Local adults and youth teams are visiting tobacco
retailers in your community. If clerks refuse to sell tobacco
or the vending machines cannot be accessed by teens, then
clerks are given recognition and incentives. Reminders are
given out for illegal sales, with citations for repeated offenders.
History
Beginning in June of 2002, the state of Wisconsin
Department of Health and Family adopted the recognition and
reminder (R&R) model of reducing youth access to tobacco,
as a concentrated approach to meet a serious threat to public
safety, health and resources for substance abuse treatment.
A partnership with WAAODA has allowed the State to provide
specialized Training and Technical Assistance to local contractors.
WAAODA is a very important piece of the Wisconsin Wins program.
The R&R approach was originally tested under
the auspices of a National Cancer Institute project in Oregon
directed by Dr. Tony Biglan, where it was successful. Then,
a replication was undertaken in Wichita, Kansas by Project
Freedom. In 2000, PAXIS Institute applied the R&R strategy
to Wyoming, bringing its illegal sales of tobacco to minors
from a dangerously high 55% to record lows hovering around
9% for four years in a row.
With the R&R model, Wisconsin has been able
to bring illegal sales of tobacco to minors to its lowest
level ever quickly. Local entities, under contract with DHFS,
continue the program-making even lower rates of illegal access
to tobacco the community norm of our state. In our state,
R&R is called Wisconsin Wins-because of word-class tobacco
control helps the whole state win better public safety, better
health, better youth development and lower state taxpayer
burden. Continued success is necessary to assure the safety
of over $10 million in Federal Funding for substance abuse
treatment and prevention.
What You Can Do
Wisconsin Wins is successful because it mobilizes
the whole community in common purpose. Here are simple things
that people from all walks of life can do to help:
Families
Not many parents know that scientists have discovered that
tobacco use primes the brains of many teens for drug use.
The discovery happened because of amazing brain scan and genetic
studies. If your child is using tobacco, please check the
www.wisconsinwins.com website for links on helping your teen
stop.
Every Citizen
Please pro-actively thank retailers and clerks in your area
for doing the right thing. If you like, you may use cards
that cue clerks and retailers that 80% of them are doing the
right thing by not selling tobacco to minors, making it the
norm in your community. Get the cards at www.wisconsinwins.com.
Youth
You can join hundreds of young people who are helping do the
Wisconsin Wins visits, making a difference for everyone. You
can help with other tobacco, alcohol or drug prevention efforts.
Contact the Wisconsin Wins coordinator on the front. You can
even thank the clerks for doing the right thing. They will
be floored by a youth telling them this. Also, if you know
of a place where kids are buying tobacco, let the Wisconsin
Wins coordinator know. Teams can educate and assist the storeowner
and staff. Remember, the vast majority of teens in Wisconsin
do not use tobacco.
Visit
for more information today.