Write a Letter to the Editor

The letters that have the best chance of being published by your newspaper are short, focused, and to the point. It also helps to tie your letter to a specific event or local activity of interest—such as an upcoming concert or sporting event that is sponsored by an alcohol producer.

Here are some other tips for your letter:

• Make sure that you include your full name, address, day and evening phone numbers, and your e-mail address at the top of the letter. Most newspapers will contact the letter writer to confirm authenticity.
• Write short sentences and limit your letter to no more than two or three paragraphs.
• Don't send copies of your letter to several papers at once. Make it an original to the publication where you really want it published and wait a few days before submitting your letter somewhere else.

Sample Letter-to-the-Editor #1:

Laurie Leiber, Manager, Media Advocacy, of the Marin Institute, sent the following letter to the editor of the Marin Independent Journal in January 2004 in respose to President Bush's State of the Union Address.

To the Editor:

In proposing to spend $23 million to test students for illegal drugs, President Bush ignores alcohol -- the drug most likely to cause death and permanent disability among youth. He could hardly be ignorant of the problem. In September, a ground-breaking document from the National Academy of Sciences reported that underage drinking causes six times as many deaths as all the illicit drugs combined. The government-mandated report, “Reducing Underage Drinking: A Collective Responsibility” estimated that underage drinking costs our nation $53 billion annually. In addition to reports from respected scientific panels, Mr. Bush’s policy could also be informed by his daughter’s citations for underage drinking and his own experiences with alcohol. When the problem comes this close to home, I can only wonder if the alcohol industry’s $22 billion dollars in sales to minors -- and consequent profits and campaign contributions -- is what keeps Mr. Bush from investing our nation’s scarce prevention resources in this tragic public health problem.

Laurie Leiber
The Marin Institute
24 Belvedere St.
San Rafael, CA 94901
415-456-5692

Submit an Op-ed

An op-ed is a guest opinion column found in the editorial section of your newspaper. As a member of the community, you can use it as a tool to get your message out in the local media.

Check your newspaper’s editorial page to find out how they accept submissions (via fax, e-mail, etc.). Include your phone number, address, e-mail address, and a brief bio with your submission (when printed in the paper, op-eds usually have a short blurb about the author(s) at the end of the piece). Once you’ve sent the piece in, be sure to follow up with the editors after a few days.

Here are some other tips for your op-ed:

• Make it newsworthy by tying it to something specific. Examples of news hooks might include: an upcoming vote on a piece of legislation or responding to a new ad campaign for beer that clearly targets youth.
• When possible, personalize your piece with an experience or anecdote. (Something as simple as “As a mother of two, I believe …” could do the trick.)
• Be brief and to the point. Op-eds are usually 800 words or less, and editors won’t be happy about having to make your piece fit.
• Appeal to the average reader. Don’t use technical language or jargon.
• Start and end with a bang. Draw the reader in with your first paragraph. Sum up your piece in the last paragraph with a strong message and call to action.
• If possible, recruit others to add to your by-line. Sometimes it helps to have an “expert” on the issue in order to get published. Or it might improve your chances to simply add other concerned members of the community to the by-line.

Sample Op-Ed #1

Sharon O'Hara, Associate Director for Community Support of the Marin Institute wrote the following Op-Ed piece for the Marin Independent Journal in November 2003 in response to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) report: “Reducing Underage Drinking: A Collective Responsibility.” The Op-Ed was published by the Marin IJ and the printed article can be seen here (Adobe .pdf Reader required).

Marin Independent Journal
Opinion Page Editor
11/26/03

Along with the festive partying that accompanies the holiday season, we have come to expect--and even accept--an increase in alcohol-related assault, injuries and deaths in our community. So perhaps this time of year is a good one for not only celebrating, but also contemplating: how can we prevent alcohol-related problems before it’s too late, particularly among youth?

Some answers can be found in a report issued to Congress this year by the National Academy of Sciences (NAS): “Reducing Underage Drinking: A Collective Responsibility.” When I read the report, I couldn’t help feeling excited about the work that I’m doing in here in Marin County. As the Marin Institute’s Associate Director, my job is to help communities prevent alcohol-related problems by changing the way alcoholic beverages are sold and promoted.

I have three teenage children, two still living at home. Like most parents of teens, I am very concerned about underage drinking. I think that I’ve done a good job of talking with my kids about drinking. And I’ve established a clear expectation that they will not drink before they are 21. But I know that once they step outside our house my kids face a community environment that has made beer the drug of choice among youth and a leading cause of death and disability

The NAS report estimates the national annual cost of underage drinking at $53 billion and acknowledges that we can do much more to prevent this dangerous and costly health problem. Most newspapers across the country reported just two of the NAS report’s recommendations: increasing taxes on alcohol—especially beer—and launching a national media campaign aimed at adults. After many years in the field of prevention, I’m thrilled that a major report both acknowledged the enormous size of the underage drinking problem and proposed major, national policy solutions to address the epidemic of underage drinking. But while these big steps are critical, I know that smaller scale, local changes also recommended by the NAS—like consistent enforcement of laws prohibiting the sale of alcohol to youth—have the potential to reduce underage drinking before my youngest kids, now 12 and 14, graduate from high school.

There is much we can and should do locally to reduce widespread underage drinking right here in Marin. In a survey conducted by the Youth Health Advisory Council, a program of the Youth Leadership Institute, youth reported that getting alcohol is easy—fewer than half were consistently asked for ID when purchasing alcohol and 17 percent said they usually get alcohol from family members. In fact, Marin youth get most of their alcohol through adults.

I’ve even seen it happen. I walked into my local grocery store a few weeks ago and watched a young man, barely 21 years old; buy several bottles of Arbor Mist (a sweet, flavored wine) for two girls standing next to him who looked the same age as my 14-year-old daughter. The young man, who reeked of alcohol, also purchased a six-pack of Corona. The transaction had all the hallmarks of a classic “shoulder tap”—when underage youth ask an adult to purchase alcohol for them, often in exchange for money or alcohol.

What, then, is the good news? All this underage drinking is taking place in a community that is uniquely equipped to implement the prevention approaches recommended by the NAS—strategies that acknowledge that underage drinking cannot be successfully addressed by focusing on youth alone. The Marin Institute is a leader in such policy level prevention. Although we have state and national constituents, we have a special responsibility to support Marin residents—youth, parents, officials, business people, educators, and clergy—in efforts to reduce alcohol-related problems.

Following my experience at the grocery store, I resolved to call the store manager to ask if what I witnessed is consistent with the store’s policies. I will invite the manager to participate as I work with other members of the business community, the Marin County Health Department, local law enforcement, and residents to promote consistent compliance with underage drinking laws and necessary enforcement.

We all have a stake in reducing underage drinking in Marin. But I have the biggest stake of all—some young people I love very much live here. If I want them safe, I can’t let my parenting stop at the front door. And I need to ask all adults—not just parents—to join me in embracing our collective responsibility to make our community safer for young people by working together to reduce underage drinking.

To learn more visit www.MarinInstitute.org or call 415-456-5692.

Sharon O’Hara
Associate Director, The Marin Institute
\Novato Resident

Sample Op-Ed #2

Laurie Leiber placed this op-ed in April 1995 prior to an Anheuser-Busch annual stockholders’ meeting. At the meeting, activist shareholders introduced a resolution calling on the world’s largest brewer to adopt more responsible advertising practices.

Is this Bud for your kids?

On its way to broader markets and greater profits, the world’s biggest brewer is softening up our kids with marketing strategies and handouts that exploit their vulnerability.

When Anheuser-Busch holds its annual shareholders’ meeting in Williamsburg, Va., on Wednesday, a group of shareholders, including the Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration-an order of Catholic nuns-will direct the corporate giant to own up to its actions. The shareholders who are concerned about the consequences of advertising to youth will introduce a resolution asking the company to report how its marketing affects kids and how much of its beer is consumed by underage drinkers.

The sisters and several other supporters of the resolution charge that Anheuser-Busch promotions that are attractive to youngsters-stuffed animals, Halloween images, cartoon characters, candy-build acceptance for beer drinking among youth. These advertising items belie company claims that it does not market to minors and opposes consumption by minors.

The shareholders introduced the resolution because they are uncomfortable sharing in profits that result from putting young people at risk. Beer is the alcoholic beverage of choice among young people. According to the inspector general of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, junior and senior high school students consume 1.1 billion cans of beer each year (or about 183 million six-packs at about $3 each). Anheuser-Busch produces about 45 percent of the beer consumed in this country. Based upon this market share, Anheuser-Busch could be generating as much as $225 million in sales revenue per year from illegal sales to young people who have not yet graduated from high school.

Although it obviously profits from underage drinking, Anheuser-Busch claims that it is “part of the solution.” It sounds impressive when Anheuser-Busch says it has spent nearly $150 million since 1982 on programs to encourage personal responsibility and discourage sales to minors. But that is only about $12 million a year. Anheuser-Busch spends about $300 million per year on traditional advertising (TV, radio, magazines, and billboards) and as much or more on other types of promotions (sports, concerts, contests, and point-of-sale materials) for a total of at least $600 million.

Anheuser-Busch defends this disparity with a premise that is ridiculous. It claims that its $600 million in promotions have no effect on youth drinking while its $12 million in prevention programs help minimize the problem. A growing body of credible research shows that children see and are influenced by beer ads. There is no evidence to support Anheuser-Busch’s claim that its modest investment in prevention has any positive impact.

In fact, many of the Anheuser-Busch sponsored “moderation” programs do not even address underage drinking. It makes no sense for Anheuser-Busch to tell junior and senior high school students to “Know When to Say When” because the message implies that some drinking among students is acceptable.

A study published by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety in 1992 reported that teenagers exposed to the “Know When to Say When” slogan interpreted “when” to mean three or four drinks. For this audience, at least, the message is more promotion than prevention.

Flimsy as it is, the pretense that the beer industry is doing its part to prevent underage drinking has been used to deflect most meaningful restrictions on beer advertising. The shareholders supporting the resolution say that Anheuser-Busch’s “personal responsibility” programs are irrelevant. “We do not question the good they do,” writes Sister Julie Tydrich of the Francisco Sisters of Perpetual Adoration. “We are asking them to stop creating ads that appeal to teenagers.”

April is Alcohol Awareness Month, an appropriate time to acknowledge the efforts of these responsible Anheuser-Busch shareholders.

Beer is the drug most likely to contribute to the death or long-term disability of a young person. Not heroin, not crack, not even tobacco.

Americans and America’s children get most of their information about beer from messages designed to encourage drinking. Beer producers must be held accountable for their marketing.

These responsible shareholders deserve our respect for putting the health and welfare of children before profit. We can only hope that Anheuser-Busch does the same.

Laurie Leiber is director of the Center on Alcohol Advertising.
This was distributed by Knight-Ridder Newspapers.