Pubdate: Tue, 21 Oct 2008 Source: Peace Arch News (CN BC) Copyright: 2008 Peace Arch News Contact: http://www.peacearchnews.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1333 Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/af.htm (Asset Forfeiture) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?241 (Methamphetamine - Canada) WEEDING OUT GROW-OPS It's time to consider grow-ops and meth labs a public safety issue and get away from relying on a "failed" court system, Surrey fire chief Len Garis told a Langley City forum last week. "B.C. bud is potentially a $12 billion industry. If we take away organized crime's ability to earn money, we win," Garis said Thursday to the more than 100 realtors, politicians, bylaw and police officers who attended the half-day forum put on by the Fraser Valley Real Estate Board at the Cascades Convention Centre. "We are turning the tide, but as the drug industry adapts to our strategies, we must find new tools," said Garis. "If we sit back, the whole thing will re-energize itself." Grow-op busters Since the Surrey fire department began its public safety inspections, which use BC Hydro consumption records to root out homes using high amounts of electricity, it has seen more than a 50 per cent drop in grow-ops, he said. It was a problem the Surrey RCMP had a hard time tackling, hampered by the need for judge-approved warrants and other restrictions. Because of what the justice system requires of police, processing of each criminal case has gone up by two-thirds, says Dr. Darryl Plecas, RCMP research chair of the University of the Fraser Valley. "It used to take (police) nine steps to process a marijuana grow operation. Today, it takes 64," said Plecas, one of six experts to speak at the forum. "It used to take one hour to process an impaired driver. It now takes five hours. If we want to help efficiency, we must demand efficiency in the courts. They are not accountable and this tragedy has gone on too long." A general consensus at the forum was prevention and deterrence will have to come from avenues other than the courts. Since getting the Ministry of Children and Families involved with seizing children living within grow homes, the number of kids in these residences has plummeted, Garis said. "We started with one in four grow-ops having kids (present), then one in 15. Now, in 2008, it's one in 50," he said. Despite lawsuits filed against Surrey fire department's inspection team, Garis will continue inspecting and shutting down power to homes suspected of illegal drug operations, he said. Langley Township has disbanded its inspection team, pending the outcome of a Supreme Court challenge against it. "We're not giving up," Garis said. Plecas said that while organized crime is behind these illegal drug houses, those who run the operations will be punished. "It's the rinky-dink wannabes that are doing these grow-ops, and they are going to go to jail," predicted Plecas. Protecting home buyers At the forum, realtors called for action to protect home buyers from purchasing former grow-ops and meth labs. Two years ago, the FVREB put together a committee to look into the challenges around houses ruined by illegal drug activity. There is no proper way for a potential home buyers, realtors or property managers to obtain a house's history, the committee found out. Realtors want to standardize how illegal drug houses are documented with each municipality while also making that information easily accessible. Hitting them where it hurts Langley City Mayor Peter Fassbender said the City just fined a woman $10,000 under its drug/premises bylaw, after police found a large meth lab in a garage of a house on 56 Avenue. In that case, the female owner allowed her son to rent out the house. He rented it out in a month by month cash basis to a meth cook. "The cost to the community was in excess of $100,000. Neighbours had to be evacuated. There were costs for policing, fire, Hazmat. The woman asked for leniency because she didn't know her son was doing this but it's unacceptable danger to the community," said Fassbender. Most communities in the Fraser Valley have established a bylaw that allows each municipality to recoup emergency costs incurred to clean up a grow-op or meth lab. "In Surrey, we have a lot of out of country landlords who just don't care (about who rents). So we fine them," said Surrey Coun. Barbara Steele. Fassbender wants the focus on civil forfeiture of homes to hit organized crime in the pocket book. He told the crowd it is a waste of time to try and go after organized crime through the "stupid" court system. Chilliwack Mayor Clint Hames suggested RCMP should create a new integrated team dealing solely with forfeitures of crime. "We spend 12 per cent of our policing budget on integrated police teams, like homicide and dogs. This should be another team. A detachment as small as ours could never handle that sort of thing," he said. While privacy issues are "the enemy" to most of these initiatives, points out Plecas, there are ways to accomplish lofty goals like this. Garis said part of the privacy issue is taking the fear from government stakeholders. He pointed to BC Hydro believing it wasn't able to provide customer records because that breached privacy laws. But once BC Hydro was educated that the information was in the interest of protecting public safety, the records were handed over. Landlord horror stories The Residential Tenancy Act has hampered landlords so much that one tenant won the right to keep a suite from being rented to anyone else while he or she was in jail, said one realtor at the forum. A realtor from Vancouver said he found a grow-op in his tenant's suite and attempted to evict the tenants. He ended up having to give the damage deposit back and provide moving costs because the renters weren't convicted of a crime. A possible way around these nightmares is establishing a rental contract stating that illegal activity is cause for eviction. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom