Grassley has been at work with Iowans for nearly two years to develop a coalition called Face It Together — or FIT — to respond to the growing drug problem in Iowa. Today he traveled to Council Bluffs, Des Moines, Burlington, Davenport, Cedar Rapids, and Waterloo to release FIT's grassroots plan of action.
The "Iowa's Grassroots Blueprint for Action" contains specific recommendations to help communities organize and fight drugs at the grassroots. It offers direction for communities that do not currently have an anti-drug program and new ideas to those who have good programs up and running. Grassley said his goal is to help mobilize and unite efforts in Iowa to fight drugs through community-based efforts.
Iowa's 947 mayors were surveyed by the coalition in developing the plan released today. Of those who responded, 83 percent said their community has a drug problem, yet only 35 percent said their community has an organized coalition to fight the problem. The majority of mayors said that methamphetamine, marijuana and alcohol are the drugs of choice in their towns.
Grassley said the FIT Coalition report reflects the view that the drug problem is "not just a school problem, not just a workplace problem, not a problem for government alone to solve. But instead, drugs are a community problem and it's time to face it together."
In announcing the coalition today, Grassley said that as parents across Iowa send their children back to school, "it's the perfect time to address head-on the drug problem in Iowa that threatens every single one of these kids. Experts tell us that by age 16, every young person will be confronted with making a conscious choice about whether or not to use drugs. The first step for all of us as parents and grandparents is to drop the misconception that it won't happen to our kids and, instead, do what it takes to get the message across in our own families that drugs are dangerous and they will destroy your life," he said.
Joining Grassley today to unveil the coalition's recommendations was a 10th grader from Creston who is recovering from drug addiction and has made a commitment to tell other kids and parents his story. "If it can happen to me, it can happen to anybody," Josh Auten said. He participated in one of the 21 anti-drug town meetings convened by Grassley in Iowa this year.
Grassley said that one of the most important lessons learned in developing this coalition is that "we all need to spend more time listening to our kids. We found that twice as many parents say they have talked with their kids about the dangers of drugs than the number of teenagers who say their parents have talked with them about drugs," he said.
In addition, Grassley was joined in making today's announcement by the mayors of four of the six cities visited, along with three members of the FIT Steering Committee, including Jim Aippersbach, Executive Director of the Iowa Association of Business and Industry; Jim Smith, Counsel for the Iowa State Education Association; and, Judi Kosterman of the Community Anti- Drug Coalitions of America.
A number of community, political and business leaders in Iowa have worked with Grassley since 1996 to build the FIT Coalition. A steering committee formed six task forces to examine options to fight substance abuse. They focused on 1) Parents, Youth, Schools, 2) Media and Public Perception, 3) Workplace and Workforce, 4) Law Enforcement and the Courts, 5) Religious, Fraternal and Community Groups, and 6) Medical Accuracy and Research.
The recommendations of these task forces were presented to thousands of individual Iowans who participated in April and July in 21 town meetings Grassley conducted across Iowa. The results of this grassroots survey were incorporated into the coalition's blueprint.
"My goal in organizing Face It Together is to bring together all elements of local communities to fight substance abuse and make our families, neighborhoods, schools, and workplaces drug-free," Grassley said. "In addition to aiming directly at the growing problem we have in Iowa and providing the necessary know-how for community leaders, I want our work to serve as a model for the rest of the country. I will be sharing our grassroots strategies and successes with other senators so that they can coordinate the same kind of effort to fight drugs in their states."
Last year, Grassley won passage of a bill he introduced to re-direct federal resources from the Washington bureaucracy to local community coalitions with a proven record of combating drug use. This year alone, the Drug Free Communities Act will make possible as many as 200 grant awards for as much as $100,000 each.
Grassley is chairman of the Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control and a senior member of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
"Iowa's Grassroots Blueprint for Action" and additional information about methamphetamine and the drug problem in Iowa is available at www.senate.gov/grassley or by calling Grassley's office in Des Moines at 515/284-4890.