http://www.floridatrend.com/issue/defau ... 1&d=5/1/97Sembler returns to the sofa. Flipping through the photo album, he points to a shot of him and Betty, hand-in-hand with Nancy Reagan. "In 1980 Nancy Reagan was known for Adolfo clothes and the dishes she bought for the White House," he says, rapid fire. "So Betty and I advised her to take on the drug crusade. Everyone thought we were crazy. But the next thing we know, she comes out with the demand-reduction program, you know the ÔJust Say No' thing. That came from us."
Braggadocio it is not. The drug cause, in fact, was Sembler's entree to national politics. In 1973 Mel and Betty Sembler awoke to the realization that one of their sons was smoking pot. "Mel and I were completely shocked," recalls Betty Sembler.
"We saw this as a fundamental breakdown of everything we believed in: family, education, law and order, responsibility to the community. Drugs represented the very antithesis of these values - pure selfishness."
Their son (they won't say which one of the three) received counseling and kicked the habit. But other young people from the community, Mel and Betty realized, were not so fortunate. At once, the Semblers pledged support and money to local drug prevention and treatment causes. And in 1976, after the closing of St. Petersburg's only juvenile drug treatment center, Mel Sembler founded a privately funded, nonprofit drug rehabilitation program called Straight. For 17 years, Sembler served as Straight's board chairman and principal benefactor. Affiliate centers opened around the country. He gave generously to fund the operations and asked others to do the same. Out of necessity, he learned the art of fund raising.
Dinner for George Bush
In 1979, Sembler's sister called from Houston, asking a favor: host a fund-raising dinner for a George Bush, who had launched his first bid for the presidency. (Sembler, a life-long Democrat, had soured on President Carter's drug control efforts and recently switched parties.) While Sembler was drawn to Bush's tough talk on drugs, few others in St. Pete knew anything about the former Texas congressman and one-time diplomat to China. At the eleventh hour, with Bush on his way to their modest ranch-style home on Treasure Island along the Gulf, the Semblers invited extra family and friends and paid the $100-per-guest donation themselves. Bush never knew. So began Sembler's passion for political fund raising and his extremely close relationship with Bush as evidenced by the warm correspondence between the two that continues to this day.
Sembler returns to the sofa. Flipping through the photo album, he points to a shot of him and Betty, hand-in-hand with Nancy Reagan. "In 1980 Nancy Reagan was known for Adolfo clothes and the dishes she bought for the White House," he says, rapid fire. "So Betty and I advised her to take on the drug crusade. Everyone thought we were crazy. But the next thing we know, she comes out with the demand-reduction program, you know the ÔJust Say No' thing. That came from us."
Wha?
? Huh?
? ::ftard:: :
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