First Lady Mary Easley today announced that the Coalition for Alcohol & Drug Free Teenagers of Chapel Hill and Carrboro is one of two community-based underage drinking prevention organizations in the nation selected to receive a $100,000 grant from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to combat underage drinking.  The grant will help fund one year of high visibility law local enforcement efforts focusing on enforcing underage drinking laws.  As a part of this effort, the federal agency will join with the local coalition to launch a new teen drinking prevention campaign to target teen drinkers as well as adults who supply alcohol to underage youth.  The theme of the campaign is: “Youth Access to Alcohol: Underage Drinking, Adult Consequences.”

“Underage drinking short circuits our children’s ability to reach their full potential and ruins many bright futures,” Easley said.  “I applaud the Chapel Hill-Carrboro coalition for partnering with federal highway safety officials and local law enforcement in new efforts to restrict youth access to alcohol, enforce underage drinking laws and educate the community about the dangers and legal consequences of underage alcohol use.  These efforts are a model for other coalitions in North Carolina and across the nation.”

During the new campaign, law enforcement officers will step up patrols to target underage drinkers and parents who provide teens with alcohol.  The coalition has also been working with local court officials to design a program specifically to deal with cases involving youth and underage drinking.  To reach out to the community, the coalition will launch a hotline citizens can use to report underage drinking or adults who are providing alcohol to teens.

The local organization is also working to strengthen and promote the law enforcement agencies’ “Parent Away Forms” which parents can fill out to notify police and sheriff’s departments when they will be away to keep their teens from hosting house parties.  In addition, the coalition and the federal highway agency are launching a series of new “Underage Drinking, Adult Consequences” radio and newspaper ads, mobile billboards, posters and other materials to be used in the Chapel Hill-Carrboro area throughout the year.

A youth risk behavior survey administered in 2005 in the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that almost 47 percent of high school students drank alcohol at least once in the last month and 25 percent engaged in binge drinking.  The same survey found that about 18 percent of high school and 20 percent of middle school students said they had their first drink at the age of 12 or younger.  Officials report that these findings are similar to survey results from schools across the state.

Funded in part by the N.C. Preventing Underage Drinking Initiative through the state Department of Health and Human Services, the Coalition for Alcohol & Drug Free Teenagers of Chapel Hill and Carrboro has been working since 2004 to address underage drinking in the community.  More information about the coalition’s programs is available online at www.chccoalition.org.