SAMHSA Awards $46 Million Partnerships for Success: State and Community Prevention Performance Grants [Colorado 1 of 4 grantees]

Source: SAMHSA News Release, 9/14/2009

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) today awarded $46 million over five years in Partnerships for Success: State and Community Prevention Performance grants. This program is designed to help states and U.S. territories reduce state-wide substance abuse rates by addressing gaps in their current prevention services and increasing their ability to reach out to specific populations or geographic areas with serious, emerging substance abuse problems.

The grants aim to achieve a quantifiable decline in state-wide substance abuse rates by incorporating a strong incentive to grantees that have met or exceeded their prevention performance targets. The grants build on the Strategic Prevention Framework (SPF), which requires that grantees utilize a five-step, data-driven planning model to ensure that program services address areas of greatest need. The key to the SPF program is that it offers monetary incentives in the form of program expansion supplements to the grantees that succeed in achieving critical performance outcomes by the end of the third year of the five-year program.

“These grants will help provide essential substance abuse prevention services to people and communities that might otherwise not get them,” said SAMHSA Acting Administrator Eric Broderick, D.D.S. , M.P.H. “Partnerships for Success also provides these services in ways offering measurable results and opportunities for developing more effective prevention strategies. ”

SAMHSA is awarding approximately four grants of up to $2.3 million per grantee annually for up to five years. The actual award amounts may vary, depending on the availability of funds and the performance of the grantee. The grants will be administered by SAMHSA’s Center for Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP).

The four grantees are:

The Colorado Prevention Partnership for Success (CPPS): This project employs a public health model to demonstrate positive statewide change among 12-17 year olds in underage and binge drinking rates and in the binge drinking disparity for Latino youth. The CPPS will continue to integrate the Strategic Prevention Framework within Colorado’s State Prevention System to ensure measurable and sustainable substance abuse prevention outcomes.

The Illinois Partnerships for Success: Funds from the grant will provide an opportunity for meaningful collaboration between State leaders and community members in order to build capacity for substance abuse prevention with a focus on underage drinking. In Illinois, 34.3 percent of youth of ages 13-18 drink alcohol on a regular basis, compared to 28.1 percent of their peers in the U.S. overall. Their goal is to reduce the high school (10th grade through 12th grade) 30-day use rate from 40.6 percent to 35 percent by 2012.

The Connecticut Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services (DMHAS): As the Single State Agency for substance abuse and mental health services, DMHAS has been designated by the Governor’s Office to lead the Connecticut Partnerships for Success (CT PFS) Initiative. This Initiative seeks to: 1) achieve a quantifiable decline in statewide substance abuse rates; 2) demonstrate a capacity to reduce substance abuse problems; and 3) achieve specific performance targets and program level outcomes.

The Tennessee Department of Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities, Division of Alcohol and Drug Abuse Services (DADAS): DADAS will use its Partnerships for Success funds to reduce alcohol binge drinking among the state’s 14-25 year olds. Tennessee’s Partnership for Success Project has a goal of reversing the state’s upward trend in binge drinking by decreasing the total number of 14-25 year olds who engage in binge drinking within any 30-day period by 4.3 percent over the five-year grant period.

For additional information about SAMHSA grants go to http://www.samhsa.gov/grants/

New PIC special collection: Evidence-Based Intervention Collection (EBIC)

The EBIC consists of nearly 50 community and school-based interventions that have been recognized as effective in meeting risk behavior reduction outcomes.  Each intervention is available for loan from the PIC.

Click here to see the available interventions.

Click on the title of the intervention to see the full catalog record.

Each catalog record includes information about agencies that have endorsed or reviewed the programs with links to the site or document where they are discussed.  Each record also contains links the intervention summary on the National Registry of Evidence-based Programs and Practices (NREPP).

Visit the PIC Library homepage or catalog and click on the links to the Evidence-Based Intervention Collection.

New CASA report finds that for every federal and state $1 spent on substance abuse and addiction, only 2 cents goes to prevention and treatment

Source: CASA News Release, 5/28/2009

Shoveling Up II: The Impact of Substance Abuse on Federal, State and Local Budgets

NEW CASA* REPORT FINDS FEDERAL, STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS SPEND ALMOST HALF A TRILLION DOLLARS A YEAR ON SUBSTANCE ABUSE AND ADDICTION

OF EVERY FEDERAL AND STATE DOLLAR SPENT, 96 CENTS GOES TO SHOVEL UP WRECKAGE OF ILLNESS, CRIME, SOCIAL ILLS; ONLY 2 CENTS GOES TO PREVENTION AND TREATMENT

WASHINGTON, D.C., May 28, 2009 – Substance abuse and addiction cost federal, state and local governments at least $467.7 billion in 2005, according to Shoveling Up II: The Impact of Substance Abuse on Federal, State and Local Budgets, a new 287-page report released today by The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University.

The CASA report found that of $373.9 billion in federal and state spending, 95.6 percent ($357.4 billion) went to shovel up the consequences and human wreckage of substance abuse and addiction; only 1.9 percent went to prevention and treatment, 0.4 percent to research, 1.4 percent to taxation and regulation, and 0.7 percent to interdiction.

The report, based on three years of research and analysis, is the first ever to assess the costs of tobacco, alcohol and illegal and prescription drug abuse to all levels of government. Using the most conservative assumptions, the study concluded that the federal government spent $238.2 billion; states, $135.8 billion; and local governments, $93.8 billion, in 2005 (the most recent year for which data were available over the course of the study).

<<SNIP>>

Key Findings

• Of the $3.3 trillion total federal and state government spending, $373.9 billion – 11.2 percent, more than one of every ten dollars– was spent on tobacco, alcohol and illegal and prescription drug abuse and addiction and its consequences.
• The federal government spent $238.2 billion (9.6 percent of its budget) on substance abuse and addiction. If substance abuse and addiction were its own budget category at the federal level, it would rank sixth, behind social security, national defense, income security, Medicare and other health programs including the federal share of Medicaid.
• State governments spent $135.8 billion (15.7 percent of their budgets) to deal with substance abuse and addiction, up from 13.3 percent in 1998. If substance abuse and addiction were its own state budget category, it would rank second behind spending on elementary and secondary education.
• Local governments spent $93.8 billion on substance abuse and addiction (9 percent of their budgets), outstripping local spending for transportation and public welfare.[1]
• For every $100 spent by state governments on substance abuse and addiction, the average spent on prevention, treatment and research was $2.38; Connecticut spent the most, $10.39; New Hampshire spent the least, $0.22.
• For every dollar the federal and state governments spent on prevention and treatment, they spent $59.83 shoveling up the consequences, despite a growing body of scientific evidence confirming the efficacy and cost savings of science-based interventions.
• With respect to children, for every dollar federal and state governments spent on prevention or treatment, they spent $60.25 shoveling up the consequences of substance abuse and addiction.
• For each dollar in alcohol and tobacco taxes and liquor store revenues that federal and state governments collect, they spend $8.95 shoveling up the consequences of substance abuse and addiction.

Click here to read the complete press release.
Click here to download for free or purchase a print copy of the full 287 page report.

Announcing TWO Anticipated Funding Opportunities for Colorado Districts/Regions to Support Tobacco Prevention and Coordinated School Health

Free regional trainings will be held in April to prepare Colorado school districts, regions, and BOCES for the two anticipated funding opportunities supporting Tobacco Prevention and Coordinated School Health. School district and BOCES staff are highly encouraged to attend the trainings to learn more about the funding opportunities and to build their grant writing skills.

Go to http://www.rmc.org/funding to learn more and to register for the trainings.

• Pueblo – Monday, April 6th
• Grand Junction – Wednesday, April 8th
• Denver – Monday, April 13th
• Ft. Collins – Tuesday, April 14th

All trainings are from 12:30pm-4:30pm

Materials from the trainings will be posted on www.rmc.org/funding by April 15th.

Applications for schools will be posted online in August 2009. School-level grants will address tobacco prevention using the Coordinated School Health model.

OJJDP Report Examines Best Practices To Address Gang Problems

The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) has published “Best Practices To Address Community Gang Problems: OJJDP’s Comprehensive Gang Model.”

The report provides communities responding to a present or potential youth gang problem with guidance in implementing OJJDP’s Comprehensive Gang Model. It describes the research informing the model, notes findings from evaluations of several programs demonstrating the model, and outlines best practices derived from practitioners with experience in planning and implementing the model in their communities.

Resources:

“Best Practices To Address Community Gang Problems: OJJDP’s Comprehensive Gang Model” (NCJ 222799) is available at http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/ojjdp/222799.pdf.

Print copies may be ordered at http://www.ncjrs.gov/app/publications/alphaList.aspx. For quick access, search by document number.

For additional information about OJJDP’s efforts to prevent and address gang problems, visit http://ojjdp.ncjrs.gov/programs/antigang/.

New Report Pinpoints Substance Use and Mental Health Problems in Individual Localities

Source: SAMHSA News Release, 6/19/08

Survey reveals wide variations and unexpected patterns of substance use and mental illness across more than 340 localities across the United States

Mental health and substance abuse problems affect every local community throughout America – but in unique, and sometimes surprising ways, according to a report by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. The report offers highly detailed analyses of the substance abuse and mental health problems occurring within these smaller geographical areas.

For example, one of the smaller geographical (or substate) areas in the survey –Utah’s Salt Lake and Weber-Morgan Counties – have among the nation’s highest levels of persons aged 12 or older using painkillers for non-medical reasons. In these two counties, levels were as high as 7.92 percent. In contrast, areas of the District of Columbia had some of the nation’s lowest levels of this type of substance abuse, as low as 2.48 percent in parts of the city. Y
et the exact same communities in Utah had the among the nation’s lowest levels of underage binge alcohol use in the past month (as low as 8.72 percent of those age 12 to 20). The District of Columbia had equally low levels in some parts of the city, but other parts had some of the nation’s highest levels (as high as 39.01 percent among this age group).

“The findings reveal that the nation’s substance abuse and the mental health problems are fundamentally local in character and might be addressed directly most effectively at that level,” said SAMHSA Administrator Terry Cline, Ph.D. “This report provides local public health authorities sharper insight into the nature and scope of the substance abuse and mental health problems affecting their communities.”

The report, Substate Estimates from the 2004-2006 National Surveys on Drug Use and Health, measures and analyzes 23 substance abuse and mental health-related behavior levels in 345 substate regions representing all 50 states and the District of Columbia. In most states, the substate regions are defined in terms of counties or groups of counties. In a few states, these areas are defined in terms of census tracts. The results were based on the combined data from the 2004 to 2006 National Surveys on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) and involved responses from 203,870 people age 12 or older throughout the United States. The full report is available on the Web at http://oas.samhsa.gov/substate2k8/toc.cfm, as is Nonmedical Use of Pain Relievers in Substate Regions: 2004 to 2006, a short report from SAMHSA that focuses on this particular problem.

Youth Drinking Prevention Less Effective in Urban Community

Source: Jointogether.org Research Summary, 3/19/2008
A model prevention program that worked well in rural communities did not achieve the same results in curbing drinking among middle-school students in an urban area, a new study finds.

Science Daily reported March 17 that researchers said that Project Northland, a prevention program that reduced alcohol use 20-30 percent over three years in rural Minnesota, had no impact on middle-schoolers in Chicago who took part in the program versus those who did not.

Study lead author Kelli A. Komro of the University of Florida College of Medicine said the negative findings in Chicago surprised researchers. “This is an important finding to realize this program was not enough,” said Komro. “The bottom line is this: Low-income children in urban areas need more, long-term intensive efforts.”

The program stressed three main messages: that drinking is unacceptable in school, at home, and in the community. The project was student-led in schools, family oriented at home, and spearheaded by neighborhood volunteers at the community level. But project leaders had difficulty getting urban community leaders engaged on the issue of youth alcohol use.

“People in these areas are concerned with housing, they’re concerned with gangs and other drug use,” Komro said. “There was a whole upfront effort where we had to educate people about how alcohol was related to those other issues, and that it was an important issue to think about with their young people.”

There was at least one positive result from the Chicago study, however: after community teams visited alcohol stores and urged owners not to sell to minors, local youth reported a 64-percent decline in their ability to buy alcohol.

The study was published online in the journal Addiction.

This article summarizes an external report or press release on research published in a scientific journal. When available, links to the sources are provided above.

Report: Schools Can’t, Shouldn’t Shoulder Prevention Burden

Source: Jointogether.org News Feature, 9/17/07
Most American kids receive some drug education in the classroom, but a new report contends that schools should not be relied upon to prevent early use of alcohol and other drugs and its consequences.

The report, “Prevention Education in America’s Schools: Findings and Recommendations from a Survey of Educators,” noted that 37 states require schools to teach students about the dangers of alcohol and other drugs. However, “Teachers don’t have the time, training or other resources needed to do the job effectively, regardless of what the state-mandated standards say,” according to the report by Join Together and Communitas Online.

For example, the report noted that 26 percent of educators who actively teach prevention in the classroom said they have had no training to do so.

Read the News article here.
Access the full report here.

New Online: Truancy Reduction Program Tool Kit

Source: Office of Juvenile Justice Programs News @ a Glance, March/April 2007

OJJDP is offering an online resource for communities interested in instituting a truancy reduction program. The Tool Kit for Creating Your Own Truancy Reduction Program provides comprehensive information and resources to guide communities, schools, and parents in addressing the problem of truancy.

Grants Fund Student Drug Testing Programs

Source: NCJRS Justice Information, 12:2, 11/15/2006

The U.S. Department of Education and ONDCP announce awards totaling $8.6 million in federal grants for schools to implement random student drug testing programs. Drug testing emphasizes early intervention, treatment, community action, and prevention efforts in keeping youth away from the damaging effects of drugs.

See also:
The original ONDCP 10/2/200 Press Release
Student Drug Testing: Compassion or Punishment? JTO Online, 2/6/2006.
PRO: ONDCP’s Random Student Drug Testing site.
CON: Drug Policy Alliance’s Drug Testing Fails Our Youth site.