Basic Public Information
Guide
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Table of Contents
Public Information
and the NA Member
Public Information and
the NA Group
Public Information
and the H&I Committee
Starting a Public
Information Committee
A Contingency Plan
The Work Itself
The Twelve Traditions
and Public Information
What We Do and Don't
Do in Public Information
Additional Resources
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The purpose of Public
Information work in Narcotics Anonymous is to inform the public
that NA exists and offers recovery from the disease of addiction.
A Public Information Committee helps to ensure that information
about our fellowship is accurate and is available to the public.
The World Service Conference Public Information Committee has
compiled the following guidelines to support emerging NA communities
needing some basic guidance in fulfilling our primary purpose
in the public arena.
Public Information,
or PI, is an area of service work in our fellowship which has
matured greatly in recent years. However, our PI service manual,
A Guide to Public Information needs to be translated into other
languages to reflect our fellowship's experiences and worldwide
membership. Until the translations can be completed, we wish to
help our worldwide fellowship by offering some basic and simple
guidelines for doing this type of NA service.
Our primary purpose
as a fellowship is to carry the message to the addict who still
suffers. PI is a vital part of "carrying the message."
Doing this type of service calls upon us to communicate and participate
in areas of the community in which, as using addicts, we were
once unwelcome. Courage and humility are necessary ingredients
in our recovery when approaching the public about our fellowship.
We hope that you find this part of NA service as rewarding and
challenging as we have.
Public Information and the NA Member
Every member of NA
has a role in helping us carry the message to the still-suffering
addict. Much of the goodwill that exists between NA and the community
is based on the relationships that we maintain as NA members.
We can improve these relationships for our fellowship by taking
care to treat others with courtesy and respect. This is especially
important when we represent the fellowship to professionals and
members of other organizations who may spread their good or bad
impressions of us to others. We need to project a positive image
of NA so that these individuals feel comfortable directing addicts
seeking recovery to our meetings.
When we participate in a public information event, we accept responsibility
for our behavior. If we are rude, use profanity, or show a lack
of respect for a facility or for other organizations, we bring
into question the effectiveness of our recovery program.
We can also be seen
as members of Narcotics Anonymous when we wear an NA T-shirt in
public, stand around outside a group meeting, or attend an NA
convention or service conference. As a fellowship, we have no
control over the behavior of individual NA members. As members,
however, keeping our spiritual principles in mind, we can share
our concerns about our public image with other members. We can
communicate to them that a bad image of Narcotics Anonymous could
easily keep the message of recovery from reaching the addict who
still suffers.
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Public Information and the NA Group
Members of NA groups
can and often do perform some basic PI work to help carry the
message of recovery to addicts, as well as to the public. PI efforts
by groups are often limited to posting bulletins, printing and
distributing meeting schedules, and informing other addicts about
their meetings.
Groups should always
be careful not to make statements or commitments that overstep
their abilities. It's important to have enough resources available
to respond to inquiries. Our spiritual foundation of anonymity
can be seriously damaged by members acting alone or independently
of the group and the fellowship. We never do speaking engagements,
presentations, or interviews alone.
As the number of meetings
and groups increases, the need for additional services to the
groups is usually met by the formation of an Area Service Committee
(ASC). We start these service committees so that the groups are
not distracted from their own primary purpose. Our groups need
to stay focused on their primary purpose and provide a safe environment
in which to practice the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions.
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Public Information and the Hospitals and Institutions
Committee
Understanding the purpose
and need for cooperation between committees is an important part
of providing service in NA. We may understand our own functions
well, but often know little of how other committees operate. It
is critical to understand the relationship between the Hospitals
and Institutions Committee and the Public Information Committee.
The purpose of the
Hospitals and Institutions Committee, or H&I, is to carry
the NA message to addicts in hospitals or other institutions who
do not have full access to regular Narcotics Anonymous meetings.
The H&I Committee will organize a team of NA members, called
a panel, to go into these institutions and introduce the basics
of the NA program to addicts in that institution. The basic difference
in function is that H&I panels present the program primarily
to addicts and the PI Committee makes its presentation primarily
to non-addicts.
Here is an example
to illustrate our different responsibilities and cooperative spirit:
If a hospital contacted the local fellowship to request a presentation
of the program to their doctors and nurses, the PI committee would
be primarily responsible to do a presentation. However, the local
H&I Committee should be informed of the event and invited
to participate. A member from H&I would be most knowledgeable
about the local H&I Committee and could answer questions about
its ability and requirements to bring panels to the hospital.
Using the same example, if the request were to present the program
to the patients at the hospital, it would be the H&I Committee's
responsibility to make this presentation. The PI Committee should
be available to the H&I Committee if this contact were to
become an opportunity for a presentation to the staff at the hospital.
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Starting A Public Information Committee
A public information
subcommittee is an important part of most area service committees.
If there is an ASC available to you, attend a scheduled meeting
with other NA members interested in doing PI work and express
your willingness to serve or start a PI Committee. From this point
on, public information efforts should be done with the support
and guidance of your ASC.
If there is no Area
Service Committee available to you, schedule a meeting of local
group members interested in public information to form a PI committee.
You may want to begin by establishing the committee's purpose,
functions, and responsibilities, and then deciding how the committee
should serve the local members of the fellowship. A PI committee
initially should handle such things as: creating, updating, and
distributing meeting schedules, responding to requests for information,
establishing a stable mailing address, helping a Hospitals and
Institutions Committee when asked, and managing other PI projects
within that area or region.
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A Contingency Plan
As Narcotics Anonymous
grows, representatives of the print and electronic media will
show increasing interest in our fellowship. When the media becomes
interested in NA, their reporters often approach us without an
understanding of the principle of anonymity. Maintaining personal
anonymity at the level of press, radio, and films must be our
highest priority when contacts are made with the public and the
media. We have found that having a "contingency plan"
is of great value for a PI committee.
Creating a contingency
plan is one of the first priorities for a new PI committee. This
plan is a strategy for organizing our response to public and media
requests for information. Very simply, it should state what to
do when certain types of requests are received from the public.
Use of the plan can help ensure that our most experienced PI members
are involved, so that the local fellowship can keep to its primary
purpose and we can stay consistent with our traditions. The plan
should include a list of members involved in public information
who are familiar with NA media responses.
The contingency plan
should also include guidelines for handling requests which will
affect other groups, areas, and regions. If a request does affect
other service groups in NA, coordination and cooperation are needed
in order to facilitate an effective response.
The WSC PI Committee
has a contingency plan for media events which may be significant
to Narcotics Anonymous as a whole. If your committee has received
a request to participate in such an event, it is imperative that
you contact the closest WSC PI Committee member, trustee, or the
World Service Office PI Coordinator to plan the response.
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The Work Itself
It is clear that we
cannot be everything for everybody. We are a recovery organization
whose members meet regularly to help each other stay clean. It
is all right for us to decline a request which is outside our
fellowship's primary purpose. It is also reasonable for us to
decline a request that is within our purpose if we do not have
the time, money, and members to honor the request. The important
thing to remember is that we respond! Failure to respond, even
if we are declining a request, demonstrates a lack of integrity
on behalf of our fellowship.
To carry a clear NA
message to the public, we as members need to have a clear knowledge
of our traditions. It takes practice to learn the traditions and
understand how to apply them. We have reserved a portion of this
guide for a discussion on the traditions, and how they impact
PI work.
Our objective in doing
public information work should be simply to spread the word that
the fellowship is available, that it works, and that it's free.
Here are some frequently used methods to accomplish this:
A. Meeting List(s)
-- If there is more than one meeting in your community, creating
and maintaining a listing of meeting information should be your
highest priority. This list should contain information such as
the day, time, and location (a street address is preferred), and
if the meeting is open to the public. It may also contain information
such as the type of meeting (step study, speaker, or discussion,
for example), smoking or non-smoking, and any other special information.
Meeting lists should be updated on a regular basis. It's our responsibility
to make sure that newcomers to our program are given accurate
information on how to find us when they reach out for help.
B. Posters -- These
are notices used to inform the public about how and where to contact
us. It is critical that when we post these notices, we first obtain
permission to do so. Some possible posting locations are: detoxification
facilities, hospitals, police stations, schools and universities,
churches or missionary outreach offices, government service offices,
drug treatment centers, or other places where addicts seeking
recovery or people who help addicts might congregate.
We need to stress that
"attraction rather than promotion" is an important concept
when doing public information work such as this. Good judgment
should be used when creating and posting these notices. We need
to refrain from provocative, promotional statements or artwork
which may convey a negative image or appear to be promotional.
Even how and where we post them should be evaluated before we
follow through on the project. A simple message that we are available
and how to contact us is the desired result.
Contents of printed
media, such as bulletins, posters, and newspaper ads, usually
consist of an attention-grabbing statement or question, followed
by information on how to contact the local meeting, group, or
phoneline. As an example, a bulletin, poster, or newspaper ad
might be as follows:
Drug Problem? Narcotics
Anonymous can help! [Your Contact Information]
Samples can be obtained from the World Service Office to help
you create your own bulletin, poster, or ad.
C. Introductory Mailings
-- We can introduce the program to professionals in health organizations
and social services, and to others who deal with addicts, by mailing
them information about our fellowship. A mailing should consist
of a letter to explain who you are, where you can be contacted,
and some basic information about Narcotics Anonymous in your community,
including the fact that we are a part of a worldwide fellowship.
Normally we include a local meeting list and, if possible, some
NA pamphlets. If appropriate, the cover letter might also mention
that speakers are available to meet with them and/or their staff,
if your local fellowship is able to fulfill this type of request.
Pamphlets such as NA--A
Resource in Your Community; Who, What, How and Why; the NA White
Booklet; and Welcome to Narcotics Anonymous are good choices for
introduction to our program. You may find that Am I an Addict?,
For the Newcomer, and Sponsorship are also helpful. We acknowledge
that not all of these pamphlets may be available in your language.
Use what you have. If you don't have any translated pamphlets
available, you may be able to use pamphlets in another language
for professionals.
Your local PI Committee
can create a standard "packet" for mailings and for
distribution during presentations. Be realistic regarding costs
and choice of pamphlets, whether mailing them or just passing
them out at a presentation.
D. Presentations --
You may receive requests to give a presentation about Narcotics
Anonymous to professionals at an institution or to an organization
at a conference. You may also receive an invitation to set up
booths or tables at a public event to provide some basic information
about NA. If you agree that it is appropriate and you have the
resources to do it, remember:
Do presentations with
others.
To help establish a good impression, start with a good appearance.
Avoid using obscenities.
Be aware of the composition of your audience. If you are addressing
non-addicts, as is usually the case, remember that the sort of
NA language which is commonly used and understood by members of
the fellowship in our meetings is not typical outside those meetings.
Too much "program talk" or emphasis on the finer details
of our recovery program is simply a foreign language to non-addicts
and therefore should be avoided.
While some personal disclosure is encouraged, the focus must remain
on a clear NA message. It's not who we are as individuals, it's
how we became clean addicts through the Twelve Steps and Twelve
Traditions of NA.
Avoid telling "drug stories." We are there to speak
about how we found a new way to live free from active addiction
through NA, not how it was when we were using.
Our attractions are: it works, it's free, and we are available
to the addict that still suffers
E. Public Service Announcements (PSAs) -- PSAs are notices which
reach the public by way of press, radio, and television. Public
service announcements are commonly posted in specific areas of
various media in which members of the public are allowed to announce
items of interest to the community, free of charge. This is an
accepted method of informing the public about NA, and is not viewed
as a direct contribution by an outside source. However, if the
announcement must contain a sponsoring organization's name ("this
ad presented by the ABC Company") as part of the PSA, that
would be unacceptable in light of our traditions.
Printed PSAs can be created by the local PI committee. We caution
local committees against creating their own videos. The cost and
process involved in creating a video PSA can greatly distract
a PI committee from carrying the message, as well as strain the
resources of the local fellowship. If you wish to be involved
with the production of PSAs and videos, please contact the WSO
Public Information Coordinator.
The WSC PI Committee
has conference-approved scripts for radio and television PSAs
which can be adapted for use in your community. The scripts are
contained in the Guide to Public Information and the tapes are
available through the World Service Office.
F. Phonelines -- A
telephone number may be established in your community as a contact
for addicts seeking recovery and for receiving inquiries about
our fellowship from the public. You should establish a phoneline
service only when you are physically and financially able to support
it. A lot of hard work and responsibilities are involved with
a phoneline, and the decision to start one should be taken seriously.
Think of the consequences if an addict seeking recovery or a professional
called and the telephone number was disconnected: an addict would
continue to suffer, and a poor impression would be given to the
professional. Information on starting and maintaining a phoneline
is covered in a separate guide available from the World Service
Office.
G. Learning Days and
Workshops -- These are an internal service offered to the members
of our fellowship. Usually a few dedicated members will set aside
time to share their experience with other interested members and
NA groups on how to do some of the basic work of PI committees.
One of our responsibilities is to inform the fellowship at large
about our function in service and how to get in touch with us
if anyone is contacted by the public and the media. More information
on this topic is contained in the Guide to Public Information.
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The Twelve Traditions and Public Information
Public information
work is done by service committees or groups created by, and directly
responsible to, those they serve: NA members. We do the best we
can with what we have while upholding our Twelve Traditions. Our
experience has taught us that we need an understanding of the
Twelve Traditions of Narcotics Anonymous as they apply to public
information. It has proven beneficial to spend time studying and
discussing the traditions. The knowledge gained helps us to be
more confident in our presentation of NA. This confidence is apparent
to our audience and assists in developing a positive image of
our fellowship. The following traditions play an important role
in PI work and have direct applications to PI service.
Our Sixth Tradition
states: An NA group ought never endorse, finance, or lend the
NA name to any related facility or outside enterprise, lest problems
of money, property or prestige divert us from our primary purpose.
"This tradition is the basis for our policy of non-affiliation
and is extremely important to the continuation and growth of Narcotics
Anonymous." (Narcotics Anonymous Basic Text, Page 66, 5th
Edition, English) While it is important to reach as many people
as possible with our message of recovery, it is imperative that
we not risk our independence by becoming reliant on any outside
source. If NA becomes strongly identified with any "related
facility or outside enterprise" (club houses, drug treatment
centers, or other Twelve Step fellowships, for example), our primary
purpose and independence will become confused with the priorities
of others.
Cooperation with those
who come in contact with addicts is important when carrying the
message of NA. Without this cooperation, many addicts would never
have found our fellowship. We want to work with other organizations,
but we do not want to be merged with them in the mind of the public.
To give the impression that we are one and the same would threaten
our independence. Our aim is simply to make it known that NA is
available. It may require additional effort to make clear the
distinction between NA and other organizations. However, we will
be rewarded as more addicts find us through other sources and
our fellowship continues to grow.
Our Tenth Tradition
states: Narcotics Anonymous has no opinion on outside issues;
hence the NA name ought never be drawn into public controversy.
"Our recovery speaks for itself. Our Tenth Tradition specifically
helps protect our reputation." (Narcotics Anonymous Basic
Text, Page 71, 5th Edition, English) We have no recommendations
for any outside organizations, nor do we participate in their
politics. To do so would invite controversy which would jeopardize
our fellowship's standing in the community. If we voice an opinion
on any public issue, we may block the path for a new member to
join our fellowship. It is critical that we remember this aspect
of keeping our fellowship open to any addict who has the desire
to stop using.
Our Eleventh Tradition
states: Our public relations policy is based on attraction rather
than promotion; we need always maintain personal anonymity at
the level of press, radio, and films. "Our attraction is
that we are successes in our own right. As groups we offer recovery.
We have found that the success of our program speaks for itself."
(Narcotics Anonymous Basic Text, Page 72, 5th Edition, English)
This tradition tells us that we do not have to promote recovery;
the changes in our lives will be apparent to those around us.
The positive effect of our own personal recovery is a powerful
element of attraction to our program.
We do need to inform
the general public of our existence. The difference between attraction
and promotion is in the content of the message and its presentation.
Providing basic information and informing the public of who, what,
and where we are is well within the definition of attraction.
When we go beyond the act of simply informing the public that
we exist, we cross the borderline into promotion.
Participation by NA
members in public information events is not a violation of anonymity.
It is a personal choice made by those who serve to give up some
of their anonymity. Obviously, to give our full names to the press,
allow our faces to be photographed, or appear on television or
film in association with or identified as a member of Narcotics
Anonymous is plainly a violation of the Eleventh Tradition. This
can threaten an individual member's personal recovery and give
a false impression to newcomers that they will have to reveal
their identities to others.
Our Twelfth Tradition
states: Anonymity is the spiritual foundation of all our traditions,
ever reminding us to place principles before personalities. "The
spiritual foundation becomes more important than any one particular
group or individual." (Narcotics Anonymous Basic Text, Page
72, 5th Edition, English) This tradition reminds us that NA is
a "WE" program, and that the sacrifice of personal ambition
is inherent to the spiritual principle of anonymity.
When we act on our
own in public information we lose the spirit of humility inherent
in a "we" program. The damage done to NA's reputation
by individuals acting on their own can take a long time to repair.
Being of service in PI we get a glimpse of humility every time
a newcomer walks through the door of an NA meeting. We can then
recognize the spiritual aim of the fellowship and our own place
within it. We are grateful to be able to carry the message of
recovery and can acknowledge the actions of a power greater than
ourselves.
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What We Do and What We Don't Do in Public Information
We Do:
Follow our traditions,
contingency plans and guidelines.
Try to be consistent. We follow through on our plans of action.
Keep updated records of contacts, posted flyers, PSAs, etc.
Remember that quality is better than quantity.
Present a good image of recovery. We are punctual, dress appropriately,
and avoid using obscenities when we speak.
Consult with members experienced in PI work before contacting
the media.
We Don't:
Do Public Information
alone.
Abuse our precious resources. When we don't complete a project,
we create a negative image of NA.
Present ourselves as the only spokesperson for NA.
Accept contributions from outside our fellowship.
State an opinion, or take a stand on any controversial or public
issue.
Give out personal information about individual NA members.
Narcotics Anonymous Does Not:
Operate hospitals or recovery houses for addicts.
Solicit, advertise, or persuade others to join.
Engage in or sponsor scientific research on addiction.
Keep membership records or case histories of its members.
Make medical or psychological diagnosis.
Provide marriage, family, or vocational counseling.
Provide monetary or social assistance.
Provide or participate in primary drug prevention education.
Accept money for its services and is not funded by any public
or private agencies.
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Additional Resources
A more complete list
of guidelines for beginning a PI committee may be found in A Guide
to Public Information. Other related materials are A Guide to
Phoneline Service and bulletins on specific topics pertaining
to Public Information. Contact the World Service Office to obtain
any of these materials. More information may also be obtained
from neighboring Public Information Committees. The WSO PI Coordinator
can assist you in contacting others close to you with PI experience.
Sharing our experience, strength and hope in this area of service
can greatly enhance the ties that bind us together.
We recognize that there
are legal restrictions in many countries prohibiting the congregation
of addicts. Please contact the World Service Office for additional
information before moving forward with public information efforts
in areas where these restrictions exist.
The World Service Conference
Public Information Committee may be contacted at the addresses
listed. Thank you for letting us serve by sharing with you our
experience, strength, and hope on carrying the message of recovery
to the world.
World Service Office,
Inc.
PO. Box 9999
Van Nuys, CA 91409
USA
Tel. (818) 773-9999
Fax (818) 700-0700
World Service Office
- Europe
48 Rue de l'Ete/Zomerstraat
B-1050 Brussels, Belgium
Tel. 32-2-646-6012
Fax 32-2-649-9239
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