Reporting

<p>Santa Barbara Teen News Network aims to provide “accessible and community-based performing arts programs, dedicated to developing passion, communication and performing arts leadership in the youth of (Santa Barbara)."</p>

<p>This article was written by Noozhawk Intern Tim Fucci as part of Day 4 in Noozhawk’s 12-day, six-week special investigative series. Related links are below.</p>

<p>In the past, the study of addiction has often been focused on substances — like heroin, marijuana and alcohol. But experts in the field now believe that addiction begins with the “reward circuitry” in the brain rather than the substances themselves.</p>

<p>Donna Genera says bartenders are therapists without degrees. As a former bartender and drug dealer herself, Genera’s work<a href="http://www.fullspectrumrecovery.com/&quot; title="Full Spectrum Recovery &amp; Counseling Services"></a> is informed by her years on the supply side of addiction.</p>

<p>Looking back, Rich Detty can’t say for sure whether his son, Cliff, was addicted to prescription medications. The drug abuse question and the true condition of his son’s mental illness still haunt him.</p>

<p>A formerly sickly child, West Virginia's top health official finds himself in the position to affect the health of more than 400,000 West Virginians enrolled in Medicaid, DHHR's biggest program.</p>

<p>Journalist Kari Lydersen examines the environmental health impacts of a large oil refinery's expansion to process tar sands oil.</p>

<p>For years, Eva Marie Warren, 53, avoided eye contact with passers-by as she panhandled on the streets, for fear of having to smile back or make small talk. To smile or talk would compel her to reveal something she was deeply embarrassed about – her teeth.</p>

<p>Unlike methamphetamines or heroin, which could have been made in a stranger’s garage, a uniformly manufactured pill from a pharmacy is considered a paragon of safety.</p>