The Southwest Healthy Youth Partnership has joined an existing youth drinking prevention website www.preventionworksinseattle.org in an effort to both spread information about this issue and get people involved.
As the site states, "Car crashes, unplanned pregnancies, violence, alcohol dependency, impact on learning and brain development" are just a few of the consequences of underage drinking.

Under a Strategic Prevention Framework State Incentive Grant the original website was built for Northeast Seattle. Madison Middle School applied for the grant which has been in place since 2006.
"The purpose is to increase awareness of underage drinking in our community," said Renaé T. Gaines SPF-SIG Community Coordinator, "and to provide resources for the community."

At this time the organization only addresses underage drinking. "This funding that we've had has been for underage drinking only but we're looking to expand and also look at why the kids in our community are using marijuana and other substances," Gaines said. They are gathering data to learn about other kinds of substance abuse through the Healthy Youth Survey.

The last one conducted was done in October 2008 (they are done every two years) throughout Washington State with 6th, 8th, 10th, and 12th graders. The study showed that West Seattle in specific was "very minimal for prescription drug abuse", said Gaines, "The numbers were high for alcohol use and marijuana."

The website shows some of the results of the survey including where youth gets alcohol, how often they drive after drinking, how frequently they drink.

The partnership will be conducting some local focus groups among youth and parents, "to get some youth input and some adult input into how significant do we see it as a problem. Where do we think kids get alcohol from and then we're going to ask the kids themselves where the alcohol is coming from," explained Gaines.

Southwest Healthy Youth Partnership - “Our Mission is to eliminate underage drinking and youth substance abuse by setting "no use" expectations in schools, in familes and in the community and by increasing healthy options for children and youth."