Curbing Crime

Great opinion piece by my friend Wayne Young; he hit the nail on the head with this stroy.

Tracking drug trade will help curb crime
IN MY VIEW
WAYNE YOUNG
The Guardian
The message couldn't have been simpler - get drugs off the streets and then watch the crime rate go down.But it was the source of that advice in a paper passed in for editing by a student a few weeks ago that caught my eye.She had interviewed an Island man who told her about getting hooked on drugs and alcohol when he was 18. Soon, all his money was going to support his addictions. So, armed with a knife, he robbed a grocery store in Summerside.This story had a happy ending. He was arrested and spent six months in jail. While there, he realized he didn't want a life of crime and addiction. And he was able to turn his life around.Many young Islanders aren't so lucky.So it was heartening to see last month that some help is on the way for them. There will be a voluntary day-treatment program for addicted youth in Charlottetown. It will eventually be complemented by a residential youth addictions facility. This is a good start.Clearly, too many Island youth are falling victim to the all-too-accessible drugs. When education and awareness fail to protect them from traffickers who troll the streets and school hallways, an accessible and effective treatment facility is a necessity.Helping prevent young people from getting into drugs and supporting them through their addictions has another benefit to our community. As the young man who robbed to get money for drugs could attest, it will help prevent crime.In Summerside, a community safety and crime prevention committee has been struck. Part of the mandate of its volunteer members is to advise city council on ways to reduce crime in the city.Their job is an important one.In a compelling CBC series a year ago on teenage drug use on P.E.I. - aptly called A Dose of Reality - police noted that by some estimates 80 per cent of property crime can be tied directly or indirectly to the drug trade. If that's true, then it's something the newly formed committee should be taking a close look at.Court reports every week detail an alarming number of breaks into businesses and increasingly, private residences, often driven by drug users who have exhausted legitimate ways of feeding their habit.It's easy to blame the offenders, often young people, who are actually caught committing these crimes. Hopefully, through stepped-up programs, they can get the help they need to straighten their lives out.But the real culprits are the drug dealers.The young man who robbed a store at 18 suggested that if businesses upgraded their security systems and police stepped up night walking patrols in areas where crimes are the highest, then they'd get more drugs off the streets and the crime rate would come down.That's helpful advice from a reformed offender.Stiffer sentences for convicted traffickers may also be part of the solution.But individually, don't we all have a role to play in keeping the drugs out of our children's hands in the first place? Is there information or leads we can provide to police that will help them get more dealers into court? This could be done anonymously through Crime Stoppers.An old Chinese proverb suggests it takes a community to raise a child. If that's true, then we should all be doing more to educate, support and protect young Islanders.It's time that we, as individuals and as a community, sent a strong message to drug dealers that it will no longer be so easy to ply their trade in our backyards. It's simply not enough to say it's up to city council or police or the courts - we all have a role to play in helping to get them off our streets and behind bars.When that happens, everyone wins.Wayne Young is an instructor in the journalism program at Holland College in Charlottetown.