Safe & Healthy Homewood Collaborative -- CARA - The Safe & Healthy Homewood Collaborative is seeking funding through the CARA Grant Program to reduce and prevent the use of opioids, methamphetamine, and prescription drug use among youth and to change the culture and context regarding the acceptability of opioid, methamphetamine, and prescription drug use. The Collaborative is a successful and well-established community coalition dedicated to promoting healthy youth development with a particular focus on preventing youth substance use among the students of Homewood City Schools. The Collaborative began in 2012 and received a DFC grant in 2015. Over the years, the coalition has mobilized a broad range of community stakeholders to implement comprehensive prevention initiatives that have successfully reduced youth substance use in Homewood. The award of the CARA grant will allow the Collaborative to further address the emerging issue of youth use of opioids, methamphetamine, and prescription drug abuse. The strategies outlined in the CARA grant application will build on the Safe & Healthy Homewood Collaborative's current efforts. The Collaborative uses the Strategic Prevention Framework and the Social Development Model (risk and protective factors) to inform the coalition's strategies and activities. The CARA project will implement evidence-based youth substance use prevention strategies through school-based education, peer leadership initiatives, family engagement activities, mentoring programs, school and community-based mental health supports, promoting the adoption of prevention policies and practices, and community partnerships designed to reduce risk factors and strengthen protective factors. Implementing evidence-based, environmental strategies will protect youth by: Increasing community, parent, and student awareness of the dangers of illicit opioids and prescription opioid abuse Increasing community, parent, and student awareness of the dangers of methamphetamine use Educating parents and encouraging safe medication storage, monitoring, and disposal of medication Ensuring adequate medication disposal locations Supporting policies and practices that reduce youth substance use Engaging community stakeholders to shift community norms regarding the acceptability of youth substance use Increasing youth leadership to promote drug-free norms Increasing the perception of disapproval of use among parents and peers By the end of the grant period, the Collaborative will achieve measurable reductions in youth opioid, methamphetamine, and prescription drug misuse, as well as create a community culture in which the use of these substances is considered unhealthy and unacceptable. This will be accomplished by building upon our existing prevention systems, addressing risk and protective factors, building the youth “voice”, and creating policy and environmental change that supports healthy youth development. Community collaboration and ongoing project assessment and quality improvement will ensure we create a robust prevention infrastructure. Through this process, we will remain responsive to changes in local data and emerging issues while ensuring alignment with CARA goals.
