Community Fund of Darien Awarded $625,000 Multi-Year Drug-Free Communities Grant

The Community Fund of Darien was recently awarded $125,000 per year for the next 5 years by the federal Drug-Free Communities (DFC) Grant, managed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  The funding will support programming from The Thriving Youth Task Force (TYTF), Darien’s volunteer coalition that convenes local community organizations to promote and empower positive youth development, with the goal of reducing teen substance use.  
The DFC Grant funding will allow the Thriving Youth Task Force to: 
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• Continue to survey 7-12th grade students about their mental health and substance use trends and share the results with parents and the community. This year’s free community presentation of the student survey findings will be held on Wednesday, October 20th at 7pm in the Middlesex Middle School auditorium and will also be live streamed via Zoom. Registration is requested for in-person attendance and required for Zoom at www.communityfunddarien.org/tytf-programs-and-events. 
• Use student survey findings to inform community and school efforts to promote the development of Darien youth into healthy, resilient adults and to reduce at-risk behaviors.  
• ​​Convene community partners to collaborate on teen mental health and substance use 
• Increase public awareness of the risks of substance use and risky behavior through community programs and social marketing, such as the nationally recognized “06820” campaign.
• ​Expand the scope of its work to include a focus on marijuana use in addition to alcohol use.

Created in 1997, the Drug-Free Communities Grant funds community-based coalitions such as Darien’s Thriving Youth Task Force that engage multiple sectors of the community to prevent youth substance use.  The twelve sectors represented by TYTF members are youth, parents, businesses, media, school, youth-serving organizations, law enforcement, religious/fraternal organizations, civic and volunteer organizations, healthcare professionals and local government.  This membership diversity helps coalitions connect their communities’ resources to each other and adopt a balanced and comprehensive approach to reducing substance use.

“We are thrilled to have secure funding for the next five years to continue the Thriving Youth Task Force’s work targeting teen substance use prevention and education,” said Janet King, Executive Director of The Community Fund of Darien.  “The DFC Grant gives us a fantastic opportunity to further engage our community to work together towards this goal.”

Thriving Youth Program Director Emily Larkin added, “This work is especially timely in light of the state’s recent marijuana legalization.  The Thriving Youth Task Force’s programs will provide parents with critical information about how marijuana impacts the teen brain and strategies for keeping open lines of communication with their teen around all substance use.”