Louisiana Partnerships for Success II (LaPFS II)

• Funder: Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA)
• Award: $2,260,000/year for 5 years
• Targeted Areas: Evangeline, Avoyelles, St. Landry, West Feliciana, Jefferson Davis, Ouachita, Franklin, St. Helena, Tangipahoa, and Sabine parishes

Overview:

The Louisiana Partnerships for Success II (LaPFS II) project will focus exclusively on addressing underage drinking behaviors, consequences, and risk factors among 9- to 20-year-olds. The LaPFS project team will work to strengthen the prevention systems infrastructure by building local capacity to implement the Strategic Prevention Framework process in 10 high-need parish-level communities (HNCs). The preventions strategies promoted by the project will align with the domains of the Social Ecological Model to improve individual, relationship, environmental, and societal contexts surrounding the target audience. LaPFS II will achieve this through the following goals:

1. Prevent the onset and reduce alcohol use by persons 9-20 years old in HNCs by implementing evidence-based programs, practices, and polices;
2. Reduce underage drinking consequences by persons 9-20 years old in HNCs by implementing evidence-based programs, practices, and policies;
3. Increase the capacity of HNCs to reduce underage drinking consumption, consequences, and risk factors by building coalitions that will employ a comprehensive prevention approach;
4. Strengthen and sustain the capacity of the prevention data management and systems infrastructure at the state and community levels; and
5. Increase the likelihood that state and community prevention stakeholders will leverage, redirect, and align statewide funding streams and resources for prevention.

The expectation is that implementing evidence-based strategies that address individual, relationship, environmental, and societal contexts will reduce local rates of underage drinking behaviors, consequences, and risk factors in the HNCs. Over time, these community improvements may lead to changes in underage drinking at the state level.

Contact:
Leslie Brougham Freeman, Principal Investigator
Leslie.BroughamFreeman@la.gov