The number of inmates in Iowa prisons is down, due in part to a drop in the number of prison terms and fewer offenders returning for parole or probation violations, corrections officials said.

As of June 31, which marked the end of Iowa's 2008 fiscal year, the state prisons housed 8,740 inmates.

That's down 66 inmates from the year before and marks only the third annual decline in 12 years, said Department of Corrections Director John Baldwin.

The 1,800 new commitments to Iowa prisons were down 162 placements from the previous year and was the lowest total since fiscal 1997. Baldwin called it a "significant" decline.

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On Thursday, top U.S. drug interdiction officials said U.S. authorities seized a record 316 metric tons of cocaine last year. In making the announcement, the officials credited Mexico's increasing cooperation with helping force drug traffickers to raise their prices and try new smuggling methods.

John Walters, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, said the record seizures have led to a 21 percent jump in the price of cocaine and a drop in the purity of the drug. The price of methamphetamine has jumped even more, he said, thanks to a crackdown on U.S. labs and Mexican authorities doing more to stop importation of precursor material.

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Sean Bucci got busted in 2003 for trafficking marijuana.

A former high school classmate, a confidential informant working for the federal government, led authorities to Bucci's door.

So Bucci decided to get even. He created a Web site called whosarat.com before he went to prison for 12 1/2 years. He featured his "snitch" as "Rat of the Week."

The federal court system took notice. His Web site launched a debate about how much access the public should have to plea agreements -- documents that can reveal who is cooperating with the federal government.

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Normally, people aren't paid to get high, but University of Iowa scientists are coughing up some coin to stoners willing to help them gain insight into the effects of marijuana.

Users won't get enough dough to live on -- maybe a month's rent -- but they'll cash in enough to cure a mean case of the munchies.

"The hypothesis is that people that use it at an early age have a greater effect, and the longer a person uses it the greater the effect," said Robert Block, an associate professor in the UI Department of Anesthesia and the lead investigator on the project.

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The war on drugs is prejudiced against minorities, a group of Drake University students and professors concluded Wednesday.

"America's war on drugs has really turned into American's war on nonwhite youth," said Eric Johnson, an education professor at Drake.

Johnson, three other Drake professors and a representative of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition formed the panel Wednesday evening on the Drake campus at a discussion hosted by Drake Students for Sensible Drug Policy.

The group of about 50 students who attended tried to brainstorm a better drug policy, one that doesn't unfairly affect minorities and college-bound students, they said.

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Rifles, shotguns, pounds of drugs and loads of cash lined a table in the garage of the University of Iowa Department of Public Safety headquarters Monday morning.

However, local police warned Congressman Dave Loebsack, D-Iowa, that without federal funding, those dangerous guns and weapons and the people carrying them will remain on the streets.

Loebsack hosted a roundtable meeting with members of the Iowa City and Coralville Police, Johnson County Sheriff's Office and the UI Department of Public Safety to discuss how funding cuts to the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grants could affect them.

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'We Don't Always Boast,' Says Pd Boss

The most common question area law enforcement officials hear from the public about drugs is: Why aren't you doing anything?

In a Friday presentation, representatives of the Fort Dodge Police Department, the Webster County Sheriff's Department and the Iowa State Patrol responded. They emphasized what has been a recent push to crack down on drugs - especially methamphetamine.

"Law enforcement is taking a big hit on not doing enough on drug enforcement," said acting Fort Dodge Police Chief Doug Utley.

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When two University of Iowa football players were arrested on drug charges in Iowa City early Saturday morning, one of them was charged with a drug tax stamp violation.

It's a law Iowa has had since 1990, requiring a tax on something that's already illegal -- possessing certain amounts of controlled substances.

"The whole purpose of the statute was to give police another tool in their arsenal to prosecute drug traffickers," Assistant Linn County Attorney Jerry Vander Sanden said.

Someone caught with enough of the drug but not the stamp to show the tax is paid may be charged with a crime that carries a fine, plus the standard possession of a controlled substance or possession with intent to deliver.

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Loebsack Wants To Restore Millions Cut From Drug Enforcement Budget

OTTUMWA -- When he started making drug arrests 20 years ago, Ottumwa Police Lt. Tom McAndrew said a $300 meth arrest was a big deal. These days, it's hard to get overworked federal prosecutors to take a $25,000 meth bust seriously.

But meth dealers are being taken off the streets. Manufacturing labs have been reduced. And imported drugs are being confiscated. Locally that's because of a sufficiently funded drug task force, McAndrew told his congressional representative Saturday.

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Coralville, Ia. - Iowa is on the verge of a $256 million prison construction boom, and Nicholas Viola is one of the statistics behind the growth trend.

Viola, 19, of Des Moines, arrived at the Oakdale state prison here in December after receiving a five-year sentence for second-degree theft. The young man acknowledged he has a methamphetamine problem.

"I'm sad, but I've got to do what I've got to do. I had my fair chances," said Viola, whose girlfriend back home is pregnant with his second child.

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Iowa has a choice: Undertake its biggest prison-building spree in history, or look for alternatives that reduce the need for more prisons.

That choice must be made soon. The Legislature is considering a recommendation from Gov. Chet Culver to build a new state penitentiary and a new women's prison at a cost of $200 million. A legislative committee proposed that, plus a $25 million expansion of the prison at Newton. State corrections officials say the Men's Reformatory in Anamosa is next in line for replacement. And, if the steady growth in prison population continues as projected, the state could face building as many as three more prisons in the next decade.

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Thanks for publishing Greg Francisco's outstanding letter "Legalize, Regulate, and Tax." (See River Cities' Reader Issue 667, January 16-22, 2008.)

It seems to me that in order to properly evaluate our nation's drug policies, we need to compare and contrast our drug policies with those of another nation with substantially different drug policies. I suggest that we use the Czech Republic for our comparison.

In the Czech Republic, citizens can legally use, possess, grow, or purchase small quantities of marijuana.

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A drug-interdiction program devastated by funding cuts could be saved by a group of U.S. senators from both sides of the aisle who announced plans on Wednesday to tack on money to the federal omnibus spending bill.

U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, an Iowa Democrat, along with four other senators, announced plans to replace money cut from the federal Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant program as part of an emergency supplemental funding bill.

They would return $660 million to the program, which was cut to $170 million in December by the Bush administration.

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WATERLOO --- Local police say the federal government has continued to shrink funding that's the backbone for drug trafficking battles.

Now the president has included even more cuts for the Byrne Justice Assistance Grant Program in his recent budget, said Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa.

The Senate approved $660 million for the program but was forced to reduce the funding due to the threat of a presidential veto, Harkin said Friday during a conference in Waterloo with law enforcement representatives.

Current proposals place the Byrne program at only $170 million. This means Iowa agencies, which currently get $4.2 million, would only see $1.5 million.

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Making a dent in meth is the aim of the Southeast Iowa Inter-Agency Drug Task Force. The drug task force has done its job well. The number of meth labs in the area is way down.

Because of that, drug task force officers had more time to pursue bigger culprits -- large drug importers, and that led recently to busts that included a $1.3 million forfeiture.

It's a double win. The illegal drugs are off the streets, and the task force gets part of the money.

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DES MOINES (AP) --- Possible cuts in federal funds could hit drug enforcement programs in Iowa.

The U.S. Department of Justice funds drug control programs at local law enforcement agencies through the Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant program. A proposal calls for cutting 70 percent of the $4.22 million that came to Iowa this year.

The grants make up a large portion of the Iowa Office of Drug Control Policy's budget, and officials say less money means investigations into narcotic suppliers and dealers would be stalled.

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Proposed cuts in a key federal drug-enforcement program threaten efforts in Iowa just as the state has shown progress in the fight against methamphetamine, officials say.

The U.S. Justice Department, which filters money to local law enforcement through the Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant program, could cut 70 percent from the $4.22 million that came to Iowa this year.

Iowa politicians say they will fight the cuts, but all sides agree that the proposed cuts reflect a shift in national priorities toward the war on terrorism.

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Bravo to op-ed author Garry Reed. (See "Do You Speak Thuggery or Freedom?", River Cities' Reader Issue 666, January 9-15, 2008.) Propaganda is propaganda, regardless whether it is used to prop up a totalitarian regime or a totalitarian policy.

Call it a "war on drugs." Tell us it's all about the children. Convince us you're really just doing it for our own good - to protect us from ourselves. Dress failure after failure up as unmitigated success.

Say whatever you want. The war on drugs is still prohibition. And prohibition still does not work.

Legalize, regulate, and tax drugs, so that we can finally control drugs.

Greg Francisco

Member, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition

Paw Paw, Michigan

[end]

DEA Tramples Canada's Sovereignty By Demanding Pot Seller Be Tried In U.S.

Attention, concerned citizens of the United States of America: It is now safe to unlock your doors and let your children back out onto the streets to play hopscotch and jump rope. Yes, the long and terrible reign of the Prince of Pot is over. No longer will this menacing merchant of the devil's weed terrorize and addict our innocent youth to his mind-destroying plants.

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John P. Walters just can't seem to contain himself. Give the career powercrat a job with the imperial appellation of "Drug Czar" and he just instinctively grasps for more.

Last summer, for example, the Top Drug Thug made headlines by declaring that simple, nonviolent marijuana gardeners are dangerous terrorists.

While you puzzle over that oxymoronic disconnect, consider this further quote from the Redding Record Searchlight: "Marijuana gardens are a terrorist threat to the public's health and safety, as well as to the environment."

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