Pubdate: Wed, 26 Jan 2005
Source: Castlegar News (CN BC)
Section: letters
Copyright: 2005 Castlegar News
Contact:  http://www.castlegarnews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/3613
Author: Dale West, (Editor)
Note: from MAP: Our newshawk did not find one of the two articles listed 
below on line at the newspaper's website so could not hawk them. But the 
other is MAP archived. The voting in the newspaper's on line poll was a 
result of a note posted to the Canadian MAP (CMAP) email discussion list 
http://www.mapinc.org/cmap/lists.htm
Cited: The Media Awareness Project http://www.mapinc.org
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v05/n116/a02.html and 
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v05/n116/a04.html

STORY GENERATES INTEREST, RESPONSES

Last week after running the story, Parents to push for solutions, a story 
that reported on the possibility of establishing drug-free zones around 
local schools, the Castlegar News received the following e-mail from That might have happened, once or twice where it was traded in 
pound-for-pound (mistakenly), but there is no way anyone would be dumb 
enough to do that. A pound of pot in LA goes for roughly about $3,000 to 
$3,300 USD. And a pound of coke would go for around $7,000+ USD. Now you 
tell me, is that a good trade? Why would anyone want to lose over $3,500 
USD? Does that make any sense whatsoever? I'm sorry, but I think you need 
to check your facts. The media needs to stop spreading these fake rumors.

Several URLs where included with this message, with links to a website 
called the The Media Awareness Project. Our sidebar story, Trip south turns 
pot to coke, which related RCMP Const. Fran Bethell's take on the local 
drug scene, had been posted to this site - and was obviously the cause of 
concern for the e-mail sender. The main story, however, was not posted to 
the site for the information of site visitors. Nor was a background piece 
outlining the success and failure of drug-free zones elsewhere posted to 
the site.

Coincidently, at the same time as this e-mail was received by the News, 
responses to the News website Question of the Week began to come at an 
unusually high rate (we normally get less than a dozen per week, in two 
days we received about three dozen responses). The question attracting this 
attention was "Would drug-free zones around schools help curb the drug 
problem?" and response was overwhelmingly against the idea (at press time: 
Yes, 2; No, 38). 
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake