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<br /> <br />Community coalition will address <br />high-risk drinking <br />Elle Kehres | 10-19-16 <br /> <br />Fighting high-risk drinking in Chapel Hill is a team effort. <br />The Orange County Health Department, the Orange County ABC Board, UNC and the town of <br />Chapel Hill formed a coalition this year to address potentially dangerous drinking in the community. <br />The coalition, formally known as the Campus and Community Coalition to Reduce the Negative <br />Impacts of High Risk Drinking, is a joint-funded effort to combat high-risk drinking by implementing <br />several recommendations. <br />Efforts to create the coalition began in 2014, when a group of stakeholders from UNC and the <br />surrounding community met to analyze data, conduct focus groups and research best practices <br />related to alcohol use in college towns. Their efforts culminated in a report that recommends 22 <br />strategies to address high-risk drinking. <br />Colleen Bridger, director of the Orange County Health Department, said these recommendations, <br />along with community involvement, will make the coalition effective. <br />“Research has proven that the most successful approach to addressing alcohol misuse in <br />communities is an ecological or public health approach, and that’s what the coalition is doing,” <br />Bridger said. <br />In line with one recommendation, Elinor Landess was hired as director of the coalition. She will work <br />on the adoption and implementation of the recommendations. <br />“The whole framework is unique because we’re addressing the environment rather than the <br />individual,” Landess said. “Our work is part of a larger conversation that is part of the community.” <br />The coalition discovered that 71 percent of UNC students and 47 percent of high school seniors <br />reported using alcohol in the past 30 days. Their findings also noted that the Chapel Hill Police <br />Department responds to 40-50 alcohol overdose calls every semester, most of which involve UNC <br />students. <br />“We recognized alcohol misuse as a public health issue and supported the approach the coalition <br />was taking to address the issue in a comprehensive manner,” Bridger said. <br />Evan Lauterborn, a junior at UNC, is skeptical about the coalition’s influence but is hopeful about its <br />future.