Packaged in brightly colored 2-ounce bottles and sold in chocolate, mango and watermelon flavors, "Spykes" malt beverages, a new alcoholic ginseng beer addictive made by Anheuser-Busch, is getting flack from campaigners against underage drinking.

Available in Washington and about 30 other states, critics say Spykes are conspicuously marketed to youth, while the company has said it's simply trying to reach its young adult demographic.

But it worries Renae Gaines, an alcohol prevention coordinator at Madison Middle School.

"As a society we make (drinking) look glamorous," said Gaines. "The message is being set early."

Gaines was hired by Seattle Public Schools to lead a community coalition to develop a plan to curb underage drinking community-wide, with the help a five-year state and federal grant.

Madison qualified for the grant because the rate of alcohol use (in the last 30 days) for eighth-graders was more than 23 percent at the time of a statewide Healthy Youth Survey in 2006. The state average is about 18 percent.

Getting products like Spykes off store shelves and away from susceptible young people is just one challenge the coalition faces.

Through partnerships with community organizations, West Seattle communities will implement data-driven prevention strategies shown to impact the behavior of youth or that change community norms about the acceptability of underage drinking.

It will also figure out where the gaps in services are to youth and families.

It's not something that will happen over night, said Gaines.

"We need to focus on changing social norms, policies and attitudes (about alcohol)," said Gaines. "It's supposed to be a learning process."

Strategies will likely include a combination of direct education in schools and efforts on a broader level to change community perceptions, said Kathy Kaminski, a drug free communities coordinator with the Seattle Neighborhood Group, also a part of the coalition.

But first, it must be determined why, when and where it's happening in each neighborhood to develop plans that might work to reduce availability, she said.

Underage drinking is a leading public health problem in the country and is likely to kill more youth that all illegal drugs combined, said Gaines.

Every year in the United States about 5,000 people under 21 die from alcohol-related injuries, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About 38 percent of those are from car crashes and 32 percent are the result of homicides related to underage drinking.

Encouraging parents to talk with their kids about alcohol before they ever start using is one key way to reducing those numbers, Gaines said.

"Definitely parents are a piece," she said. "Don't wait until middle school to talk about it, don't wait until there's a problem to start prevention."

Drinking can put youth at risk for a host of other problems, such as violence and anger issues, academic failure and sexually transmitted diseases since promiscuous behavior is often associated with underage drinking.

"I don't know if (West Seattle) stands out from any other community," said Gaines. "But anytime we have kids 12 and 13 (years old) drinking and blacking out, there's a problem."

Lois Grammon-Simpson, West Seattle's coordinator for the Seattle Neighborhood Group, said more than once she's seen groups of young people drinking during school hours in public. She's reported the incidents to area schools and the police department, but she's concerned that parents are the ones who lack a general awareness.

"The parents of all of these juveniles likely had no idea what their children were doing, assuming they were in a classroom or involved in a school activity," said Grammon-Simpson.

By reaching out to organizations that target minority youth, Gaines also hopes to build strong connections to West Seattle's ethnic communities as well as address socio-economic barriers.

At Madison alone, 24 languages other than English are spoken and 41 percent of the student body is eligible for the federal free and reduced lunch program, typically an indicator of poverty status.

Program manager for Safe Futures Youth Center, Marcus Stubblefield, said kids are drinking at younger and younger ages. It's not abnormal for alcohol use to begin in the fifth and sixth-grade, he said.

Safe Futures, a city-operated program targeting at-risk minority youth and families, has joined the coalition and is focusing on reaching out to refugee families through peer-to-peer, and peer-to-adult education.

"It's a public health epidemic," said Gaines, "and if we approach it as that maybe we can initiate some change."

Rebekah Schilperoort may be reached at 782.1244 or rebekahs@robinsonnews.com