Pubdate: Thu, 12 Aug 1999
Source: Austin American-Statesman (TX)
Copyright: 1999 Cox Interactive Media, Inc.
Contact:  http://www.Austin360.com/
Author: Dave Harmon

IN UT TALK, MCCAFFREY URGED LOCAL SOLUTIONS ON DRUGS

It took a general to end America's war on drugs. That doesn't mean the
government's anti-drug crusade is over, but Gen. Barry McCaffrey, the
nation's drug czar, refuses to use war imagery to describe the national
strategy to control illegal drug use.

In a visit to Austin on Monday, McCaffrey, a retired four-star general whose
official title is director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy,
avoided drug war rhetoric and promoted drug prevention and education, along
with a big dose of community involvement, during a speech before a
standing-room-only crowd at the University of Texas' Lyndon B. Johnson
School Public Affairs.

McCaffrey said the federal government can provided research and money to
combat drug use - the federal government's anti-narcotics budget has jumped
to 17.8 billion a year - but he said the real solutions need to happen at
the local level, with civic groups, churches, teachers, local government,
treatment providers and others banding together to solve the problem one
addict at a time.

"It's local leadership that's going to do something about this problem,"
McCaffrey said.

The country still has about 4 million chronic drug abusers, drug use costs
the nation than $100 billion a year, and more than 50,000 people a year die
as a result of illegal drug use, he said.

But overall, McCaffrey gave an encouraging progress report on drug use
nationwide: Cocaine use has plummeted in recent years; overall illegal drug
use also is down.

On the interdiction front, McCaffrey said he was pleased to see that the
government is beefing up its presence on the U.S.-Mexico border and is
spending more on drug education, prevention and treatment programs.

"We're moving in the right direction," he said.

A number of people in the audience didn't agree. Several groups, including
the Drug Policy Forum of Texas and Common Sense for Drug Policy, handed out
pamphlets criticizing the nation's anti-drug strategy and the surging U.S.
incarceration rate that has come with harsher criminal penalties for drug
crimes.

After his Austin visit, McCaffrey planned to visit El Paso and its Mexican
sister city, Juarez, where he said he will meet with local leaders and
"underscore that we cannot confront this problem unless it's in partnership
with Mexican authorities."

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