Pubdate: Mon, 11 Jul 2005
Source: Tri-Valley Herald  (Pleasanton, CA)
Copyright: 2005 MediaNews Group, Inc. and ANG Newspapers
Contact:  http://www.trivalleyherald.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/742
Author: Michael Doyle

METH PROBLEM ISN'T JUST LOCAL ONE

Drug surpasses former chart-toppers heroin and cocaine in recent survey

Methamphetamine has now spread well beyond the Central Valley to become the
leading drug problem in a majority of local communities nationwide, a new
survey shows.

Though still toxically rooted in the Valley, meth production and use have
been bleeding across both state and international borders. Law enforcement
officials in 58 percent of counties surveyed labeled meth as their biggest
drug challenge, surpassing such crippling old stand-bys as heroin and
cocaine.

"We certainly don't have a hold on the meth problem," Bill Ruzzamenti,
director of the Fresno-based Central Valley High Intensity Drug Trafficking
Area, said Tuesday. "It has gone coast to coast, unfortunately."

Officials in every region except the Northeast called meth their top drug
problem, according to the survey of 500 counties by the National Association
of Counties. By contrast, officials identified cocaine as the major problem
in only 19 percent of the counties and marijuana as the major problem in 17
percent of the counties surveyed.

Eighty-seven percent of the counties surveyed found an increase in the
number of meth-related arrests starting three years ago. The Upper Midwest,
Northwest and Southwest report the biggest change, though the rate of
increase has slowed somewhat over the past year.

The meth spread, in turn, carries a long shadow with it. Officials in 70
percent of the counties surveyed blamed meth for an increase in the number
of local robberies and burglaries, and many counties similarly report having
to remove more children from meth-tainted families.

"That's something," Ruzzamenti said, "that we've been dealing with for some
time in California."

Federally funded and locally staffed, for the most part, the Central Valley
HIDTA coordinates anti-meth efforts in a nine-county region from Sacramento
in the north to Kern in the south. When it was established six years ago,
Ruzzamenti said, federal estimates were that 50 percent to 60 percent of the
nations illegal meth production came from California.

Now, Ruzzamenti said, federal officials estimate that 50 to 60 percent of
the meth used in the United States comes from labs in Mexico.

Thats been a pretty dramatic shift, Ruzzamenti said.

Most of the Valleys illegal labs once could be found within five miles of
State Route 99, Ruzzamenti said. Now, though he noted that meth-lab dump
sites are still showing up in Stanislaus and Merced counties, among other
places, the regions labs have shifted to far more remote locations.

Illustratively, Ruzzamenti recalled receiving a recent phone call from a New
Jersey law enforcement official. New Jersey authorities had recently seized
a significant meth lab - a find, Ruzzamenti said, that came out of the blue
for the region.

With the growth of this drug from the rural areas of the Western and
Northwestern regions of this country and its slow but continuing spread to
the East, local law enforcement officials see it as their number one drug
problem, the survey concludes.

The surveys other findings include:

- - In 24 counties surveyed, officials report that between 75 and 100 percent
of all arrests are related to methamphetamine.

- - Only 16 percent of counties surveyed report hosting a meth rehabilitation
program.

- - Sixty-two percent of the counties report an increase in domestic violence
cases related to meth, and 53 percent report an increase in simple assault
cases linked to the drug.

Local law enforcement officials acknowledge that for every lab they close
down, 10 new ones are created, the survey notes.

Meths nationwide spread has already become abundantly apparent to lawmakers,
roughly 100 of whom now count themselves as members of the House Meth
Caucus. The proliferation is spurring wider support for a bill authored by
Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein, which would limit access to cold medicines
containing an ingredient used in meth production.

The bill, co-authored with Republican Sen. Jim Talent of Missouri, would
move behind the counter cold medicines containing psuedoephedrine. The bill
would also limit the quantity of such medicines that an individual could
purchase monthly. The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to consider
the bill next week.

Fresno Democrat Jim Costa has co-sponsored similar legislation in the House,
and Mariposa Republican George Radanovich supports it as well.
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