Pubdate: Wed, 11 Apr 2001 Source: Duncan News Leader (CN BC) Copyright: 2001 Duncan News Leader Contact: http://www.duncannewsleader.com Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1314 Drug-sniffing dogs can work, if handled right Intent and consequences. Good policy-making is all about making sure the latter matches the former as closely as possible. Sending a locker-sniffing dog out on regular school patrols in an effort to keep them drug-free is, on the surface a good idea. It will, however, be bad policy, if the school board doesn't take serious steps to minimize any unintended consequences. Regardless of one's personal feeling about drugs, most would agree they have no place in schools. The school board's drug use policy is a good one - strict, yet compassionate and clearly defined: Use drugs and you will be suspended; Use them repeatedly and you will be expelled until you demonstrate you have sought and received treatment. Sending in Gator will both increase the district's ability to enforce the policy and deter students from flouting it. That said, other potential consequences must be minimized before a good idea becomes good policy. First of all, the presence of the police dog should not automatically mean the legal system should take a hand in dealing with those caught. How many of you experimented with drugs and backed off on your own before they became a problem? Would you have been better off being caught and charged? Secondly, it should be clearly shown that Gator is working in a public place in response to an obvious public problem. Otherwise, it would be too easy for impressionable teens to conclude that it is all right for police to invade personal space without reasonable and probable grounds. The school district hardly wants to be contributing to raising a generation of fascists. And it wants to be building young lives, not ruining them. There are some good reasons for sending Gator into our schools. It's incumbent on our trustees to make sure that it addresses the good reasons not to. - --- MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart