In spite of seeming the alarmist, I must tell you that we are in crisis. The use of drugs and dangerous pharmaceuticals in the local area, especially in the schools, is increasingly alarming. Such usage is said to be doubling every year.

My recent association with those who have the statistics and personal experience, such as former U.S. Attorney Jay McCloskey, head of the local Drug Enforcement Agency Lt. Arno, and Bangor Police Chief Don Winslow, leaves no doubt of the emergency nature of our local situation. Further verification can be had by asking any doctor, pharmacist or policeman.

Such arguments and reinforcing statistics presented on March 13 to the committee acting on LD 0997, which authorizes 10 more drug agents in this area, resulted in a unanimous ought to pass resolution in spite of present budget difficulties and the realization that only emergency measures should be funded for a while.

Frighteningly, our children are at risk even in the public schools that have always seemed safe and secure. When your child goes to school, though, he or she frequently rubs elbows with, and sometimes sits next to, the inexorable drug pusher. And the likelihood of such encounters is increasingly alarming.

Think. If your loving child or grandchild is having a bad hair day, or is unhappy that the world isn’t perfect and he or she just happens to be next to “a friend” who just happens to have “something to make him or her feel better,” that loving child is in great danger. Just a few trials of OxyContin, heroin or a host of similarly dreadful concoctions are almost guaranteed, in just a short time, to make one an addict for life. We who are paying attention have experienced stories that would tear at your heart.

Do you think that your influence and guidance, or that of the teachers, can protect your child? Wrong. The greatest influence that your child experiences is peer pressure and that pressure is increasingly to try drugs.

Do you think the police can protect your child from the drug peddler? Wrong. There are only five funded drug agents serving all of Penobscot, Hancock, Piscataquis and Somerset counties. Realize that it takes five people to man one 24-hour tollbooth on the turnpike. It takes five soldiers to man one 24-hour sentry post. Our five drug agents, even with heroic efforts, are hopelessly pressured.

What can you do?

? Realize that the situation is frightening.

? Try your darndest to convince your child to never take anything consumable from anyone other than family members.

? Learn more: what to look for, what to do.

? Copy this commentary and send it to your friends.

? Call and write to your representative and senator, and demand that they vote for LD 0997 when it comes up for vote, which could be soon

LD 0997 provides additional protection your child needs. We need more agents, desperately. Demand them.

We cannot stop the drug trade, it’s too lucrative, but an aroused citizenry can do wonders. We angry parents and grandparents can help make our area at least unproductive for the drug pusher. This request is not for nameless, faceless strangers, it is to help protect your kids and mine.

Roy Martin of Glenburn is a member of the Committee Against Heroin.