SERAC Annual Report - 2010

CHAIRMAN'S REMARKS
The Southeastern Region Action Council (SERAC) continues to grow and flourish in New London County. This past year has seen an increase in staff, grant dollars, and connections with the 20 towns that make up New London County. SERAC is blessed with a visionary staff and a Board of Directors that recognizes the value of prevention work. Together they are dedicated to bringing school systems, colleges, community organizations, youth, parents, and senior citizens the highest quality educational programs and trainings. Various advertising campaigns have been seen throughout the county. SERAC continues to be recognized as the "go to" resource for issues such as alcohol, tobacco, drug abuse, mental health, addictions, and more.

Congratulations on another successful year!

Susan A. Radway
Chairperson, SERAC Board of Directors

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR'S REMARKS

This year our Regional Action Council reached its 20th year in Southeastern CT! I am sure that the services we provided then are very different than those we provide now. SERAC continues to grow and change but remain steadfast in our mission: To unite the communities in Southeastern CT to reduce substance abuse and other risky behaviors.

In the last 5 years, SERAC has developed a strong action plan on and had great successes in many of the communities in the region. Our success is due to the strong commitment of individuals, agencies, and school systems. Yes, we have had our bumps in the road but we have adapted and understand that each community is at a different level of capacity.

I could not have done it without the strong support of staff, board members, community members, parents, youth and many more. All of us together make each other stronger and send a clear message to the community as a whole that we want to reduce the impact of substance abuse and other addictive behaviors.

There is still so much more work to be done. While we try to stay ahead of the trends we know there are some that make us work harder. Awareness is one of the best defenses we have in this.

Michele Devine
Executive Director

SERAC PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS

Gambling

SERAC received funding to increase the awareness of problem gambling in Southeastern CT. SERAC created a Training Manual for the Right Steps to Sports curriculum. This training is for youth sports coaches. The curriculum covers the following topics:

SERAC became an active member of the New England Gambling Consortium and attends regular meetings and represents prevention is SECT. Our staff attends professional development to stay on the cutting edge of problem gambling prevention.

Youth and young adults continue to be a population at risk. We have begun to reach out to by presenting 12 workshop in area schools on problem gambling awareness.

Regional Mobilization

Community Education

Some of the new and emerging issues that we have done extensive research on are:

3rd Annual Youth Forum

SERAC hosted a 3rd Annual Youth Forum in April 2010! This year's event was titled "Dream It! Believe It! Live It!" Almost 60 middle school students came from New London, Waterford, Montville, and Old Lyme school systems to participate in workshops about leadership, self understanding, and peer relations.

1st Annual Prevention Day

The 1st Annual Prevention Day at the Mystic Hilton was a huge success. We had 65 participants from a variety of different professions: health teachers, guidance counselors, mental health counselors, administrators, youth service bureaus and many others. The day provided a great opportunity for prevention professionals to network around new information.

Public Awareness

SERAC has been forefront on the crucial issues for public awareness in the past year.
Campaigns in the 2009-2010 year include:

Safe Disposal Programs for Prescription and Over the Counter Medications

Safe Disposal Programs were developed out of a partnership with the Department of Consumer Protection in order to educate community members on ways to properly dispose of medications as well as increase public awareness about the prescription drug misuse.

Participating agencies in 2009-2010 included: Montville Senior Center, Colchester Town Hall, Norwich Recreation and Police Department, Jewett City's Resident State Troopers/ Griswold Town Hall.

SERAC collected the following substances:
Controlled- 3893 pills/ 1440 ml (liquid)
Non-controlled- 32,383 pills/ 17,640 ml (liquid)

Regional Community Information

In the spring of 2010 SERAC assisted the Department of Mental Health Addiction Services with their bi-annual Statewide Priority Planning for the treatment and prevention of substance abuse and mental health.

Community members participated in surveys and focus groups. The following priority issues were identified for Southeastern CT:

Alcohol
Misused Prescription Drugs
Tobacco
Gambling
Marijuana
Heroin
Cocaine
Suicide

Regional Data

Recent use of alcohol was 7.5% (N=874) among seventh graders in a 2008-2009 regional profile.

Perception of great risk associated with marijuana use was only 25.8% (N=289) among eleventh graders.

Only half of tenth graders in the region, report that their parents perceive alcohol use as "very harmful."

Priority Plan

In the early part of 2010, SERAC spent considerable time disseminating the information from the Regional Youth Summary Report 2006-2009 to the community.

In May and June of 2010, SERAC members participated in a regional planning process to identify the priorities for the upcoming year.

Priority substances: Alcohol, Misused Prescription Drugs, and Marijuana

Targeted strategies and activities: SERAC members decided that parent and adult education was first and foremost.