Kid Drownings

Fulton Homes currently sponsors Dave Munsey's Watch Your Kids Around Water campaign on Fox, and also funds KTAR-AM's Two Seconds Is Too Long campaign. Fulton Homes is a Tempe-based homebuilder that builds mostly east of the 101, and in new areas such as Litchfield Park and areas of Peoria. The economic focus of the developer has never been Maryvale.

Douglas Fulton, president of Fulton Homes Sales Corporation, recently sponsored two programs to give away fences. One was called Fence Watch, which urged neighbors to rat out badly kept pools to KSLX-FM, which then referred the information to the fire department, which inspected the pool. The most needy pool each week was given a free pool fence. Fulton built a total of 12 fences. Only one fence was in Maryvale.

Fulton Homes tried to target Maryvale through Spanish radio, and also gave away 750 sets of free swimming lessons at the YMCA. "We realized that there were so many more drownings there and that maybe putting out Spanish ads would help," says Fulton. But there is no YMCA in Maryvale. The closest one to 85033 is more than 40 blocks away.

Leslie's Pool Supplies, which carries many water-safety products, also had a fence giveaway program. It teamed up with the firefighters to provide fences for people who wrote letters explaining their need. This campaign was called Help Us Save Them. A spokesman for the fire department was unable to locate their records, but thought approximately 15 of the 18 fences were built in Maryvale.

Assuming that Fulton Homes, Leslie Pools and the firefighters erected approximately 16 pools in the target area last year, it would take 100 years at the current rate to provide Maryvale with the margin of safety the CDC recommends.

Salt River Project is also in on the effort. It has been sponsoring drowning prevention efforts since it started in the Valley. It also sponsored Target Zero. Jennifer Martyn of SRP says that SRP has been involved in water safety for 100 years. Martyn says that SRP's involvement has always been closely tied to the fire department. "People trust things more when they're getting it from the fire department. We also sponsor several other campaigns, but we've always worked with the firefighters."

SRP's involvement has been one of both cash and trade, the only sponsor that has consistently asked the fire department what was needed and provided the cash to purchase it. It has paid for printing in English and Spanish, reproduction of more than 15,000 CPR videotapes (also in both languages), creation of other items such as can coolers, and has also given time to water safety events all over the Valley. But Martyn confirmed that no specific research had been done, that SRP generally asks the fire department what to do and does it. The good intentions are there, and could possibly be used more effectively if there were a specific understanding of the Maryvale problem.

Even when targeting the area, sometimes the message gets lost. Ironically, the Just a Few Seconds message itself was part of the problem in Maryvale. Since 22 percent of drowning victims and 59 percent of 85033 residents are Hispanic, it was necessary to translate materials into Spanish. But when they translated the Just a Few Seconds message into Spanish, they met with an unexpected problem. John Harrington of the Arizona Drowning Prevention Coalition says, "In English, that means to people, Oh, it only takes a few seconds for my child to drown.' But in Spanish, it translates as, Oh, I have a few seconds that I can step away.'" An Arizona Department of Health Services study also points out that the rough translation of the message in Spanish was, "You have enough time."

The Arizona Drowning Prevention Coalition, one of the most vigorous of all citizen-led groups in the drowning prevention since its beginning in 1989, recently enlisted the help of Sarah Fleury of BJ Communications. The mother of a near-drowning victim herself, Fleury is trying to get other advertising agencies on board. "BJ Communications is a PR firm; we're really not equipped to handle something of this magnitude by ourselves, but it would be a potentially award-winning campaign, and I hope someone sees that potential and agrees to help."

The idea is to get an independent message, free of a sponsorship tie-in. "The dilemma of media or other corporate sponsorship is that the message is stuck with an ulterior motive," says Khan. "Any sponsor obviously has their own reasons for backing a campaign, which usually has as much to do with PR as with saving kids."

But the ideology with the fire department is to take what's offered, because it needs all of the help it can get.

"It's like getting a free lunch. You aren't going to complain about it. Even if it's not your favorite dish," explains Khan.

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In the playground at Hacienda de Los Angeles, the bright plastic slides and swings are rock still, not even the wind having the energy to make them play again.