Substance-Abuse Counselor Back at HS?

The return of a substance-abuse counselor to the district topped Principal Emil Binotto's wish list for the 2012-2013 school year at Monday night's Board of Education meeting at the .

The high school has seen eight "bona fide drug-related issues" on its campus since September, Binotto said. "That doesn't include kids that have issues at home," he said. Binotto and Hopatcong schools Superintendent Dr. Charles Maranazno said bringing back a substance-abuse counselor could help rehabilitate drug-abusing students and prevent others from using drugs.

Hopatcong lost its substance-abuse counselor, which also handled students, in 2010 after the district lost more than $1.7 million in state and had its proposed budget reduced by the borough by about $730,000.

Maranzano said he has had several conversations with Binotto and high school Vice Principal David Pierson about the return of a substance-abuse counselor.

"That is a loss we're certainly feeling now," Maranzano aid. "I can't emphasis enough the preventative nature and the compelling sense of follow through that we get when we get a person follows a case through. And then the brutal facts are that the students who are at risk and identified to us as potential (drug) users are not getting the same attention that they got a few years ago.

"And I'd hate to say to you five, 10 years from now that our numbers are dramatically higher and then correlate them to the fact that we're not doing enough preventative work."

The substance-abuse counselor met with 138 students between the high school and middle school during the 2009-2010 school year, Binotto said. But not all were using drugs, he said.

"Some of the students had friends who were using drugs," Binotto said. "Some of the kids were beginning to experiment. Some of the kids had parents or lived in homes where chemical use was rampant."

The substance-abuse counselor also coordinated the now-defunct Kids for Kids and REBEL programs, Binotto said.

Maranzano also said the district was hurting from losing its school resource and security officers over the past several years.

"We're OK," Maranzano said. "Our students are certainly handling themselves very well in this day and age, at this point in time. But we've lost that preventative edge that you have when you have adults in the building that are specific to those positions."

"It would be wonderful to have at least one component back, and the SAC is the one that the high school administration has identified as the priority component."