Archive

Prevention Services Archive Library

The Prevention Services Archive consists of the history of Prevention Services starting from around 2009 and continuing until present day. It contains a record of our initiatives, campaigns, and projects, including publications, videos, media campaigns, radio, presentations, and events. The publications include our research, evaluation reports, and educational campaign materials.

The purpose of this catalogue of prevention work is to preserve the integrity of our historical documents and make them available to you. They serve as a guide to the development of our campaigns over time, a sense of where we began and where we are today.

The Prevention Services Archive is a tool for VCBH SUS Prevention Services staff, contracted providers, and partners to access our materials to use to further our strategic prevention initiatives.

Our current work is at www.VenturaCountyLimits.org.
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> County of Ventura Strategic Prevention Plan 2017-2022

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Supporting Health • Preventing Harm

Prevention Services works upstream to reduce alcohol and drug-related problems in our community. Initiatives are aimed at limiting harms related to impaired driving; underage and binge drinking; marijuana and vaping, especially as it relates to harms to youth; prescription drug abuse; and addressing health disparities among vulnerable populations. A primary goal is to delay the onset of first use of alcohol and or other drugs by youth. We collaborate with schools, parent groups, government agencies, medical partners, law enforcement, community-based organizations and more.

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Mission

To implement effective and sustainable primary prevention initiatives, guided by the best available local data, to systematically reduce community problems affecting everyone, and provide targeted strategies to increase protective factors for vulnerable populations.

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Guiding Principles 

The following prevention principles shape prevention planning and implementation across Ventura County: 

• Support collaborative and community-based coalitions to implement change ‍
• Collect and use data strategically, with emphasis on actionable information 
• Develop and implement prevention policies that have a strong evidence base 
• Engage diverse communities with strategies that are culturally and linguistically appropriate 
• Pursue prevention initiatives which capitalize on health care reform and integration ‍
• Conduct ongoing monitoring and evaluation – formative evaluation – to ensure results 
• Implement both universal and selective/indicated (targeted) prevention strategies 

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Strategic and Collaborative Prevention Approach

VCBH has engaged in strategic and data-driven environmental prevention strategies since 1996 to address local alcohol and drug use and abuse. VCBH engages in a collaborative prevention approach, engaging all county sectors (e.g., law enforcement, government/ elected officials, county partners, prevention providers, etc.) in local prevention efforts. The 2016 – 2021 Strategic Prevention Plan builds upon the work that has been conducted while targeting the current needs of the county, based on local data, and will continue to engage/seek the following:

• Secure funding to support community collaborations that increase awareness and mobilize action for environmental prevention efforts (e.g., safe prescription drug disposal; ongoing minor decoy operations to prevent sales to minors)
• Support the implementation of new policies, laws and practices that promise to decrease the risks of AOD problems across entire communities or regions (e.g., using local data to focus on alcohol service practices in common settings of DUI behavior; regulate cannabis availability)
• Implement community education and media advocacy campaigns to affect behavior at the individual, family and community levels (e.g., augmenting/enforcing social host laws)
• Sustain the involvement of concerned groups, local experts, and policy makers to use local data in systematically reducing identified AOD problems (e.g., work of the multi-agency Prescription Drug Abuse and Heroin Workgroup’s efforts to decrease fatal and non-fatal opioid overdose)

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