Belmont Brothers Win National Red Ribbon Contest

The National Family Partnership (NFP) announced this week that brothers Zane (age 6) and Kane (age 3) Tanabe of Belmont are the winners of the 2012 National Red Ribbon Photo Contest: “The Best Me Is Drug Free.”

The Tanabe family entered the contest to promote awareness in their neighborhood and to win a drug prevention grant for their school, Cipriani Elementary School.

Students from throughout the United States entered the contest by decorating their homes together with their parents - mailboxes, front doors and fences. Parents uploaded photos to www.RedRibbon.org, then friends and family voted and the entries with the most votes won (from ten regions across the U.S. including every state).

“We received so many wonderful entries from across the U.S., and an outpouring of support with over 140,000 votes, said Peggy Sapp, NFP’s volunteer president.

As winners of the photo contest, Zane and Kane won $1,000 drug-prevention grant for Cipriani Elementary School and an iPad for their family.

Red Ribbon Week, nation’s oldest and largest drug prevention campaign, reaches more than 80 million people nationwide every year since 1985.

"This really helped us to introduce the topic of drugs to them. We thought they were too young, but this contest helped us open up the dialogue. My son keeps saying he wants to have a drug free life and he's not afraid to tell other kids," said the boys' mom, Kelly Tanabe.

In 1985 after the murder of DEA special agent Enrique 'Kiki' Camarena, parents, youth and teachers in communities across the country began wearing Red Ribbons as a symbol of their commitment to raise awareness of the destruction caused by drugs.

In addition to the national contest, the Tanabe brothers were honored in November, along with other Belmont students, at a Belmont City Council meeting for their participation in the local contest, which was sponsored by the Belmont Police Department.

Said Cipriani Elementary School Principal Lisa Zachry: "As a school, we will use the grant money to focus on prevention and wellness."

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