Tofino and Ucluelet RCMP are working together to present a new framework to promote healthy youth in each community.
The Community Prevention Education Continuum (CPEC) program is using the DARE program for Grade 5 students as its platform to launch this comprehensive strategy from, according to Sgt. Jeff Swann.
"CPEC, if done right, can make some profound changes in our youth, and in just a short while, as these youth age, it will make even more positive pronounced changes in our community," Swann said in a media release. "It is essentially a drug-prevention framework that is grounded in the principles of prevention and engages and promotes the strengths of our West Coast communities."
He describes the new program as a flexible crime prevention strategy to meet the needs of individual communities as it struggles with drug issues. "CPEC is about community mobilization, bringing people together within a community or region, working together towards a common goal," Swann said. "Healthy youth."
It's a community-led sustainable approach, which is police assisted with a focus on educating youth to make healthier choices. "It is a continuum of prevention education, building protective factors encompassing youth from Kindergarten through to Grade 12," he said.
Drug awareness coordinators have been invited out to the West Coast from November 22 to 26 to meet with interested community members and the police are planning to host at least two meetings in each community.
