MADD CHAPTER WINS NATIONAL AWARD

MADD has something to be glad about.

Cape Girardeau's Mother's Against Drunk Driving Community Action Team got national recognition of its work at a MADD awards ceremony in Albuquerque, N.M. It was selected as the community action team of the year out of more than 600 national chapters.

"We were astonished considering our size and the amount of competition," said Sharee Galnore, who is co-director of Cape Girardeau's MADD and supervises the Safe Communities program from the Cape Girardeau Police Department.

The group was recognized for its exceptional activities in raising awareness of drinking and driving.

"It's a continual thing," Galnore said. "It has been that way since we started."

The program that has made the most definitive imprint is the victim impact panel, she said. Since 1993, it has allowed victims of drunken drivers to tell their stories to an audience of people convicted with their first or second DWI offenses.

"It's a major commitment on the part of those who participate," Galnore said. "Every time they are reliving the loss of a child, a husband."

Those in the audience have been ordered by a judge to sit and listen for an hour.

"These people are telling their stories over and over again because they want it to have an effect," she said.

The first MADD group in Cape Girardeau formed in 1992, with a group of 16 meeting at the Community Counseling Center. Of those, nine had either been injured by a drunken driver or had a family member injured by a drunken driver.

Now, about 20 people come to the meetings.

But that is still enough to make a difference, Galnore said.

Cape Girardeau's chapter was the only one in Missouri to participate in MADD's Great American Picnic Campaign this summer, she said. They cooked hot dogs and offered drinks in front of Wal-Mart as part of one of MADD's new national themes to get across its message.

"While we had a picnic atmosphere, we were trying to educate people, too," Galnore said.

Although the group was recognized for fund raising, she said most of the money raised here goes back into MADD's state organization. The $20 collected from each person who attends the victim impact panels pays for local flyers and other printed materials, she said.

MADD also got its message out in a new way through a billboard campaign, which got assistance from Ford and Sons Funeral Homes and Safe Communities.

"Each year we try to take on a little bit more," Galnore said.

But to run their Red Ribbon campaigns, candlelight vigils and Christmas lights in the county park, the regular members enlist much assistance from friends and relatives, Galnore said.

MADD also gets a hand from law enforcement.

More training of police has allowed Cape Girardeau to run sobriety checkpoints more often, said police Sgt. J.R. Davis. This has been one of many factors contributing to fewer alcohol-induced accidents, Davis said.

"Along with MADD and the Safe Communities program, we continue to push that message," he said.

Police also assist with the Red Ribbon campaign and TEAM Spirit activities, Galnore said.

TEAM Spirit, sponsored by the state Division of Highway Safety, gives teen-agers a chance to develop leadership skills and alternatives to drug and alcohol abuse.

As youths from all over Southeast Missouri come to Cape Girardeau for TEAM Spirit's annual gathering, MADD sends Red Ribbons home with them. "That gives us an impact over thousands of lives in the region," Galnore said.

But the most important goal of MADD is to care for its members, many of whom have experienced the death of a relative to drunken driving.

"We have some people who are victims who have stayed with us through the years," Galnore said. "Others may move on after awhile. But we want to be here to lend support to one another."