36 - Wednesday, September 29, 1999 — North Shore News

W. Van cops go under cover to fight drugs

Grady Semmens
Contributing Writer

IF he had his way, Scott
Findlay would make
sure no one under the
age of 19 touches alco-
hol, tobacco or any ille-

it’s nota pr t
world, the West Vancouver
Police constable tries to do as
much as he can to keep the
teens in his jurisdiction on the
straight-and-narrow and
ensure that nobody sells them

neces that can do them

Constable Tan Craib trom the
Yest Vancouver police depart-
ent’s community police sec-
tion spent four evenings per

of local parks, bars,
liquor stores and mini-marts in
a campaign to step up the
enforcement of federal and
provincial liquor, tobacco and
drug hws, especially as they
relate to minors.
It’s. a job thac Findlay finds
ng and one tor which he
Ss well-suited as someone who
grew up in West Vancouver
and is now a member of the
department’s Drug Abuse
Resistance Education (DARE)
team.
“I know all the spots where

kids tike to go to drink and vet
up ro trouble because T went
to school here and know the
coach of one of the high
school’s football teams so Pve
been to a dot of them — or at
least heard about them) —
betore,” ndlay

hour inter-
view
Findl
cer Constable fan Craib, on
the last night of the summer
patrol (Sept. 2), Findlay and
Crib shared some of their
thoughts about the problem
of drug use among young peo-
ple in the community.

Their evening began in
Horseshoe B: Spm. with
a stroll up the lineup of cars
waiting to board the terry to

up from the start of
the line Findlay makes his first
Mon after spotting 2 woman
nursing a bottle of Mike’s
Hard Lemonade while sitting
in the passenyer-seat of the

The woman is startled as
Findlay = pokes his head
through her open window.

seme, maam, is chat
open alcohol you have there?™

g himself as

a police officer, he makes her
dump the rest of the be erage
out and checks to make sure
is no more alcohol in the

car before leaving hee with a
stern warning about drinking
alvohol while sitting ina vehi-
cle ona highwa
A few cars up, Craib conti

eates a couple of superc
Budweiser from ovo men in
their carly 208) ina
Landcruiser.

When we reach the end of

the lincup Craib kneels beside

the gutter to drain the rest of

the beer from the cans,
“Since we didn’t
¢ anybody taking a

¢ the beers w
finished, we d
them otf with just warnings,
says Findlay.

Being a Thursday it’s not
a particularly busy night here.
You should see it on a week-
end though, we confiscate
enough liquor so that we have
to make a few trips back to our
van to unload it all.”

After the terry lineup patrol
they do a wal
Horseshoe Bay's harbour-
front and then drive through
Whytecliff Park to watch for
any signs of drug use in the

ctually
Pp and
basically

voto Ser. Jim
Almas, the coordinator of the
DARE program, the summer
patrols are a way of comple-
menting the lessons the DARE
officers give Grades + and 8
students in all of West
Vancouver's: schools through-

sof

through of

out the vear about the dangers
gs and how to deal with
peer pressure,
“We've come to the real-
m that we are losing the
ron drugs,” said Almas ina
recent interview.

“We realize now that vou

can’t reduce the number of

young people that are taking

drugs by entorcement of the

laws or by education alone, we
to use both.

“And this is a way of get-
ting our DARE officers out
onto the street so the kids they
deal with can see them in
another role as police offi
out the: ng to prevent the
sale of tiquor and drugs.”

Heading eastwards, Craib
and Findlay stop at the liquor
store iy Caulteild village ror a
quick check for minors brows:
ing the booze-Hlled aisle
Then it’s on tw Ambleside
Park.

Findlay says the popular
West Vancouver beach is the
busiest. place for the patrols,
especially after sundown when
teens often gather in the trees
and on the beach to drink and
smoke cigarettes and other

more mind- Urering products.

down here, \
“Amblesi raws all sorts
of people trom West Van +
well as) North Van and
Vancouver, Burnaby and even

Coquitiam.”

In the last five years, both
Findlay and Craib say they
have noticed an inerease in the
amount of drug-related crimes
in) West Vancouver as) more
drug users fram) other com-
munities come to the North
Shore to support their habits
and drug dealers come to tind
new customen,

“West Vancouver is a big
andy store to them,” says
Findlay.

“I vou have a drug addict
in downtown Vancouver who
is known to police and arrest-
ed every time he sticks his
head out, all he has te do is
hop ona bus over te the
North Shore where we don't
know him but we have to deal

i Scrimes he comunity.”

> trend, neither
officer believes drug use to be
on the rise among West
Vancouver's teen population.

“There has been an
imere in marijuana use in
aigh schools but on the whole
1 don’t think more kids: are
doing drags, bur I do think
the ones who do are more

more media and peer pressure
thar encourages people to
drink.

When [ think back to
when J was younger, we didn’t

©1295" ‘Marine Drive’
984-7017.

have all the beer commercials
and so much of the peer pr
sure as they do today,” ¢
pass by the
. Youth Centre, a
drop-in centre where hun-
dreds of local vouth spend
time socializing and taking
Part in a variety of organized
projects and activities, Findiay
his experience we
with teens hasn't led him to
believe more kids are doing
drugs.

“Tt is hard to pinpoint
whether there has been an
increase or a decrease bur
think on the whole most kids
do have health attitudes and
priorities in tite,” he says.

“OF course there are some
who are into it bur they are the

eptions, However, it is def>

struc that young people
bombarded with a lot
more information about drugs
— both positive and ne
— that they have to deal with
these days.”

Youth centre coordinator
tra Applebaum = agrees with

ndlay and Craib, but says
he’s concerned about what he
sces ae a trend towards youth
starting to experiment: with
drugs at an increasingly
younger ag

“Pee been working with
young people since 1975 and

ms to me that drug use
to go through ey
where younger and younger
kids get into it for a while,” he
said in an interview.

Alcohol and hard drugs are
what concern Applebaum the
most in West Vancouve:, since
many young people come
trom affluent’ families and
often have enough money to
indulge in drinking, and illegal
drug:

“ve once heard a school
youth worker say that in West
Vancouver a youth can go
from an being an A-student to
a drug addict faster than any-
where they'd ever seen. I think
this is because many kids,

Hough they have so many
amazing opportunities avail-
able to them, come from
rather sheltered and parochial
worlds and maybe don’t have
as much experience or knowl-
edge about the dangers of
drugs.”

Applebaum said he has
mixed’ ‘feelings abour the
police department stepping up
enforcement of drug and alco-
hol laws.

“Obviously when you see a
15-year-old ‘kid ‘wrapped
around a bottle of Southern
Comfort you know it’s not
healthy, and I think everything
we can do to deter young peo-
ple from using drugs is good.
But I’m not sure that giving
out tickets and sending more
people through the court sys-
tem is the best way to do it,”
he said.

“Young people just don’t
respond to us telling them that
drugs are unhealthy, so we
need to make it more uncom-
fortable for them to get these
substances.”

This is exactly what Findlay
says he and Craib have done.

“I know we have made
some dif ©,” he said. :

“Because I’ve talked to a
number of kids who have told
me that they have known
we’re down here doing patrols
and they've either decided not
to come to the beach where
there are families to drink, or
have just gone and something
else alrogether.”

Almas said he considers the

See Summer page 38