Jackson County&rsquo;s Community Backed Anti-Drug Tax was initiated in 1989 to respond to a wave of drug-fueled crime that swept through Kansas City&rsquo;s neighborhoods.</p><p>Twenty years later, money from the quarter-cent sales tax known as COMBAT has become a crucial revenue source for county government, law enforcement, and a host of treatment and prevention programs.</p><p>&ldquo;The reality is COMBAT has become core to the function of Jackson County government,&rdquo; County Executive Mike Sanders said at a recent forum.</p><p>That poses a conundrum for voters, who will decide on Nov. 3 whether to renew the tax for seven more years. COMBAT was created to respond to a specific problem, not to be a supplemental funding source. But the problem &mdash; drug use and the crime related to it &mdash; is depressingly ongoing.</p><p>We would love to see a tax go away. But for three broad reasons, we support renewal of COMBAT this year.</p><p>&bull;The first is that, although COMBAT could be improved in several ways (see below), the approximately $20 million that the tax raises annually is by and large put to good use.</p><p>It funds the successful Jackson County Drug Court, which saves taxpayers&rsquo; money by sending nonviolent offenders to treatment programs instead of prison.</p><p>Another effective use of the money is the Drug Abatement Response Team, which uses code enforcement and other tools to close drug houses and clean up neighborhoods.</p><p>&bull;We also believe this would be a terrible time to yank a funding source from law enforcement agencies and nonprofit treatment providers.</p><p>The Kansas City Police Department lost $15 million in city funding this year, and can ill afford to lose the $2 million it receives in COMBAT funds. </p><p>Agencies that rely on COMBAT money have few alternatives. The Missouri Division of Alcohol and Drug Abuse provides funding to help only about 10 percent of the estimated 464,000 Missourians with substance abuse problems. Treatment programs supported by COMBAT serve 4,000 persons annually in Jackson County.</p><p>&bull;This year&rsquo;s ballot question broadens use of the tax money to include the fight against violent crimes. That&rsquo;s a good idea. Drugs, gangs, illegal weapons and violent crimes are intrinsically linked. A beefed-up strategy for tackling violent crimes would almost certainly reduce drug trafficking in the county.</p><p>COMBAT money already provides for specialized drug-fighting units within the Kansas City Police Department, and it enables a task force to investigate drug crimes and trafficking in eastern Jackson County. </p><p>It pays the salaries for a third of the staff in the Jackson County prosecutor&rsquo;s office and 15 percent of the staff in the Jackson County Jail. </p><p>The goal, though, is to keep people from entering the criminal justice system because of drug crimes. That&rsquo;s why the focus on prevention and treatment is essential.</p><p>Unfortunately, COMBAT has not removed the scourge of the drug trade from Jackson County. But its programs have kept lives and families intact, and freed up law enforcement resources for other uses. Its renewal deserves voter approval on Nov. 3.