Fighting War Against Substance Abuse

NORFOLK - The Naval Drug and Alcohol Advisory Committee (NDAAC) held its first installation-wide leadership gathering and war room planning session at Naval Station Norfolk, May 12.

NDAAC's goal is to foster negative attitudes toward alcohol abuse and illicit drug use throughout the Naval Station Norfolk community.

"This was an opportunity to get as many tenant commands together to share ideas, best practices and lessons learned in a collaborative way," said Capt. Kelly Johnson, executive officer of Naval Station Norfolk. "The key is to look at this from a preventive perspective versus reactive."

The meeting's theme, "Doing Battle to Counter Poor Decision Making" focused on three main goals: assessing the threat, determining potential policy recommendations to counter the threat, and developing plans of action to effectively fight the region's alcohol and drug abuse battle.

"The choices these folks are making is because they're filling a void due to a lack of awareness and a lack of alternatives," said Johnson. "We try to think of ways to offer alternatives to binge drinking and abuse of drugs."

Chief Master-at-Arms (AW/SW) Lawrence Leslie, Naval Station Norfolk's drug and alcohol prevention advisor (DAPA), and Master-at-Arms 1st Class (SW) Waldemar Zapata, assistant DAPA, shared the same sentiments about how a collaboration between NDAAC and service members could significantly lower substance abuse in the Navy.

"Let's put our minds together because only together can we conquer alcohol and drug abuse," said Leslie.

Waldemar Zapata encouraged base-wide participation for attending meetings and submitting recommendations which could help minimize abusive occurrences.

"Hopefully, this meeting will get the word out there and get people to attend," said Zapata. "Let's help our Sailors out."