Keyport police win DARE competition KEYPORT — No one in the country could DARE to beat the Keyport Police Department. The Keyport DARE (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) van won first place in the specialty vehicle class at the National DARE competition held in Atlantic City June 23-26, Keyport Police Chief Theodore Gajewski said. The 1996 Ford Windstar and a 1990 Yamaha Wave Runner, decorated in a patriotic theme with the DARE logo all over them, won the category for the department, Patrolman Robert McCartin, the DARE officer, said. The van and the personal watercraft are black with stars and stripes decorating the entire vehicles. The trailer, which pulls the watercraft, is white with stars and stripes decorating it as well, McCartin said. Both the van and the Wave Runner were donated to the borough by Michael Clay of Unlimited Auto, located on Route 35 near Maple Place, Gajewski said. "We won second place in the state last year," Gajewski said. "We were a little hungry to try to go for first place this year," McCartin said. The competition was the third competitive car show in which the police department has competed, McCartin said. Since the second-place finish, people have been working to improve the look of the van, Gajewski said. Last year, the borough did not have a watercraft to send to the show. "Nobody had anything like that," McCartin said. The goal for next year’s competition is to win best in show, the top prize, said McCartin. Best in show in the competition went to a pickup truck from Mahwah, McCartin said. The department plans on making improvements to the sound system. It hopes the improvements will make the vehicle good enough to be best in show at the 2004 show, McCartin said. When the van and watercraft are not competing in car shows, they are being displayed at schools, in parades, and at different municipal events, McCartin said. DARE is a drug-abuse education program in which a police officer visits schools to speak to children about the dangers of drugs. McCartin goes to the Keyport Central School, Broad Street, and St. Joseph’s Roman Catholic School, Maple Place, to teach the children about the dangers of drug use. He teaches six classes, which totals about 150 students, he said. — Maura Dowgin