Families celebrated the end of summer with a block party Aug. 18, the first joint event of the Moniteau County Healthy Lifestyles Coalition and the Council for Drug Free Youth (CDFY).
After entering the parking lots of United Church of Christ and First Christian Church in California, families could enjoy food, games and special material from vendors looking to inspire better living.
The coalition efforts are specific to substance abuse prevention. Co-chairman VanDee Miller said he helped develop the organization working with through the Missouri Department of Mental Health for Moniteau County.
"We are a newly formed coalition, and we are putting on this event," Miller said. "(We are) inviting people from our communities, who serve our community regularly, to share resources to help healthy lifestyles -- not just drug-free but also healthy."
Miller said the coalition started as a brainstorming session between several health- and services-related organizations such as Central Missouri Community Action, Compass Health Network, the Community Health Center of Central Missouri and so on.
"We just discussed needs of the community, weaknesses in our community, tried to brainstorm ways that we could help that better," Miller said. "Some of our weaknesses and needs had to do with just people knowing what resources were available, and some of it was actual resources not being available. When there's a coalition through the Department of Mental Health, you can then apply for different grants and funding to help get those sorts of resources to your community."
According to CDFY Project Coordinator Tijera Safir, her organization took notice of the Moniteau County Healthy Lifestyles group and could see both organizations wanted to accomplish the same mission preventing drug use among youths. She said CDFY's Andrea Holloway worked closely with Miller in establishing a connection.
"We're both organizations; we do multiple programs," Safir said. "The Council for Drug Free, we do programs out here as well; that's how we first started with them. We have our programs out here -- it's Safety Kids, Show-Me Players and Uplift. And we also have COPE (Communications Offers Positive Enrichment) and Baseline. ... A couple of those programs are peer to peer. So kids come out and teach their peers about a healthy lifestyle. Then, we have our facilitator programs called Team Baseline, and that's facilitated. That's when adults ... give them the facts about about drugs and prevention and stuff like that."
At the block party event, attendees could frequent several booths promoting health and services including the Council for Drug Free Youth, the Missouri Department of Corrections, the U.S. Army, the U.S. National Guard, Moniteau County Health Center, El Puente Hispanic Ministry, Hollon Family Chiropractic, the Missouri Highway Patrol, the California Fire Department, Al-Anon and Alateen Family Groups, and much more.