Governor's Office for Substance Abuse Prevention (GOSAP) - Who We Are
The Governor's Office for Substance Abuse Prevention awards and administers federal grant funds apportioned to Virginia under the Governor's discxretionary portion of Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act (SDFSCA) funds allocated to Virginia by the U.S. Department of Education, under the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, and administers funds from the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) for the purpose of creating epidemiological profiles of Virginia localities on consequences and prevention of substance abuse. Under the SDFSCA program, GOSAP annually makes approximately $600,000 available for local program grants. Learn more about these programs and others which GOSAP supports..
Read the 2008 GOSAP Annual Report or the GOSAP Strategic Plan (both in .pdf format).
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Agency Mission
The mission of the Governor’s Office for Substance Abuse Prevention is to support positive youth development by providing strategic statewide leadership, fostering collaboration and the sharing of resources at all levels, and providing tools and training to practice evidence-based prevention so that Virginia’s youth will develop into productive citizens free from substance abuse, violence, delinquency, school drop-out, criminal gang participation, and related risky behaviors.
Agency Values
- Prevention focus — Always strive to improve and support the best interests of Virginia’s youth, families, and communities by promoting development of healthy behavior.
- Collaboration — Work together to share resources and focus on common ideals and desired outcomes.
- Leadership — Recruit and convene partners to facilitate best practices and develop prudent policies.
- Integrity — Follow all rules, guidelines, and requirements.
- Fairness — Treat all applicants, partners, and employees equally.
- Creativity — Value innovation in a supportive, energetic environment that encourages the use of best practices.
- Efficiency — Coordinate with others to share resources, reduce duplication and foster synergy.
- Effectiveness — Produce tangible products and accountable results.
- Respect — Respect the input and work of all people involved in positive youth development activities.
- Customer service — Exceed a customer’s reasonable expectation for a timely, courteous and accurate response.
- Loyalty — Remain committed to GOSAP’s mission, values and goals, while supporting the team/effort to achieve them.
Agency Vision
We envision the Governor’s Office for Substance Abuse Prevention as a nationally-recognized leader in evidence-based prevention practice because it:
- leads and models strong collaboration among state and local agencies, organizations, coalitions, and faith communities that address prevention;
- prioritizes, coordinates, and leverages Virginia’s prevention resources to improve efficiency;
- improves the effectiveness of Virginia’s prevention efforts by providing practical tools for and training in evidence-based prevention practice;
- develops and recognizes prevention professionals and volunteers; and
- sustains and enhances evidence-based prevention practice including: risk-based, data-driven needs assessments, measurable goals and objectives, use of evidence-based programs, and evaluation for accountability and improvement to reduce the incidence and prevalence of substance abuse and its consequences in Virginia.
Accomplishments & Initiatives
There is no formal ranking system or yardstick by which to measure Virginia’s prevention efforts. Still, state prevention managers have noted a rejuvenation of interest and collaborative activity over the last few years. Federal technical assistance staff who are familiar with Virginia’s prevention efforts, as well as those of other states, have described GOSAP’s accomplishments as “exemplary” and “cutting edge.” Even before the release of the Community Profile Database, GOSAP staff received calls from other states interested in viewing the system for possible adaptation to their states. GOSAP staff has been selected to showcase the Community Profile Database at numerous state and national conferences. Though not objective rankings, these qualitative indicators suggest that GOSAP’s efforts are respected, and continue to gain national attention.
Positive youth development impacts children, families, schools, communities, and Virginia’s social and economic environment. Consequently, GOSAP has a variety of customers who require different products and services. Since 2002, GOSAP has developed products and services across four major areas: leadership, funding, tools and training.
Strategic Statewide Leadership:
GOSAP has developed a leadership infrastructure to share resources and improve effectiveness, efficiency and accountability across Virginia’s 13 state agencies that have responsibilities to the positive development of Virginia’s youth.
- GOSAP created and directs the GOSAP Collaborative, representing Virginia’s 13 agencies with prevention responsibilities, to: improve communication, foster agreement, facilitate cooperation and partnerships, share resources, increase consistency, simplify processes, and increase accountability.
- The GOSAP Collaborative "advise(s) the Governor and his Cabinet on proposed policy and operational changes to facilitate interagency communication and collaboration in planning, implementing and monitoring prevention-related programs, services and stretegies between state, local, public and private entities." (see "Executive Directive")
- The GOSAP Collaborative "coordinate(s) strategic planning efforts and initiatives to minimize duplication of effort and resources, to model interagency/inter-initiative collaboration and to work towards a seamless continuum of programs, services and strategies accessible to all Virginians." (see "Executive Directive")
- GOSAP created and directs the implementation of Virginia’s statewide prevention plan in partnership with the GOSAP Collaborative, to set the course for Virginia’s current and future prevention practices.
- Through a grant from the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), GOSAP and its Collaborative compiled Virginia's first Epidemiological Profile Report of Substance Abuse in the Commonwealth. This report provides data to guide future prevention efforts.
- GOSAP staff actively participates in prevention-related planning and implementation work groups to coordinate, link and leverage resources.
Statewide Grants Administration:
GOSAP has obtained and provided resources to support community-based prevention efforts that promote positive youth development.
- GOSAP serves as federal liaison to substance abuse prevention efforts requiring gubernatorial-level oversight or cooperation, allowing Virginia to qualify for and obtain federal prevention funding. It represents Virginia at national public safety, prevention, and substance abuse meetings, conferences, and events. It serves as a contact point to obtain federal technical assistance for prevention efforts.
- GOSAP leverages funding streams to maximize results from limited prevention funding. It cultivates relationships with public and private entities to sponsor or co-sponsor efforts.
- GOSAP follows state and federal funding requirements to set priority funding areas, develop requests for proposals, screen proposals, select grantees, approve the release of funding, monitor grants, and provide technical assistance to grantees.
- GOSAP provides funding annually for local implementation of proven, evidence-based programs and strategies. In FY 2007, GOSAP's grantees received over $600,000 in funding.
Epidemiological Profiles:
Epidemiology is the process of applying research methods to collect data and analyze relationships among risk factors and their distributions within populations. This public health methodology is used to:
- identify the causes of a condition (etiology)-the underlying factors that put a person at risk for developing a condition;
- determine the extent of condition in a community (prevalence)-estimate the burden of the condition on a community, predict trends, assess community needs, plan health services facilities and training;
- study the natural history and progression of a condition (prognosis)-basis for evaluating treatments;
- evaluate new and existing strategies for prevention and treatment; and/or
- inform public policy and environmental regulation.
The Governor's Office for Substance Abuse Prevention (GOSAP) is implementing a grant from the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) to prepare statewide and city/county epidemiological profiles (Epi Reports) to provide data to inform efforts to reduce and prevent substance abuse and its consequences. Epi Reports are intended to provide quick, easy access to consistent, comparable data to: assess and prioritize needs, plan and implement evidence-based strategies that have been proven effective, allocate funding and other resources, and monitor trends to improve results.
In addition to developing the reports on substance abuse and of these indicators, GOSAP's epidemiological profile project seeks to:
- establish, enhance and maintain a surveillance system to collect, compile, analyze and disseminate data on the trends and patterns of substance use and its consequences;
- build cross-agency collaboration and capacity to appreciate and understand the relationships among problem behaviors and conditions that exist because the factors that increase the risk of substance abuse also produce risk for crime and violence, school drop out, teen pregnancy, and other problem behaviors and conditions;
- promote cross-agency collaborative efforts to share and leverage resources to address risk factors that are common to problem behaviors and conditions; and
- facilitate data-driven decisions to ensure the efficient and effective use of resources to produce community-level reductions in substance abuse and its consequences.
Virginia's 2009 Epi Report is a state-level report, with a prototype local-level report. We currently are working toward updating existing data, collecting new data and designing reports within the Community Profile Database so that each locality in Virginia can generate reports to meet their local and regional needs.
Read the 2009 EPI Report - An Epidemiological Profile: Substance Use in the Commonwealth of Virginia (.pdf). Download the Adobe Reader at the top of the page to view.
Tools to Practice Evidence-Based Prevention:
GOSAP has created tools to promote and assist state, local and private service providers in practicing evidence-based prevention strategies that have been proven to reduce and prevent risky adolescent behavior.
- GOSAP's Website Clearinghouse is a one-stop site for information on prevention in Virginia. From a baseline average of abotu 100 user sessions per day in 2006, website usage increased to an average of over 300 perday in 2007. It offers:
- A calendar of prevention-related training and events with links to information and registration sites;
- Several links to prevention websites, with a indicators to specify which sites have content for kids, teens, parents, educators, seniors and professionals;
- Links to current funding opportunies submitted by Collaborative agencies or associates, as well as resources for other funding streams;
- Links to training opportunites and sources providing training programs;
- Links to prevention-related bulletins and newsletters and listservs provided by federal and state agencies;
- Announcements on prevention-releated initiatives and news;
- Information on GOSAP, its products and services;
- Downloadable copie of Virginia's statewide prevention plan, pocket guide to prevention and other useful publications; and
- Links to Collaborative member websites for information on each agency's specific role in Virginia's prevention efforts.
- GOSAP’s Community Profile Database is a web-based, interactive database to support evidence-based prevention practice by allowing easy access to data to monitor the development of Virginia’s children and the well-being of Virginia’s communities on one user-friendly web site. It allows:
- Virginians to set benchmarks and monitor progress toward achieving outcomes;
- Citizens to see what is happening in their communities and to become involved;
- School children, college, and graduate students to find facts and analyze real data for projects and papers;
- Professional researchers to access the data they need for statistical analysis;
- Public and private organizations to access uniform data to develop grant applications;
- State agencies to compare data and to target resources to high-need areas and issues;
- Local government workers to find consistent data to assess their needs and plan local programs to address them; and
- Planners to link to evidence-based, best-practice guidance on program and service strategies.
- Gosap's Community Profile Database includes:
- Data that users can customize by locality, ZIP Code, age, race and gender groups (wherever such data are available). In addition to reporting and downloading capability, the system has basic mapping and graphing ability.
- Program information on evidence-based services and strategies operating in Virginia, as well as contact information, funding souces and descriptions that may be downloaded as word processing files, .pdf files or spreadsheets.
- Resouces to find detailed descriptions of the data, their sources, associated limitations andplaces to find additional information and comparison data. More importantly, it links useres to best practice information including:
- sources for finding evidence-based programs that research has proven are effective in preventing or intervening in adolescent problem behaviors;
- downloadable research articles and prevention materials;
- resource web sites and clearinghouses;
- program performance measures required by federal agencies;
- information on formulating and monitoring program outcome measures;
- resources for evaluating programs for improvement; and
- links to the state-level Virginia Youth Tob acco Survey, Virginia Community Youth Survey and State Estimates of Substance Use.
- Support for Families to link people who simply need assistance with the daily challenges of raising children and living in a family to potential resources in their communities.
Training to practice evidence-based prevention:
GOSAP has provided training to build Virginia’s state and local capacity to reduce and prevent adolescent risky behavior.
- GOSAP presents and co-sponsors statewide training events, such as the Governor’s Annual Prevention Comes First Conferences. These venues provide prevention practitioners with opportunities to learn best practices and research from national, state, and local experts. The Prevention Conference is attended by more than 400 participants annually.
- GOSAP conducts implementation workshops for potential grantees and grantee training in grant writing, grants administration, and evaluation to improve the ability of potential grantees to develop proposals and manage grants effectively.
- GOSAP develops and co-sponsors statewide campaigns, such as Prevention Comes First. These activities provide children, parents, educators, and others with practical information for preventing problem behavior.
- GOSAP supports prevention leadership experiences for youth, such as the Youth Alcohol and Drug Abuse Prevention Program (YADAPP), to promote positive youth development.
- GOSAP staff presents prevention-related workshops and training at national, state and local meetings and conferences to promote the use of risk-based planning and evidence-based programming.
Authorization: § 2.2-118, Code of Virginia
Governor to administer substance abuse prevention program. It shall be the responsibility of the Governor to administer the substance abuse prevention program within the Commonwealth and to authorize, direct, and coordinate activities of agencies of the Commonwealth in such program. The Governor is hereby empowered to establish an office of substance abuse prevention within the office of the Governor to assist in the coordination of the substance abuse prevention activities of the Commonwealth, review substance abuse prevention program expenditures by agencies of the Commonwealth, and determine the direction and appropriateness of such expenditures. The Governor shall cooperate with federal, state and local agencies, private and public agencies, interested organizations, and individuals in order to prevent substance abuse within the Commonwealth. The Governor shall report annually by December 1 of each year to the General Assembly on the activities of the office.