NCJ Number
161673
Date Published
1990
Length
35 pages
Annotation
The impact of drug abuse on youth, adults, and families in an urban ghetto community called Northton are described, based on comments from a variety of community residents.
Abstract
Young people sometimes experience a strong desire, induced partly by peer pressure, to experiment with drugs. Some experience strong mental coercion in addition to this peer pressure. When addicts deplete their resources, they may go to those closest to them and draw them into their schemes for getting high. Drug dealers tend to mark certain spaces and corners as their own territory. Addicts may gravitate to a crack house. Youth especially vulnerable to drug addiction and unwed pregnancies are those from homes lacking strong, intact family units and instead usually headed by single mothers working or on welfare and nearly destitute. Some long-term community residents express deep frustration about the drug situation, as well as concern about an impending apocalypse. The drug culture has created new role models who may be the product of a street gang, making money fast and scorning the law and traditional values. However, one long-time community resident has been greatly involved in community life and has begun to engage in direct action against drugs in the local community. However, the lack of jobs has caused the work ethic to lose its force, and the underground economy has a strong pull. Statements by community residents