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Posted: Mon 6:18 PM, Jun 11, 2012
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Reporter: Joe Nelson Email
Updated: Mon 6:43 PM, Jun 11, 2012

National conference in Menomonie brings rural drug problems into focus

MENOMONIE, Wisc. (WEAU) - While drug abuse has advanced over the years, so have treatment options and addiction research.

Social workers, medical students, judges and counselors came together in Menomonie to learn new ways to understand, diagnose, and treat addicts in rural areas.

"It'd be easier to group everything together, but we can't. We're all very different people, we all do things for very different reasons, and are trying to help people understand that," Jermaine Galloway, speaker and Idaho police officer said.

More than 250 people from nearly every state are attending the 28th annual National Rural Institute on Alcohol and Drug Abuse at UW-Stout, learning how to better serve their clients and communities through workshops specific to rural problems, organizers said.

Former addict, Randy Cook, who has been counseling drug abusers for nearly 30 years, has gone to the conference for 10 years to put what he's learned into his work.

"We're learning the current trends, what the kids and adults are abusing, and will learn about drug court approaches and what the judicial system is doing for treatment," Cook said.

As science advances, lessons taught on research-based drug courts are giving judges more insight before giving drug sentences.

"This is an emerging field where judges, prosecutors ... and people in the field ... have access to this great information that we previously didn't have." "So what we're talking about is greater public safety, less recidivism, and a lesser cost for everybody," Eau Claire circuit court judge William Gabler said.

"There's no conference like it. Most don't focus on rural areas ... It's bringing in people from different parts of the country, and we can learn from each other," Galloway said.

A public forum on drug addiction is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Memorial Student Center in Menomonie.

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