BY LINDA DeNICOLA
Staff Writer
TINTON FALLS – An ordinance was introduced at the June 13 Borough Council meeting to establish the Alliance Committee to Prevent Alcohol and Drug Abuse.
If approved in July, the new alliance will replace the Tinton Falls Alliance to Prevent Alcohol and Drug Abuse program, which was part of the Monmouth County Comprehensive Alcoholism and Drug Abuse Plan.
Last January, alliance founder Joan Vernon, asked the council for help to keep the alliance going. Vernon said the Tinton Falls alliance was not able to get the funds requested from the county so the group wanted to go it alone.
She requested that the council maintain funding at the same level as the county provided.
Last year the alliance received $9,300 from the county, which is half of what it received the year before.
The council agreed that there was a clear need for the program in the community and said it would fund the program.
According to the ordinance, the alliance committee will consist of seven members and two alternates from throughout the town. The mayor will appoint the chairman and vice chairman, and the committee will select a secretary.
The alliance’s mission is to reduce and eliminate the incidence, prevalence and impact of alcoholism and drug abuse in the borough through planning projects and programs that provide education and prevention services.
According to the ordinance, members of the alliance committee will function as a force for change, striving to be well informed, identifying aspects of the problem and seeking prevention strategies.
When he heard that Tinton Falls wanted to pull out of the county program, Barry Johnson, director of the Monmouth County Division of Alcohol and Drug Abuse Services, said he was pleased to hear that the borough is going to fund the program and keep it going.
“They can come back into the alliance in the future,” he said, adding that Shrewsbury also decided to fund its own alliance.
Vernon is the substance awareness coordinator in the Tinton Falls School District. “The Tinton Falls Alliance is something I do above and beyond my job. I’m a volunteer in the community,” she has said.
In 1999 Vernon saw the need for the alliance and found out how to go about bringing the alliance program to the borough and got the council to approve the request.
“We formed as a local committee made up of 13 to 14 members. We have council members, the high school nurse, someone from the courts and police department, neighborhood watch, senior citizens, Scouts and someone who works in a substance abuse treatment center,” she said.
Vernon explained that if the council had decided not to provide the funding to maintain the alliance, it would have taken years to secure the funding needed.