Allies for Substance Abuse Coalition in Hancock County Iowa is a coalition in North Central Iowa that was formed
in 2012 to work on Youth Substance Use Prevention. We currently have 12 community sectors involved with at total
of 22 active members. In addition, we have two student led coalitions, one in each school district with a total
of 58 youth members. ASAP will use DFC grant funding to assess, build capacity, plan, implement, and evaluate
ways in which we can change the cultural norm around youth substance use in Hancock County. We do that through
the use of Seven Strategies for Effective Community Level Change; 1) Provide information including educational
presentations, workshops, radio and movie theater ads, and other media. 2) Enhance Skills through workshops,
seminars, activities designed to increase the skills of the participants. 3) Provide Support by creating
opportunities to support people to participate in activities that reduce risk or enhance protection. 4) Enhance
access/reduce barriers by improving systems and processes to increase the ease, ability, and opportunities to
utilize systems and services. 5) Changing Consequences through increasing or decreasing the probability of a
specific behavior that reduces risk or enhances protection by altering the consequence for performing behavior.
6) Changing Physical Design or structure of the environment to reduce risk or enhance protection. 7) Modify/
Change policies. Our members are taking ownership in raising the protective factors and reducing the risk
factors within the sector they have influence, live, and work in and have a plan to expand on those throughout
the county.
