The Wisconsin Alcohol Policy Project (WAPP) at the University of Wisconsin Law School provides training, tools and technical assistance to individuals and groups working to adopt and implement alcohol policy. WAPP resources on specific policy initiatives are listed in the "Choose Effective Policies and Programs" section below. Here are a few general WAPP resources:
Alcohol Policy Glossary: A summary of the various terms and jargon associated with alcohol policy
Wisconsin Alcohol History for Advocates: A timeline of historical events that reframes the history of alcohol in Wisconsin to show that our alcohol culture is a relatively recent development
The Alliance for Wisconsin Youth enhances and supports the capacity of member coalitions in their substance abuse prevention and youth development work. Over 100 Wisconsin coalitions are members of the Alliance. Visit their Resources page for links to tools.
Health in Practice: tools to inspire healthy change for your community. Included: information on Wisconsin's alcohol culture, local initiatives, state initiatives, and data sources. Note: After March 31, 2015 this website is no longer being updated due to the closing of the Wisconsin Clearinghouse for Prevention Resources.
National:
Alcohol Justice: The Industry Watchdog promotes evidence-based public health policies and organizes campaigns with diverse communities and youth against the alcohol industry’s harmful practices. Includes campaigns, projects, and legislative activity.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Alcohol Program works to strengthen the scientific foundation for preventing excessive alcohol use and provides fact sheets, online tools, data, online media, publications, public health objectives, and more.
The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), supports and conducts research on the impact of alcohol use on human health and well-being. It is the largest funder of alcohol research in the world.
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) is the agency within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that leads public health efforts to advance the behavioral health of the nation. SAMHSA's mission is to reduce the impact of substance abuse and mental illness on America's communities. SAMHSA has a wealth of resources for every stage of community health improvement work and offers several grants, including the Drug Free Communities grant. The Administration's Strategic Prevention Framework closely resembles the CHIPP models widely used in public health.
Substance abuse prevention training opportunities are currently provided by these entities, among others:
The Alliance for Wisconsin Youth provides member coalitions with support services and training via telephone, email, meetings, visits, and workshops.
The Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America (CADCA) offers several training opportunities, including webinars, the Mid-Year Training Institute, and the National Coalition Academy. (The National Coalition Academy is a three-week training course is offered free of charge; participants only need to cover travel costs. Participants receive instruction on core competencies essential for a highly-effective coalition, ranging from developing strategic and action plans and building partnerships to enhancing cultural competence and resource development.
Community Health Improvement in Action (CHIA) provides community health improvement training opportunities with a focus on alcohol-related work, including webinars and in-person trainings.
The Wisconsin Alcohol Policy Project (WAPP) at the University of Wisconsin Law School provides training, tools and technical assistance to individuals and groups-- including local elected officials, law enforcement and coalitions-- on the evidence-based policies and practices that prevent and reduce alcohol misuse and abuse. TA includes everything from training sessions on alcohol policy to answering questions by telephone about specific alcohol-related policies or problems. As mentioned below, the WAPP holds the biennial Wisconsin Alcohol Policy Seminar (in even-numbered years) to offer training and information on developments in alcohol policy.
The Wisconsin Division of Public Health Regional Offices provide technical assistance and training related to family and community health, communicable disease prevention and control, chronic disease prevention and health promotion, environmental health, and injury prevention. Guidance on planning, implementing and evaluating community health improvement initiatives, including data collection, is available.
The Underage Drinking Enforcement Training Center (UDETC) provides a variety of science-based, practical, effective training and technical assistance services to support, enhance, and build leadership capacity and increase state and local community effectiveness in their efforts to enforce underage drinking laws, prevent underage drinking, and eliminate the devastating consequences associated with alcohol use by underage youth.
National and Statewide Data: Alcohol and Public Health: Alcohol-Related Disease Impact (ARDI) ARDI is an online application that provides national and state estimates of alcohol-related health impacts, including deaths and years of potential life lost. Estimates are calculated for 54 acute and chronic causes using alcohol-attributable fractions and are reported by age and sex for 2006-2010.
County and Municipal Data: Wisconsin County Alcohol Outlet Density Reports: Lists outlet density by a number of factors in every municipality by county, a joint project of the Wisconsin Department of Health Services and the Wisconsin Alcohol Policy Project.
State and Countywide Data: County Health Rankings. The Rankings measure the health of nearly all counties in the nation and rank them within states. The Rankings are compiled using county-level measures from a variety of national and state data sources. These measures are standardized and combined using scientifically-informed weights.Alcohol-related measures include: excessive drinking, alcohol impaired driving deaths, and alcohol-related hospitalizations (under additional measures, rate not available for smaller counties).
How to access the data: Choose Wisconsin on the map. Then choose your county. The "County Snapshot" will appear: see the measure under "Health Factors" and then "Health Behaviors." In addition to the snapshot, click on "Additional Measures". To better understand what each measure means, click on the measure. In a new screen, a Data Source tab and a Description tab provide detailed information on the measure.
You must go to the original source of data for stratification by subgroupings:
Alcohol-related hospitalizations can be stratified by age group: DHS Public Health Profiles. To access, select the link to your county. Select Wisconsin for the state figure. Click on the "About the Data" link for detailed information. Rate not available for smaller counties.
National and Statewide Data (school district and aggregated county data available locally): Youth Risk Behavior Survey: CDC-Youth Online-High School YRBS. The Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System monitors high school students for six types of health-risk behaviors that contribute to the leading causes of death and disability among youth and adults, including alcohol and other drug use. Youth Drug and Alcohol Use measures include: % of students who had their first drink of alcohol other than a few sips before age 13; and % of students who had at least one drink of alcohol on one or more of the past 30 days. This link is for state and national data only. Data is available by school district; partner with your schools to see if they participate in the survey (if not, advocate for their participation).
How to access the data: Choose Youth Online Data Analysis Tool, then choose Wisconsin. In the next window, in the left-hand bar of "Filter Data", choose "Alcohol and Other Drug Use." Also in Choose Table Content, choose the appropriate year. Then choose specific question of interest. Data can be stratified by race/ethnicity, gender, and grade in school.
State and Countywide Data: Wisconsin Department of Health Services, Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS). Coordinated by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), every state and U.S. territory health department conducts the survey as part of the system, whose purpose is to collect information on adult health-risking behaviors, health conditions, use of preventive care and other health-related topics. Uses a representative sample of Wisconsin adults living in households with landline telephones. Alcohol-related measures available include Adult Binge Drinking and Adult Heavy Drinking.
How to access the data: Select measure under Risk Factors. Fill out the remainder of the form to narrow data set to a specific population. The All Counties Module also provides estimates by county for specific three-year periods.
State and Countywide Data: Wisconsin Department of Transportation. Traffic crash statistics. Human consequences of traffic crashes, including alcohol, broken down by county (see 2012 Wisconsin Traffic Crash Facts, Section 5). Stratified by age, severity of crash, location (e.g., highway or local roads).
State and Countywide Data: Impact of Alcohol and Illicit Drug Use in Wisconsin. A report on the burden of alcohol and drug use in Wisconsin, including prevalence, morbidity, mortality, criminal justice, and economic costs.
State, County, and Municipal Data: The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources. Annual reports each January on snowmobile fatal crash statistics, including factors involved. Listed by location (county, municipality).
State and Law Enforcement Agency Jurisdiction Data: Wisconsin Department of Justice, Training and Standards Bureau. Annual reports on arrests in Wisconsin. Arrests in Wisconsin 2012 includes alcohol-related arrests under "Society Arrests," starting on page 10. Appendix Table 5 (starting on page 177) breaks down adult and juvenile society arrests by law enforcement agency jurisdiction for OWI and liquor law violations.
The Burden of Excessive Alcohol Use in Wisconsin: Full Report and One Page Summary. A study estimating the economic costs of excessive alcohol consumption in Wisconsin: $6.8 billion in 2012, borne by everyone in the state, not just the drinkers themselves. (Revenue generated by current alcohol taxes covers less than 1% of the total economic cost.) Following the statewide summary, 2-page county reports outline the cost to the residents of each Wisconsin county, including the per-person cost excessive alcohol use imposes on each resident based on local information.
Wisconsin SPF-SIG Assessment Toolkit: Includes alcohol-specific assessment tools, such as key informant interview questions, focus group questions, and an environmental scan. Created by Dorothy Chaney, revised by Community Health Improvement in Action
Listening to the Community: A Guide to Primary Data Collection:Tools and resources for how to collect primary data about general community health needs and strengths while increasing community engagement. It includes how to choose and implement effective methods, including key informant interviews, focus groups, surveys, forums, and observation.Created by the CHIPP Infrastructure Improvement Project:Listed in the Table of Resources under the “Resources by Stage” tab
Changing Wisconsin’s Alcohol Environment to Promote Safe and Healthy Lives (ACE Report). A Wisconsin State Council on Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse (SCAODA) workgroup selected 49 separate opportunities to improve Wisconsin’s alcohol environment. The recommendations are divided by the groups or organizations able to make changes to the alcohol environment (state legislature, municipalities, schools, community groups, and employers).
Resources from The Wisconsin Alcohol Policy Project (WAPP) at the University of Wisconsin Law School: Municipal Policies lists resources on public impairment, alcohol outlet density, social host (underage parties held on land or property owned by adults), age compliance checks, intoxicated youth in public, sober servers and pedal pubs. Outdoor Events and Festivals has tools for assessing and improving alcohol serving practices at these events. Two tools created by WAPP in collaboration with CHIA:
Awarding Alcohol Licenses: Issues and Procedures: A comprehensive guide to understanding the municipal licensing system and options for improving the alcohol environment through the licensing process. This document combines information initially provided by WAPP in separate tools (Alcohol Licensing Process Chart, License Conditions, Importance of licensed Premises Description, Citizens Guide to Alcohol Licensing, and Alcohol Licensing Checklist.)
The Wisconsin Initiative to Promote Health Lifestyles (WIPHL) provides free training, consultation services and support to healthcare professionals in Wisconsin who implement Behavioral Screening and Intervention (BSI).
