DROP’s founders came from the local voluntary, statutory or community sector, and believed that whilst it is vital to support drug users to get out of the trap of addiction, there are other groups of people who are not using drugs, but who suffer from the effects of drugs in their families, or in their community, and these people also needed support and solutions. 

So the Project was set up to meet the needs of individuals, families and communities affected by drug and drug-related issues.

DROP’s core work has always been to provide drug users with the information, understanding and abilities to overcome their addiction. Prior to DROP’s inception, local drug users joined the Pathfinders group, which was run by volunteers and which, despite a lack of stable funding or facilities, organised a range of social and educational non-drug-related activities. Once DROP became funded and incorporated, it set about putting a well-staffed and well-housed structure on the Pathfinders group, which thus became the first group of people to attend for rehabilitation at the five-morning a week Drop Day Programme.

And, what about the non-drug-users affected by drugs? Who were they? Who are they?  
They are the parents who fear that their child will be cajoled into trying drugs, at some stage, by some friend, acquaintance, bully, or peer group, in an environment where that child’s sense of belonging might very well depend on how much they agreed to fit in with the dominant group.
They are the children of drug-using parents, who are still young enough to need their parent to be present and available and to be able to look after their basic needs like providing food, shelter, clothing, and a sense of consistency and safety.
They are the adult children of drug users whose experience of early life has given them a subjective reality that is dominated by the fear, uncertainty and danger of the demands of addiction.  
They are the people who are enmeshed in a relationship with a drug-using partner; a partner whose key relationship is now with the drug itself.
They are the parents who have spent years worrying about and protecting their grown up drug-using child, fruitlessly trying to battle their child’s addiction, so that they can no longer differentiate between how they feel or what they need, and what they think their child feels, or needs.
They are the people who have watched their communities become renowned for dealing and using, and who have felt powerless to restore the dignity of their homes and the safety of where they must live.
They are the people who are working to restore their community’s strength, respect and capacity, employed or volunteering in under-funded services in places where powerful drugs are more common than powerful resources. 

The Project founders wanted to create a project that could respond to all of these people, to each of these needs, and which was flexible enough to adapt to meet and address any future needs. They wrote the Project’s early mission statement:
“To provide a response to meet the needs of individuals, families and communities affected by drug and drug related issues”

The first priority was to formalise the existing support services for people in active addiction.
There were a few minor issues to sort out such as the fact that the new DROP clients had no place to meet. Staff members were hosted in an HSE administrative headquarters which could not allow drug users to enter its premises. So the staff and the clients gathered around the back of this building and made their way to various rooms in the Dun Laoghaire area that had been hired out or lent to them by local voluntary organisations. The group came up with the idea of erecting a pre-fabricated building on an empty space around the back of the administrative headquarters, but a public meeting disagreed. Luckily, in 2000 the Management Committee of DROP found some premises for rent at 45 Upper Georges Street where the landlord was not averse to having drug users sharing the premises with the existing tenants, a firm of Accountants. DROP began by leasing first the ground floor and then the second floor of the three storey building.

DROP also began to Sponsor a Community Employment Scheme which enabled it to provide a structured staff team, a daily work plan and a wage to its clients, who were now called CE participants. Along with the participants who attended DROP on a daily basis to address their addiction, the CE scheme employed other long-term unemployed people and placed them in host agencies throughout the country so that they could re-enter the workplace, gain training and development supports and help themselves to develop their economic independence. For this scheme, either the participant or the agency had an involvement in addiction.

Next came the Education Service. The staff member in this service worked in partnership with the Local Drugs Task Force and liaised with the Task Force’s network of representatives from the local community, statutory and voluntary agencies, and to work with those people to identify and meet the community’s needs with regard to drug related education and prevention issues.

By this stage, in 2003, DROP was providing a holistic response to drugs in the community, through providing an Education Prevention Service to prevent drug use, a Rehabilitation Service to address drug use, and a Reintegration Service to assist ex-drug-users and other affected by addiction back into the mainstream economic community, whilst also assisting agencies who were addressing drug-related social issues in terms of building their capacity through increasing their work force.

In 2004 DROP set up the Afternoon Programme, a structured programme of workshops and drug counselling for anyone at any stage of any drug use. This very popular service continued until late 2007.

In 2007 the long-awaited refurbishment of the premises took place, which entailed the services moving out of DROP into temporary accommodation for three months. Moving back to the premises did not, unfortunately, mean that all of our work could resume as normal. The long-term fall-out of a 25% rent increase in 2005, on top of the knock-on costs of the refurbishment, caused two major financial difficulties. The organisation had to reassess how to coordinate its rehabilitation services within its restricted budgets. Firstly, it had to make a post redundant, and secondly it had to scale down and finally close the Afternoon Programme. The year was hugely difficult for everyone at DROP, and many thanks are due to the entire team who worked with extra strength, patience and tolerance during a particularly stressful year.

Towards the end of 2007 the situation started to improve, thanks to the arrival of the NDST funding for the Evening Service. The Evening Service is designed to provide support to people who are using cocaine problematically or addictively, with or without any other drugs, and who want to link in for some support to regain control over their lives, their brain chemicals, and their emotions. In order to carry out this support service the Evening Service team undertook training in the recommended approach of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy with the Addiction Training Institute. And meanwhile the Day Service Team were working on setting up a Drug Free Group and a Family Support Group. The Local Drugs Task Force also placed in DROP two of its staff, the Development Worker and the Education Officer, both of whom work with drug-related services in the area, offering educational and organisational supports to the community.

2008 therefore started more brightly than 2007. The Evening Service is proving very popular and is increasing its capacity. The Day Services are continuing to run the Day Programme, and have now set up a Drug Free Group and Family Support Group, thanks to some funding assistance from the Local Drugs Task Force. The Afternoon Service continues to provide an appointment-based support for any drug users.

At this stage any news from 2008 should be kept for the next Annual Report. However, one last thing to mention is that 2008 is the Project’s tenth Anniversary, and a Project evaluation has begun, along with plans for a 10th year anniversary Open Day, to welcome all existing and potential stakeholders to celebrate a decade of development, change and support. We look forward to seeing you at the celebrations.