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.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom