Forfeitures help fund drug education, prevention programming

ZANESVILLE — The Muskingum County Prosecutor's Office is awarding more than $30,000 in drug forfeiture money to local schools and community organizations for drug education and prevention programming.

"Every year, we do a calculation that's based upon the amount of forfeiture funds that we receive from drug prosecutions," Prosecutor Ron Welch said.

Funds include cash recovered from drug dealers and forfeitures from assets that are sold at auction, such as cars and property.

That money is placed into a law enforcement trust fund, and a certain amount of that money must be spent annually on drug education and prevention programming. 

"We, fortunately, had a significant amount of forfeitures this year, which allows us to use some of those proceeds to help educate people against the dangers of drug use," Welch said.

One of the groups Welch's office chose to assist this year is an organization he believes is doing a great job and is in need of additional resources. 

So a check for $3,300 was made out to Muskingum Behavioral Health to support the group's "Too Good for Drugs and Too Good for Violence" program.

According to MBH Chief Executive Office Yolanda Taylor, the money will be used to purchase handbooks for students for the first time, as well as expand the program's reach to more children. 

Prevention specialists from MBH go into the Zanesville City Schools and Foxfire to work with pre-kindergarten through sixth-grade students on healthy decision-making processes. 

With additional funding this year, they will also be able to enter seventh- and eighth-grade classrooms to further their education before entering high school. 

While other programming offered by the schools focuses on teenagers, MBH chooses to educate children about avoiding drugs and violence as soon as they enter school.

"You start early to hope that they don’t use drugs," Taylor said.

By the time children reach high school, the idea is to have them equipped with the tools needed to keep teens from accepting or using drugs. 

The program builds kids up and promotes positive self-esteem.

"Helping a child understand at a young age that they have value and they have skills that no others have and helping them be proud of themselves and care for themselves and higher self-esteem and know who they are, they are less susceptible to use drugs and become addicted," Taylor said.

For children who come from homes where they are exposed to drug usage, prevention specialists are there to listen and teach coping skills.

"A lot of children who are subject to drugs from their family or friends or their family uses don’t know how to cope with it," Taylor said. "What do I do when mom's high? What do I do when mom kicks me out for the whole entire day? Where do I go?"

Kids are provided with useful information and safe places they can go when life at home is hard to handle.

According to Welch, the curriculum is working.

Students start out with a baseline test at the beginning of the program and retake the test at the end. 

Results showed a 90 percent increase in skills for all classes.

"Obviously, if it helps one kid, it’s worth it, but the numbers indicate it’s helping many, many more," Welch said.

Additionally, local high schools are receiving more than $25,000 to provide educational programs, such as speakers and assemblies, to help prevent drug usage.

Forever Dads is receiving $2,000 to provide parents with additional resources on sobriety so they can provide a more stable environment for their children.

Also receiving $2,000 is the county's newly established child advocacy center, Heroes Landing, to build a library for victims of sexual abuse and their families who may be in need of resources to help cope with the trauma of their victimization. 

Having the ability to take forfeited money from drug dealers and use it to fight their trade is something that Welch takes pride in.

"One of the most gratifying parts of this job is to be able to take something somebody was using for bad and turn it into something that's being used for good," he said. 

cmholmes@gannett.com

740-450-6758

Twitter: @cmholmesgannett