Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, April 12, 1994                   TAG: 9404130015
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

TEEN PREGNANCY?

Was it solved in December, when Mayor David Bowers officially declared that it could no longer be ignored?

Or in February, when this newspaper published the last in a series of Extra section articles on the subject and letters to the editor on it slacked off?

Or in March, when came the promise of state funds to conduct a pregnancy-prevention campaign here?

Or have we, as a community, put our heads back in the sand?

In recent days, the editorial staff of this newspaper has had the privilege of talking with all seven Roanoke City Council candidates individually.

When asked about major problems facing the city, only one - Nelson Harris - brought up the subject of Roanoke's highest-in-the-state teen-pregnancy rate. Harris wonders why a task force to study the teen-pregnancy problem and recommend solutions is still not in place.

So do we.

Such a task force was proposed by Bowers before Christmas; the idea was immediately embraced by City Council and members of the Roanoke School Board, and subsequently endorsed by others - including this newspaper. City Manager Bob Herbert indicated it would be appointed "relatively quickly."

City officials now say they hope to announce the task force and schedule its first meeting before the end of April. We hope so, too.

City leaders and citizens should not need reminding that Roanoke's teen-pregnancy rate is still the highest in the state. It still represents a critical problem that feeds an array of related ailments, including poverty, crime, drug abuse, child abuse, school dropouts, mental illness, and so on.

The issue should not have lost its urgency. The costs of neglect are still mounting daily.

Perhaps the community does need this reminder: The heads-in-the-sand approach - standard operating procedure for years as other local groups studied teen pregnancy, made recommendations and were soon forgotten - helped bring us to where we are today.