A Sammamish mother wants parents to confront teens’ problems head-on | Eastside Youth Forum to be held Wednesday

Published 7:18 pm Monday, February 1, 2016

A Sammamish community leader and mother wants to start a conversation about the problems on Eastside teens’ minds.

On Wednesday, the Meydenbauer Center will host an Eastside Youth Forum for teens in the Sammamish Plateau and Issaquah Valley to discuss the darkest problems teens deal with — problems like depression, eating disorders and substance abuse.

The forum has been organized by Sammamish resident Nancy Anderson. Anderson — a city planning commissioner, mother of a Skyline alumna and frequent volunteer — said that, for years, she’s been deeply bothered by the thought of Plateau teens who have lost their lives to substance abuse, either because someone was driving under the influence or they took too much.

“In the past 10 years, really, we’ve lost quite a few teens,” she said. “It’s kept me up at night, wondering who was out there and what they were on.”

Anderson declined to name specific examples out of sensitivity to the families — people she knows — who lost loved ones.

But examples of community tragedies are readily available. In 2012, a 16-year-old boy committed suicide in Skyline High School’s parking lot. In 2014, a former Skyline cheerleader was found dead of an apparent overdose in her Louisville, Kentucky, apartment.

Sammamish Police Chief Nate Elledge discovered in early 2013 that 40 percent of DUI arrests over the previous three years had been drivers under 21 — and many had been under 18. Later that year, the EX3 Teen Center hosted a community meeting to address the DUI trend and a spike in the teen suicide rate.

For her part, Anderson said she thinks the problem is connected to affluence, the pressures of a community that places a high emphasis on achievement — resulting in kids who need to find something, anything, to blow off steam — and a parent-condoned party culture. Indeed, the city of Sammamish passed an ordinance early in 2015 bulking up penalties for adults who facilitate underage drinking.

Anderson said that, even though she took measures with her own daughter like drafting up a no-drinking-and-driving contract (which she thinks worked well), she feels she shares blame in tacitly supporting teen parties on the Plateau.

“For example, you have before- and after-parties for school dances,” she said. “I didn’t host any of these parties, but I didn’t stop my girls from going to them either.”

Anderson didn’t know what to do about the problem, other than worry. Then, last summer, a rash of car prowls hit her neighborhood, a problem bad enough that the police organized a meeting with area homeowners. Anderson was surprised by how many people — smart, successful neighbors — hadn’t understood the pitfalls of leaving valuables in their cars.

But as soon as people talked about it, they understood how to solve the problem. That made Anderson think: If an open dialogue could work for adults, maybe it could work for teens too.

“Maybe it’s a prejudice or a bias in our community that we don’t want to admit these issues affect our kids,” she said. “I don’t think we need to be ashamed anymore. We all went through growing pains when we were teens.”

She imagined her Eastside Youth Forum as a one-off event, but acquaintances encouraged her to make it more permanent and she successfully filed for nonprofit status in the fall.

She arranged for speakers including King County sheriff’s deputy Jim Pugel, Olympic gold medalist Tom Malchow and Skyline principal Donna Hood. The forum will have multiple breakout sessions.

Now Anderson just has to wait to see if it goes well. If it does, she wants to put on similar forums for teens in other Eastside cities, like Bellevue.

“My hope is that one kid walks out of there with a new perspective on healthy living or helping a friend,” she said.

The Eastside Youth Forum will take place 6-9:45 p.m. at the Meydenbauer Center, 11100 NE 6th St. in Bellevue. On-site registration begins at 5:30 p.m.

More information can be found at eastsideyouth.com.