative sentencing and diversion programs through the use of youth/peer/teen courts;
• Community-based systems of care which create positive and effective interventions;
• Early identification and intervention programs for at-risk youth such as first offender diversion programs that involve juvenile offenders and their families;

• The establishment of links/liaisons between college/university administrations and students to address campus binge drinking; and

• The inclusion of alcohol-related offenses in juvenile drug courts.

The participants recommended that OJP examine the following innovations and promising practices/programs which focus on intervention:

• The Midtown Manhattan Community Court; and
• Spirituality and prayer intervention groups in tribal communities.

Marketing, Public Education and Community Awareness

Participants recommended that OJP support and promote the following efforts and initiatives.

• Partnerships with other agencies and increased funding at the local, state, and national levels to restrict alcohol advertising and marketing campaigns that target or appeal to underage persons by:

• Requiring that there is a balance between alcohol advertising and health information/messages (counter advertising) that deglamorize underage alcohol consumption on billboards, in radio and television broadcasts, and on college/university campuses;

• Requiring that all alcohol advertising be preceded by warnings that explain and describe the dangers associated with the underage use of alcohol;

• Mandating the "time channeling" of alcohol advertisements on television so that they do not appear during programs frequently viewed by underage persons; and

• Prohibiting the marketing of youth-oriented products (i.e., "alcopops" and "freeze 'n' squeeze").
• The inclusion of alcohol in Office of National Drug Control Policy and other government sponsored anti-drug media campaigns.

• School-based programs to offset the negative effects of alcohol advertising on young persons.

• Community efforts to limit alcohol advertising on billboards.
• Efforts to stop the promotion of discounted drinks.
• "Hands Off Holidays" campaigns to protect young people and ethnic/racial marketing targets.

• The development of a strategic media and public education campaign that targets abroad audience and describes the negative impact and consequences of the underage use of alcohol.
• Culturally competent educational efforts in Indian Country to teach young Indian persons how spiritually, mentally, and physically harmful alcohol has been to Indian people.

Prevention

Participants felt that OJP should support and promote prevention programs which focus upon both the environment and on the individual through the provision of technical assistance and resources to assist communities in changing the messages that they send to underage persons about alcohol. These efforts might include support for initiatives such as the development of counter advertising programs and the introduction and consistent enforcement of provisional liquor licenses.

Training and Technical Assistance

Participants recommended that OJP should support and promote the following efforts and initiatives.

• Opportunities for communities regarding strategic planning and the development of initiatives to address the underage use of alcohol and its negative consequences. This training should include:

• An emphasis on broad participation within and across communities;

• A strong focus on the development and improvement of communication links between and across community coalitions;

• An evaluation component (possibly based upon the use of indicator databases in the community to monitor trends) so that communities are equipped to assess and improve their initiatives in a collaborative and competent fashion; and

• Strategies for institutionalizing and legitimizing essential community programs, policies, and initiatives.
• Mandatory training of alcohol venders and servers regarding the sale of alcohol to underage persons, and a substantial increase in the consistency and severity of penalties for those who do no comply with the training.
• Core educational requirements for juvenile court judges and prosecutors on enforcement issues.
• The provision of technical assistance and funding for each state to develop substance abuse Internet referral systems for agencies and citizens seeking treatment resources and other information.
• Training for judges (local, state, federal, and tribal) on effective intervention strategies.
• Advocacy training for youth.
• Youth/adult partnership training.

Victim Issues

Participants recommended that OJP support and promote:

• The identification and engagement of youth victims in advocacy and healing;
• The development of programs to assist communities (especially minority communities) in collectively dealing with and addressing their experiences of historical trauma and its impact on their alcohol-related problems;
• The development of restorative justice programs in youth/teen/peer courts;
• Mandatory training on victim's issues for juvenile court judges, prosecutors, public defenders, and probation officers at the local, state, and federal levels; and in tribal communities;

• The development of a strategy to address the impact of the underage use of alcohol on child victimization;
• The use of victim impact panels in the juvenile justice system; and
• The development of programs to assist children of alcoholics.

Youth Involvement

While the work group recommended that youth be substantively included in all programs, initiatives, and decisions that address the underage use of alcohol and its negative consequences, they also developed a specific list of recommendations regarding youth involvement.

Participants recommended that OJP support and promote:

• Efforts to "reach out" to youth who are not currently involved with this issue and encourage them to become engaged; and
• Peer based mentoring programs in schools starting in elementary school.

The participants recommended that OJP examine the following innovations and promising practices/programs which focus on substantive youth involvement:

• Youth empowerment programs which are supported through non-profit organizations at the local, state, and national levels (i.e. MADD Youth in Action Program, MADD National Youth Summit, MADD Student Activist Training, UNITY, SADD, and PRIDE);
• State coalitions organized by the American Medical Association to reduce underage drinking; and
• The United Way's Regional Youth/Adult Substance Abuse Project in Bridgeport, Connecticut.