Introduction
The Sacramento County Coalition for Youth (SCCY or Coalition) is mobilizing to address youth substance use in Sacramento County.
The Coalition addresses the concern that Sacramento County youth ages 12 to 20 are drinking alcohol too early, too much, and too often, according to Sacramento County data from the California Healthy Kids Survey (2017-19). Also of concern is underage marijuana use, due to the legalization of recreational marijuana in California. The Sacramento County Substance Use Disorder Strategic Prevention Plan (July 2021 – June 2026) describes the SCCY as a key strategy for preventing underage substance use, including work to limit youth access and redirect media messaging and community norms indicating that youth substance use is safe.
The Coalition is led by the Sacramento County Office of Education and is supported by the Sacramento County Department of Health Services, Division of Behavioral Health Services, Substance Use Prevention & Treatment. Together, we engage youth, families, schools, neighborhoods, and communities reflective of the cultural, racial, ethnic, linguistic, and LGBTQ diversity in Sacramento County.
SCCY Action Plan
The SCCY developed an Action Plan from October 2015 to May 2016. It provides a broad framework and a responsive menu of environmental prevention strategies and activities as a guide, ensuring strategies implemented by the Coalition will be outcome-based and lead to multi-level community change. The SCCY will use this Action Plan to guide project implementation.
The SCCY selected four Environmental Prevention strategies to include in the Action Plan:
- Developing targeted media messaging
- Limiting youth access to alcohol and other substances
- Addressing current laws, policies, and practices
- Understanding and redirecting social and community norms
Each strategy is described in the Action Plan and a menu of possible activities is provided for each strategy. Environmental prevention approaches have the highest potential to produce population-level change.
The Action Plan is designed to be flexible, allowing the Coalition to be responsive to new priorities and opportunities within the County as they arise. The Coalition can leverage a wide variety of existing and potential resources, individuals, entities, organizations, and successful national and local campaign models to implement its Action Plan. The SCCY will measure progress, collect data, and set benchmarks to reduce youth access to alcohol and other substances and prevent underage substance use in Sacramento County.
Read the complete SCCY Action Plan . (827k PDF)
