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EVALUATING THE SYNTHETIC DRUG CONTROL

STRATEGY

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIMINAL JUSTICE,

DRUG POLICY, AND HUMAN RESOURCES

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON

GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

JUNE 16, 2006

Serial No. 109–216

Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/index.html

http://www.house.gov/reform

(II)

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM

TOM DAVIS, Virginia, Chairman

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut

DAN BURTON, Indiana

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

GIL GUTKNECHT, Minnesota

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

CHRIS CANNON, Utah

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee

CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio

DARRELL E. ISSA, California

JON C. PORTER, Nevada

KENNY MARCHANT, Texas

LYNN A. WESTMORELAND, Georgia

PATRICK T. MCHENRY, North Carolina

CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania

VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina

JEAN SCHMIDT, Ohio

——— ———

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

TOM LANTOS, California

MAJOR R. OWENS, New York

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

DIANE E. WATSON, California

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts

CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland

LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California

C.A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of

Columbia

———

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

(Independent)

DAVID MARIN, Staff Director

LAWRENCE HALLORAN, Deputy Staff Director

TERESA AUSTIN, Chief Clerk

PHIL BARNETT, Minority Chief of Staff/Chief Counsel

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIMINAL JUSTICE, DRUG POLICY, AND HUMAN RESOURCES

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana, Chairman

PATRICK T. MCHENRY, North Carolina

DAN BURTON, Indiana

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

GIL GUTKNECHT, Minnesota

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

CHRIS CANNON, Utah

CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan

VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina

JEAN SCHMIDT, Ohio

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

DIANE E. WATSON, California

LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California

C.A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland

MAJOR R. OWENS, New York

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of

Columbia

EX OFFICIO

TOM DAVIS, Virginia HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

J. MARC WHEAT, Staff Director

DENNIS KILCOYNE, Counsel

MALIA HOLST, Clerk

TONY HAYWOOD, Minority Counsel

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on June 16, 2006 ............................................................................... 1

Statement of:

Burns, Scott, Deputy Director for State and Local Affairs, Office of National Drug Control Policy; Uttam Dhillon, Director, Office of CounterNarcotics Enforcement, Department of Homeland Security; Joseph

Rannazzissi, Deputy Assistant Administrator, Office of Diversion Control, Drug Enforcement Administration; and Dr. Don Young, Acting

Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, Department of Health

and Human Services ..................................................................................... 18

Burns, Scott ............................................................................................... 18

Dhillon, Uttam ........................................................................................... 27

Rannazzissi, Joseph .................................................................................. 32

Young, Dr. Don .......................................................................................... 47

Coleman, Eric, Oakland County commissioner, National Association of

Counties; Lewis E. Gallant, executive director, National Association

of State Alcohol and Drug Abuse Directors; Sherry Green, executive

director, National Alliance for Model State Drug Laws; Sue Thau,

public policy consultant, Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America;

and Ron Brooks, president, National Narcotics Officers’ Associations’

Coalition, director, Northern California HIDTA ........................................ 65

Brooks, Ron ................................................................................................ 168

Coleman, Eric ............................................................................................ 65

Gallant, Lewis E. ....................................................................................... 79

Green, Sherry ............................................................................................ 116

Thau, Sue ................................................................................................... 144

Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:

Brooks, Ron, president, National Narcotics Officers’ Associations’ Coalition, director, Northern California HIDTA, prepared statement of .......... 170

Burns, Scott, Deputy Director for State and Local Affairs, Office of National Drug Control Policy, prepared statement of .................................... 21

Coleman, Eric, Oakland County commissioner, National Association of

Counties, prepared statement of .................................................................. 67

Cummings, Hon. Elijah E., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Maryland, prepared statement of ............................................................ 10

Dhillon, Uttam, Director, Office of Counter-Narcotics Enforcement, Department of Homeland Security, prepared statement of ........................... 29

Gallant, Lewis E., executive director, National Association of State Alcohol and Drug Abuse Directors, prepared statement of .............................. 81

Green, Sherry, executive director, National Alliance for Model State Drug

Laws, prepared statement of ....................................................................... 118

Rannazzissi, Joseph, Deputy Assistant Administrator, Office of Diversion

Control, Drug Enforcement Administration, prepared statement of ........ 34

Souder, Hon. Mark E., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Indiana, prepared statement of ............................................................... 4

Thau, Sue, public policy consultant, Community Anti-Drug Coalitions

of America, prepared statement of .............................................................. 146

Young, Dr. Don, Acting Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation,

Department of Health and Human Services .............................................. 49

(1)

EVALUATING THE SYNTHETIC DRUG

CONTROL STRATEGY

FRIDAY, JUNE 16, 2006

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIMINAL JUSTICE, DRUG POLICY,

AND HUMAN RESOURCES,

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM,

Washington, DC.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 9:05 a.m., in room

2247, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Mark E. Souder (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.

Present: Representatives Souder, Cummings, Watson, and Norton.

Staff present: J. Marc Wheat, staff director and chief counsel;

Dennis Kolcoyne, counsel; Malia Holst, clerk; Tony Haywood, minority counsel; and Jean Gosa, minority assistant clerk.

Mr. SOUDER. The subcommittee will come to order. Good morning, and I thank you all for coming. We have been looking forward

for some time now to the release of the synthetic drug control strategy which was finally unveiled on June 1st. Today we will hear

from several witnesses as to the strengths and weaknesses of this

plan.

With the near universal recognition that methamphetamine addiction has become an epidemic, it is imperative that the Federal

Government provide the best possible leadership and vision on this

pressing social and law enforcement problem. State and local governments, as well as many private agencies devoted to helping families and communities cope with this scourge have long complained

that, no matter how diligent non-Federal actors have been or could

be, nothing can fill the void of national direction. Only Federal

leadership will suffice, and many have awaited the new strategy

with guarded-only optimism.

There seem to be ample reason for concern as to the administration’s commitment to amass strategy. We can hardly forget a key

presentation at the HHS-sponsored conference in Utah last August

19th, which said, ‘‘We don’t need a war on methamphetamine.’’ Nor

can we forget, as the New York Times reported on December 15th,

that FDA was working behind the scenes to block the Combat

Meth Act.

This strategy sets three primary goals: One, a 15 percent reduction in methamphetamine abuse; two, a 15 percent reduction in

prescription drug abuse; and three, a 25 percent reduction in domestic methamphetamine laboratories.

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The strategy itself concedes that the first two goals may be met

without much change in the Federal response given that recent

trends already may be moving in that direction. The third goal is

likely to be achieved due to tough restrictions on precursor chemicals set out first by most of the States and now by Congress to the

Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act enacted this spring with

virtually no support, and even some opposition from the administration.

With the national standard for precursor chemical control soon

to be in full effect through the Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act, hopes are high for significant declines in domestic meth

production, but meth will remain readily available, unless international diversion of precursor chemicals can be stopped. This is

borne out by the increased smuggling of meth across the southwest

border, as Mexican drug traffickers move to exploit the decline in

domestic meth production.

Accordingly, the strategy begins with this international aspect,

laying out three prongs. One, attaining better information about

international trade in pseudoephedrine; two, swift and effective implementation of the Combat Meth Act; and, three, continued law

enforcement and border activities and continued partnership with

Mexico.

Regarding the first prong, the administration has been taking

some positive steps and recognizes that the problem cannot be

tackled until its international nature and scope is fully understood.

The challenge begins with this hopeful fact: The main precursor

chemical pseudoephedrine, PSE, is produced in a handful of countries, chiefly in China, India, and Germany. If exportation of PSE

can be tracked and controlled from its sources, we could go a long

way in choking off the essential ingredient needed by criminal organizations now profiting by producing meth chiefly in Mexico and

distributing it throughout this country. Fortunately, the administration has been making diplomatic efforts through the U.N. Commission on Narcotic Drugs to persuade some reluctant governments

that the meth epidemic is global, and that they should get with the

program.

Though the implementation of the Combat Meth Act is the second prong of the international meth strategy, the strategy restates

provisions of the law while not always describing how ONDCP will

ensure that implementation will be carried out by responsible

agencies.

The third prong of the international segment of the strategy, that

of law enforcement at the border and partnership with Mexico,

summarizes current bilateral law enforcement efforts within Mexico. Efforts to train Mexican law enforcement and significantly upgrade its quality are extensive. Mexico has also moved aggressively

to curtail illegal diversion of meth precursors, and in some respects, it is ahead of the United States in this area.

Although the strategy states that its intent is to strengthen border protection, it disturbingly fails to elaborate on this at all and

is completely silent on what will be done in this area. In fact, the

strategy makes no mention of the Department of Homeland Security, which contains multiple agencies tasked with border security

and counterdrug activities.

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This is almost shocking, considering that it now seems universally accepted within the administration that approximately 80

percent of the meth being consumed in this country is coming from

Mexico. Stopping meth smuggling from Mexico is clearly imperative, and yet the strategy fails to explain why border protection is

adequate or just how such protection will be strengthened.

The domestic aspect of the strategy leans heavily on the requirement of working closely with State and local officials. The strategy

acknowledges that the overwhelming majority of drug arrests and

prosecutions, over 90 percent, are conducted by State and local authorities. Nonetheless, we have been told by people we trust that

there wasn’t much consultation or dialog with State and local officials in crafting this strategy. And while it touts the efforts of State

and local authorities, the administration seeks to drastically cut

the Federal programs which have been essential to State and local

law enforcement.

For example, the administration wants Congress to eliminate the

Byrne Justice Assistance Grants Program, JAG. In 2004, one third

of all the meth labs seized were taken down by JAG-funded State

and local drug task forces. The strategy fails to explain how the

State and local authorities can be expected to keep up this pace of

lab seizures if the administration succeeds in gutting the very programs that make it possible. Why would you hold a press conference about a strategy based on programs you are proposing to

eliminate?

The administration has asserted that prevention is one of the

three pillars of its anti-drug efforts. Yet, declining funding in this

area, only at 11.7 percent of the drug control budget, casts doubt

on this claim. And the strategy is thin on prevention, with only a

brief reference to research under way at the National Institute on

Drug Abuse, NIDA, and almost as brief a discussion of the National Youth Antidrug Media Campaign. The discussion ends by

noting the importance of voluntarily airing the ads by local radio

and TV stations, yet it says nothing about how such voluntary airing will be encouraged.

One of the most appalling aspects of meth is its grisly aftermath.

This includes children who are poisoned due to chemical saturation

in homes where meth is produced as well as cleanup of lab sites.

And there are stories in the annals of the meth epidemic of law enforcement personnel or firemen wounded or killed by lab site explosions or inhalation of chemical fumes.

While much of what is in this brief section is not considered a

part of the strategy per se, the administration should be praised for

its commitment to the drug endangered children, the DEC program. While DEC training has occurred in 28 States, the strategy

asserts that ONDCP will work to achieve DEC training in all 50

States by 2008, with no further details offered. Hopefully, this excellent program will find more aggressive advocates on the Federal

level.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Mark E. Souder follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. We have a good mix of witnesses with us today.

Our first panel consists of the Honorable Scott Burns, Deputy Director for State and Local Affairs of the Office of National Drug

Control Policy; the Honorable Tom Dhillon, Director of CounterNarcotics Enforcement from the Department of Homeland Security;

Joseph Rannazzissi, Deputy Assistant Administrator of DEA’s Office of Diversion Control; and, finally, of Dr. Don Young, Acting Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation at the Department

of Health and Human Services.

Our second panel will give us State and local perspective. We

have Mr. Ron Brooks, president of the National Narcotics Officers’

Associations’ Coalition; the Honorable Eric Coleman of the Oakland

County Board of Commissioners in Michigan, representing the National Association of Counties; Dr. Lewis Gallant, executive director

of the National Association of State Alcohol and Drug Abuse Directors; Ms. Sherry Green, the executive director of the National Alliance for Model State Drug Laws; and finally, we have Ms. Sue

Thau, public policy consultant for the Community Antidrug Coalitions of America.

Again, we thank you all for coming from so many places across

the country to be here today. We look very much forward to your

testimony. I would like to yield to our ranking member, Mr.

Cummings.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Good morning, Mr. Chairman. Good morning, everyone. I want to thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this very

important hearing today to evaluate the administration’s recently

announced synthetic drug control strategy.

Growing abuse of methamphetamine, other legal synthetic drugs

like ecstasy and a variety of pharmaceutical drugs defines a major

recent trend in drug abuse. The recent enactment of the Combat

Meth Act and the administration’s release of a synthetic drug control strategy earlier this month underscore the seriousness of the

problem. Meth, in particular, has captured the attention of lawmakers and the media with the devastating impact it is having on

entire communities in many areas of our country.

A powerfully addictive synthetic stimulant that has been around

for more than 30 years, meth, until relatively recently, was concentrated in western States, including California, Arizona, and

Utah. The recent eastward expansion of meth production, trafficking, and abuse has led to the drug suddenly becoming recognized

as one of the primary drug threats facing our Nation today. Indeed,

not since the introduction of crack cocaine into the streets of major

cities like my city of Baltimore, New York, and Chicago, have we

seen such an outcry for an aggressive antidrug response by the

government at all levels.

A July 2005 report by the National Association of Counties, the

Meth Epidemic in America, identifies meth as the No. 1 illegal

drug threat facing most of the 500 counties that participated in a

survey of local law enforcement agencies. Moreover, the drug’s destructive impact on families has contributed to a significant increase in child welfare roles in hundreds of counties across the Nation according to the same report.

Meth is relatively unique in that it can be manufactured by laypeople using ingredients purchased in the U.S. retail stores and

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recipes available on the Internet. This has enabled most of the production of U.S. consumed methamphetamine to occur domestically

both in so-called super labs that produce large amounts of high purity meth, and in clandestined labs that are small enough to be operated in homes, apartments, hotel rooms, rented storage space,

and trucks. The environmental damage caused by meth production

can be severe, and the cost of cleaning up the toxic wastes from

these sites is immense. Because the ingredients are extremely volatile in combination, labs also pose a grave risk of harm both to the

so-called meth cooks who make the drug and to the individuals living in close proximity to the activity. Many labs are discovered only

after an explosion has occurred. Law enforcement officers tasked

with finding or dismantling labs are forced to share the risk.

All too often, the collateral victims of meth abuse are the young

children of addicts and cooks. These children live with the constant

risk of harm from explosions, exposure to toxic chemicals, and extreme familial neglect. As the National Association of Counties report and countless news reports have described, these conditions

have led to a large number of children being taken from the custodial control of their parents and placed in foster care.

Sadly, the health and behavior effects that result from prenatal

exposure to meth and from severe family neglect or abuse make the

children of meth addicted parents especially challenging for foster

families to care for and difficult to place. Absent effective treatment

for the parents of displaced children, re-uniting families torn apart

by meth may be almost impossible.

Meth abuse has not yet become a major problem in the communities of Baltimore City, in Baltimore and Howard Counties where

I represent. But the rapid spread of meth production, trafficking,

and abuse in the United States underscores the fact that America’s

drug problem affects all parts of this Nation, rural, suburban, and

urban alike, and that no community is immune to the introduction

of a dangerous new drug threat. Drugs, unlike people, do not discriminate on the basis of color, class, or geography.

States have been at the forefront of efforts to develop effective

policies and strategies to combat the growth of meth abuse, production, and trafficking in the United States. States including Oklahoma have successfully used restrictions on retail sale of cold products containing meth precursor chemicals to drive down the volume

of meth production in clandestined labs. Federal legislative efforts

to address the meth epidemic, including the Combat Meth Act enacted earlier this year, similarly have focused largely on limiting

over-the-counter access to products containing precursor chemicals

as well as on limiting the illegitimate importation and exportation

of meth precursor chemicals across the international borders.

The administration’s new synthetic drug control strategy emphasizes these objectives, and I believe Congress and the administration should continue to pursue them. At the same time, Mr. Chairman, I believe it is difficult to overestimate the importance of education, prevention, and in particular, drug treatment as we attempt

to stifle this growing epidemic.

Despite some popular notions to the contrary, research from the

Center for Substance Abuse Treatment shows that meth addiction

can be effectively treated, and that the benefits of treating meth

9

addiction are similar to the benefits derived from treating addiction

to other drugs; use of the drug is sharply reduced, criminal activity

and recidivism declined, employment status and housing status improve, and overall health improves. Ensuring that people who have

become dependent upon meth have access to effective treatment is

therefore essential to stopping this problem that is creeping across

our country.

Unfortunately, it bears noting that the 53-page strategy announced by the administration devotes just 31⁄2 pages to prevention

and treatment combined. Indeed, several important programs that

contribute to reducing demand for meth and other synthetic drugs

are not even mentioned in the strategy, which is incredible. In the

case of Safe and Drug Free Schools State grants, for example, this

is no doubt because the problem has been targeted for elimination

in the President’s budget.

This leads to the broader concern that this strategy, even as it

purports to be comprehensive, appears to reflect the same flawed

balance of priorities embodied in the overall Federal drug control

budget proposed by the President. Over the past 6 years, we have

seen prevention and treatment dollars decrease from 47 percent to

merely 35 percent of the Federal drug budget. Even programs that

support Mexican drug enforcement at the State and local levels

have been targeted for elimination or deep cuts, as funding for supply reduction efforts beyond our borders expands without solid justification. The High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas Program,

COPS meth grants, and the Byrne Justice Assistance grants, all

critical programs, would be eroded or eliminated.

Given these facts, I think one of the central questions raised by

today’s hearing is this: Does the strategy genuinely reflect an ambitious forward-thinking effort to devise the most comprehensive and

effective synthetic drug strategy our Federal drug policy efforts can

muster? Or does it instead represent mere lumping together in one

document of preexisting ideas, initiatives, and priorities inside a

new glossy cover?

To help us answer these and other questions, we are fortunate

to have appearing before us today representatives of several Federal agencies tasked with formulating and implementing various

aspects of the synthetic drug strategy, as well as a number of outside organizations that contribute greatly to the Nation’s antidrug

efforts through their dedication and expertise. I look forward to

hearing the testimony of all our witnesses concerning the content

of the strategy, the manner in which it was formulated, and their

perspectives on whether and to what extent the strategy adequately describes the best possible formula for beating back the

growing threats of illegal synthetic drugs and prescription drug

abuse.

Mr. Chairman, I thank you for your relentless attention to this

issue, and I also thank each of our witnesses for appearing here

today. With that, I yield back.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Elijah E. Cummings follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Ms. Watson.

Ms. WATSON. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you for holding this

hearing that is critical to the understanding of the administration’s

heavily anticipated synthetic drug control strategy.

Eliminating drug smuggling and distribution throughout the

United States is vital in keeping our communities safe. There have

been several programs unveiled by the public and nonprofit sectors

throughout the United States. These programs are going to be the

next new innovation in helping us eradicate our drug problem.

Some have been good and some have been not so good. None of

them have been the ultimate problem solver. The new strategy set

forth by the Office of the National Drug Control Policy is very ambitious but not impossible if funding and resources are at a sufficient level.

The three goals set forth in this strategy are excellent. If we

could accomplish what the plan sets out, including 15 percent reduction in prescriptive drug abuse, 25 percent reduction in methamphetamine labs, and 15 percent reduction of methamphetamine

use, it would be of great benefit to our people and our streets.

While they are great goals, the question of how they are going to

be met with the administration’s funding cut proposals need to be

addressed. Can these goals be accomplished when the administration wants a $23.6 million cut in the Justice Department’s community-oriented policing services meth hot spots program? Can these

goals be met when the administration wants to eliminate the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance grant program?

My family personally has been affected by meth use. My niece at

the end of May passed due to the abuse of this killer drug. It affected her vital organs, she had a hole in her heart, from age 19

to age 22. We suffered along with her. The treatment programs we

enrolled her in did absolutely nothing. Every method that we as a

family and friends used to try and help her did not work. Prevention could have saved her. We lived in an upscale community in

Sacramento, she lived with me, and we were right there. Did not

notice until too late. Tried to save her and failed. So a focus on prevention so users would not have to face treatment is essential.

The administration states that prevention is an essential component of its three pillars of antidrug efforts. The decline of funding

in this area has cast major doubts on their claim. If the administration is serious about creating a solution to this problem, fund

each mandate sufficiently.

And so I want to thank the panelists for your willingness to come

and testify before this subcommittee so we can understand how

this new drug control strategy will be implemented in the midst of

major cuts in funding. I don’t want to see anyone suffer as my

niece and her loved ones did.

We must realize that drug use is international in scope, and for

every one life that is lost to drugs, many are affected. So, Mr.

Chairman, thank you so very much for this hearing today.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you. And thank you for your continued aggressive and active interest in this committee. It has truly been a

bipartisan effort as we move through this and other drugs, and we

are looking forward to our hearing on treatment as well that is

coming up in just a few weeks.

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First, I would like to ask unanimous consent that all Members

have 5 legislative days to submit written statements and questions

for the hearing record, and that any answers to written questions

provided by the witnesses also be included in record. Without objection, it is so ordered. I also ask unanimous consent that all exhibits, documents, and other materials referred to by Members and

the witnesses may be included in the hearing record, and that all

Members be permitted to revise and extend their remarks. Without

objection, it is so ordered.

Our first panel is composed of the Honorable Scott Burns, Deputy Director for State and Local Affairs at the Office of National

Drug Control Policy; the Honorable Tom Dhillon, Director of the

Office of Counter Narcotics Enforcement, Department of Homeland

Security; Mr. Joseph Rannazzissi, Deputy Assistant Administrator

of the Office of Diversion Control of DEA, Drug Enforcement Administration; and Dr. Don Young, Acting Assistant Director or Secretary for Planning and Evaluation for the Department of Health

and Human Services.

As an oversight committee, it is a standard practice to ask witnesses to testify under oath. If you will raise your right hands, I

will administer the oath to you.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. SOUDER. Let the record show that all the witnesses have answered in the affirmative.

Mr. Burns, thank you for joining us. You are now recognized for

5 minutes.

STATEMENTS OF SCOTT BURNS, DEPUTY DIRECTOR FOR

STATE AND LOCAL AFFAIRS, OFFICE OF NATIONAL DRUG

CONTROL POLICY; UTTAM DHILLON, DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF

COUNTER-NARCOTICS ENFORCEMENT, DEPARTMENT OF

HOMELAND SECURITY; JOSEPH RANNAZZISSI, DEPUTY ASSISTANT ADMINISTRATOR, OFFICE OF DIVERSION CONTROL, DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION; AND DR.

DON YOUNG, ACTING ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR PLANNING AND EVALUATION, DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND

HUMAN SERVICES

STATEMENT OF SCOTT BURNS

Mr. BURNS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member

Cummings, Congresswoman Watson, thank you for the opportunity

to appear before you today to discuss the administration’s synthetic

drug control strategy. I want to thank the subcommittee for its

strong bipartisan commitment to reducing the illicit use of all

drugs.

The Synthetic Drug Control Strategy was released on June 1st,

and represents a firm commitment by the administration to work

toward ambitious and concrete reductions in the illicit use of methamphetamine and prescription drugs as well as in the number of

domestic methamphetamine laboratories.

Specifically, the strategy aims to reduce methamphetamine use

by 15 percent over 3 years, illicit prescription drug use by 15 percent over 3 years, and domestic methamphetamine laboratory seizures by 25 percent over 3 years. In these respects, it is similar to

19

the administration’s National Drug Control Strategy in that it is

both ambitious and achievable.

The synthetic strategy also recognizes that supply and demand

are the ultimate drivers in an illicit drug market, and that a balanced approach incorporating prevention, treatment, and market

disruption initiatives is the best way to reduce the supply of and

the demand for illicit drugs.

The most urgent priority of the Federal Government toward reducing the supply of methamphetamine in the United States will

be to tighten the international market for chemical precursors,

such as pseudoephedrine and ephedrine, as you know, used to

produce this drug. Toward this end, the Office of National Drug

Control Policy Director John Walters has met with Ambassadors

from China, India, and the European Union. The administration

worked with allies in the international community to draft, promote, and adopt a resolution on synthetic drug precursors, particularly methamphetamine precursors, at the annual meeting of the

United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs.

Other important parts of the synthetic strategy are swift and effective implementation of the Combat Meth Act and our continued

partnership with Mexico. Domestically, the synthetic strategy recognizes the critical role that State and local law enforcement as

well as treatment and prevention professionals play in addressing

the methamphetamine threat. And, in fact, I would be remiss if I

did not recognize the role that State and local policy and law enforcement officials have played in addressing, in particular, the

problem of methamphetamine production in the United States.

The synthetic strategy contains a 10-part plan to enhance the

Federal partnership with State and local agencies related to methamphetamine, focusing on initiatives such as helping drug endangered children programs expand nationwide, holding four regional

and one national methamphetamine conference, and better sharing

of data and assisting States in developing their own regional drug

control strategies related to synthetic drugs.

The synthetic strategy also addresses prescription drug abuse.

The administration’s ambitious goal of reducing prescription drug

abuse by 15 percent by the end of 2008 must balance two general

policy concerns: First, to be aggressive in reducing overall user

abuse; and, second, to avoid overreaching and avoid making lawful

acquisition of medications unduly cumbersome. The seriousness of

this problem cannot be overstated as prescription drug abuse has

risen to become the second most serious drug problem when measured in terms of prevalence, with past year abusers numbering approximately 6 million.

The administration will continue to target doctor shopping and

other prescription fraud as well as illegal on-line pharmacies, continue to thwart thefts and burglaries from homes and pharmacies,

focus on strategies to combat stereotypical drug dealing, and to investigate and prosecute those in the medical profession to be distinguished from the vast majority that prescribe appropriately, who

are engaged in illegal overprescribing for profit.

Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Cummings, Congresswoman

Watson, I would like to personally thank you and members of the

subcommittee and the members of the House and Senate meth cauVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:22 Mar 30, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00023 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\33394.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
20

cuses for your individual and combined efforts in addressing these

issues. I look forward to working with you and members of this

subcommittee as the strategy is implemented, and conferring along

the road as we strive together to meet the goals we have set forth

on behalf of the American people. Thank you. And I look forward

to any questions the subcommittee may have.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Burns follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Dhillon.

STATEMENT OF UTTAM DHILLON

Mr. DHILLON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member

Cummings, and Representative Watson. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today to testify on behalf of the Department of Homeland Security in support of the administration’s National Synthetic Drug Control Strategy. And I look forward to

working with this subcommittee in our common fight against the

illicit use of methamphetamine and other synthetic drugs.

As the Director of Office of Counter Narcotics Enforcement, it is

my responsibility to coordinate counternarcotics policy within the

Department of Homeland Security and between the Department

and other Federal departments and agencies.

I understand that methamphetamine abuse is a serious issue facing our Nation. According to a recent report by the National Association of Counties, 58 percent of counties surveyed said that methamphetamine was their largest drug problem, followed by cocaine,

marijuana, and heroin.

Increasingly, the methamphetamine that supplies the U.S. drug

market is produced internationally, and the Department of Homeland Security is committed to stopping the flow of methamphetamine and its precursors into our country. The administration’s

Synthetic Drug Control Strategy, like the National Drug Control

Strategy, postulates a balanced approach by incorporating prevention, treatment, and market disruption initiatives as the best

courses of action to reduce the supply of, and demand for, illicit

drugs.

The Department of Homeland Security is in a unique position to

focus on market disruption through the strategic goals outlined in

the Department’s Secure Border Initiative [SBI]. The Department

of Homeland Security’s Secure Border Initiative is a comprehensive

approach to border control and enforcement through the integration of technology, infrastructure, communications, and command

and control designed to disrupt and dismantle criminal organizations by preventing and deterring cross-border crime including but

not limited to illicit drugs. SBI will provide a comprehensive multiyear plan for more agents to patrol our borders, secure our ports

of entry, and enforce immigration laws as well as providing a comprehensive and systemic upgrading of the upgrading used in controlling the border, including increased manned aerial assets, expanded use of unmanned aerial vehicles, and next generation detection technology.

Through SBI, the Department of Homeland Security has developed a Border Enforcement Security Task Force [BEST], and now

has a practical vehicle to directly partner with State and local law

enforcement officials to combat drug trafficking and border violence. BEST is charged with sharing information, developing priority targets, and executing coordinated law enforcement operations

to enhance border security. By establishing a new connectivity between the Department’s intelligence community and law enforcement, BEST provides a focused response to intelligence driven

identified targets such as criminal organizations that violate the

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border, and will improve the Department’s overall effectiveness

against the full range of criminal activity along the border.

The Department of Homeland Security fully embraces its counternarcotics mission, and will do its part to ensure the success of

the Synthetic Drug Control Strategy by working cooperatively with

our Federal, State, and local law enforcement partners tasked with

combating the flow of illicit drugs into the United States.

Thank you. And I look forward to answering your questions.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you very much.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Dhillon follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Rannazzissi.

STATEMENT OF JOSEPH RANNAZZISSI

Mr. RANNAZZISSI. Good morning, Chairman Souder, Ranking

Member Cummings, Congresswoman Watson. On behalf of Administrator Karen P. Tandy, thank you for the opportunity to testify

before you today regarding the Synthetic Drug Control Strategy.

This strategy is a companion document to the President’s National

Drug Control Strategy.

The unique nature of synthetic drugs warrants a targeted response. DEA’s efforts to address the synthetic drug problem have

been ongoing for decades. The strategy provides DEA and contributing agencies a framework to continue our ongoing efforts and to

chart new milestones to achieve domestic and international

progress against methamphetamine and other synthetic drugs.

DEA worked with DOJ and ONDCP to implement a comprehensive innovative strategy to reduce availability of synthetic drugs

and strengthen the international and domestic law enforcement

mechanisms. The strategy focuses principally on methamphetamine

and pharmaceutical control substances and incorporates many ongoing DEA programs that target these substances.

Methamphetamine is a unique synthetic drug. Its production requires no specialized skills, training, and its various recipes are

readily available. Its precursor chemicals have historically been

able to obtain and inexpensive to purchase.

The diversion of controlled pharmaceutical substances also continues to be a significant threat. Controlled pharmaceutical substances are diverted through several means, including illegal prescribing, theft, robbery, prescription forgery, doctor shopping, and,

of course, the Internet.

The manufacture and use of methamphetamine is not a problem

confined to the United States but has become prevalent in many

regions of the world. The DEA through our law enforcement partnerships across the country and around the world has initiated successful investigations that have disrupted and dismantled significant methamphetamine trafficking organizations, particularly

those targeting the United States. We have also taken an active

role in fighting diversion of ephedrine and pseudoephedrine

through both enforcement operations and international agreements. These initiatives resulted in substantial reduction in the

amount of precursor chemicals entering the United States, but we

have more to do internationally.

DEA has a key role toward achieving the administration’s goals

set forth in this strategy. Chief among our tasks would be the full

implementation and enforcement of the Combat Methamphetamine

Epidemic Act of 2005. Other domestic initiatives will include a national listing on the DEA Web site of the addresses of properties

in which methamphetamine labs or chemical dump sites have been

found. In addition, construction for a new clandestine lab training

facility at the DEA academy will begin in the fall of 2006.

A key element of the strategy for combating methamphetamine

is international cooperation, particularly in the area of precursor

chemical control. Already, DEA and DOJ have facilitated and

played a leadership role in several recent meetings of the interVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:22 Mar 30, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00036 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\33394.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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national community. These meetings, such as the May 2006 National Methamphetamine Chemical Initiative Strategy Conference

where the Attorney General announced several new anti-methamphetamine initiatives, have helped increase awareness around

the world and resulted in agreements to monitor and track key precursor chemicals. Several nations, most notably Mexico, also have

taken independent steps to control methamphetamine precursors.

Internet diversion of pharmaceutical controlled substances is especially difficult to investigate and overcome. Internet-based drug

traffickers often mask their activities as those of legitimate on-line

pharmacies. DEA’s approach to pharmaceutical controlled substance abuse problems strives to balance two general policy concerns: Reducing the prescription drug abuse while not making the

lawful acquisition of prescription drugs unduly cumbersome.

DEA is joined by the interagency community and responsible private sector entities in its effort to prevent pharmaceutical controlled drug abuse and diversion by collaborating with Internet

service providers and companies, credit card and financial service

companies, express mail carriers to target Internet-based drug traffickers, DEA is at the cutting edge of on-line drug investigations.

Although recent DEA operations are indicative of our ability to

target the largest and most dangerous organizations, additional

tools are needed. More can be done to eliminate Web sites that

have telltale signs of their illicit nature, and steps can be taken to

ensure that the legitimate doctor-patient relationship includes a

face-to-face consultation.

DEA is fully committed in its role to meet the ambitious goals

set forth in the Synthetic Drug Control Strategy.

Chairman Souder, Ranking Member Cummings, and Congresswoman Watson, I thank you again for the opportunity to testify,

and will be happy to address any questions you may have. Thank

you.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you very much.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Rannazzissi follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Dr. Young.

STATEMENT OF DR. DON YOUNG

Dr. YOUNG. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, members of the subcommittee. I appreciate the opportunity to discuss the efforts of the

Department of Health and Human Services in support of the administration’s Synthetic Drug Control Strategy focused on methamphetamine and prescription drug abuse.

I am pleased to be here to talk about the HHS contribution to

the administration’s coordinated strategy for combating the problems of methamphetamine abuse. The synthetic strategy was released June 1st this year, although HHS has been working with its

Federal partners to develop the national synthetic drug’s action

plan since October 2004.

The synthetic’s strategy sets a goal of reducing methamphetamine abuse over 3 years, a 15 percent reduction in the abuse or

nonmedical use of prescription drugs over 3 years, and a 25 percent

reduction in domestic methamphetamine laboratory seizures over 3

years. Much of the synthetic strategy is devoted to methamphetamine abuse. Methamphetamine is associated with serious health

conditions, including memory loss, aggression, psychotic behavior,

and potential heart and brain damage.

HHS is engaged on these issues through a number of its agencies. HHS brings a wide array of resources to this issue. The HHS

fiscal year 2007 budget provides $41.6 million for HHS methamphetamine targeted treatment and prevention research and a

dedicated $25 million for methamphetamine treatment services

within the access to recovery program. The access to recovery program is a voucher-based program intended to expand consumer

choice and access to effective substance abuse treatment and recovery support services. The Substance Abuse and Mental Health

Services Administration and the Administration for Children and

Families work together to provide training, technical assistance, information, and resources to local, State, and tribal agencies to improve systems and practice for families with substance abuse use

disorders who are involved in the child welfare and family judicial

systems.

One of the key components of meth is a commonly used pharmaceutical product, pseudoephedrine. Pharmaceutical products containing pseudoephedrine, either alone or in combination with other

drugs, are used extensively by the general public to treat the symptoms of upper respiratory tract infections and allergic rhinitis.

In carrying out our strategy to end methamphetamine abuse, we

must balance the legitimate health needs of consumers to access to

medicines against the urgent needs of law enforcement to confront

a serious drug problem. We believe that the U.S.A. Patriot Act recently enacted and signed into law achieves this balance. It restricts the OTC sales of pseudoephedrine, ephedrine, and phenylpropanolamine, but also enables individuals to buy sufficient quantities for legitimate medical use. By working together in a coordinated effective way, we can be successful in achieving the goals set

out by the synthetic’s strategy. By drawing on the resources my

colleagues and I are discussing with you today, we can be successVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:22 Mar 30, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00051 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\33394.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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ful. Thank you for your time. And I would be pleased to respond

to any questions.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Young follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. I thank each of you for your testimony. And the

button on the microphones are counter-intuitive. If it is up, it is on;

if it is down, it is not.

Let me make a couple of additional comments with my frustration. That, Mr. Burns, I hope ONDCP understood a very subtle

message that Congress gave this week. And this hearing today is

going to focus mostly on meth, most likely. You will see this committee increasingly move as we hopefully start to turn some corner

on meth, at least get an aggressive strategy in every agency more

toward over-the-counter drugs which clearly is a steady and increasing problem in the United States. We have had multiple hearings on OxyContin over the years, but we focused on meth in this

cycle because at the local level, that is what we are hearing constantly. The idea to battle meth didn’t start in Congress, even

though this committee held its first hearings probably 7 years ago

on this. It is being something that is demanded at the grassroots

level. All you have to do is turn on your TV set in any market in

almost every single State now, but certainly in about 40 States, it

is still coming in to the east coast, and that will be the major story,

and that demand came on the politicians.

I have been a strong supporter of the National Ad Campaign.

Last, there has been a concern that the National Ad Campaign has

been dropping in its funding by the director and by others. I said

that if the National Ad Campaign started to address some of it, I

have not opposed the marijuana initiative, but some of it focused

on meth, we could sustain the support in Congress. We brought a

resolution to the floor last year and it was increased by $30 million

over the President’s request if it was used on meth. That was ignored. This week, the Appropriations Committee reduced it yet further to where the National Ad Campaign is at risk. And as you full

well know, in the Senate, they have not been as enthusiastic with

the ad campaign as the House. It got reduced to $100 million. The

administration came over and asked multiple Members of Congress

to introduce it. They talked to our leadership. Not a single Member

of Congress was willing to go to the floor to defend the position of

the National Ad Campaign. Not one single Member of either party

because of the lack of responsiveness of this administration on

meth. And if that message doesn’t permeate, there will be no National Ad Campaign. That is just, that is not a threat, it is a promise. That there has to be more responsiveness and an understanding of what is happening.

Second, this is the second year in a row where you have come

in proposing to zero out what is the primary funding of our drug

task forces around the United States on meth. You work with State

and local law enforcement, and you know the intensity of this. On

the HIDTA question, this year it wasn’t a zeroing out of the

HIDTA. I have asked repeatedly, what don’t you like about

HIDTAs? Which one? And the only answer I have gotten steadily

is: The proliferation of HIDTAs has occurred in the United States

denigrating the original mission of the HIDTAs, which was high intensity. Well, what is the proliferation of the HIDTAs? Where are

those proliferations? Well, that would be the Missouri HIDTA,

which is a meth HIDTA; that would be in Iowa, which is a meth

HIDTA; that would be the Rocky Mountain HIDTA, which is a

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meth HIDTA; that would be the Dallas HIDTA, which is focused

more and more on meth. In other words, the administration’s proposal indirectly, though it has never said directly, it has said to

proliferation, all of the new HIDTAs were meth HIDTAs.

So that to come forward with the strategy at the same time while

you are proposing to gut many of the things that are in it, we just

don’t see this reconciliation.

Now, let me be honest. We were looking for a few more specific

things than today in your testimony what you chose to highlight

was the endangered children program, which is a great program

and should be expanded, and conferences. We have meth conferences going through our ears in the United States. Any person

who is in the field who can’t go to a meth conference has—I don’t

know where they have been. There are conferences all over the

place. What we need are specifics. Quite frankly, the DEA presentation today—and DEA’s been the only agency that has been very

aggressive on this, as opposed to somewhat aggressive on this—had

more details than the plan, which is astounding.

Here we wait and wait and wait, and we get a plan, and the testimony that comes forward from one of the agencies is more detailed with specifics and somehow to address how we are going to

deal with this on the Internet.

We all know we are going to control the mom and pop labs, no

thanks to the Federal Government. The State governments are already doing it, and now we are going to finish the rest of the States

by October 1st. We are going to reduce the mom and pop labs. You

are going to reach your reduction figures, which are—they are

going to be done because of what other people already did. Not necessarily on synthetic drugs overall. Over-the-counter is going to be

tougher. But the mom-and-pop labs are going to reach that. But it

is going to move to the Internet. There were a number of things

in DEA testimony to try to address that.

Now, let me ask Mr. Dhillon, and I am not holding you accountable, because you are new in the post. And we are glad to have you

there, and we have worked together on the Homeland Security

Committee, of which I am a senior member. Why would the Department of Homeland Security not have been more mentioned

or—how do you see this integrated? For example, I am making

some suggestion to you and I would like to hear some of your comments back.

DEA, Mr. Rannazzissi made some comments about how they are

looking at this. Clearly, one of the things, since you are both in

charge at Homeland Security of ICE, you are in charge of Coast

Guard, and you are in charge of CBP, three of the major agencies

with this; DEA would be a fourth that at the Federal level provides

actual ground troops. Is there an awareness in the agency? Do you

see an awareness of the agency to look at the data that you are

picking up? For example, you are going to have the data of whether

meth from Mexico is coming across from Laredo or the west. Are

you going to look at that data and work directly with DEA or the

intelligence agencies? Is ICE going to connect up with DEA? How

do you propose to do that? Is Coast Guard going to do that? Are

you going to look at—because as we shut down the mom-and-mop

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labs, both the Internet and the border are going to become the

places where crystal meth is coming in behind.

We see that in Oregon already, we see it in Oklahoma. The

States that did the pseudoephedrine control laws have already seen

the switch to crystal meth. It is coming your way. It is coming

through all of your zone. Are you going to try to separate out the

data here? Are you going to work with it? Are you going to work

with particular strategies? Are your agents? I am less concerned

about a national conference than basically making sure that CBP

and ICE understand that the meth pressure is going to come at

yours, and you are watching for that and the patterns.

Mr. DHILLON. Chairman Souder, I believe that it is my responsibility as the Director of the Office Counter-Narcotics Enforcement

to obtain that information, that data that you are talking about,

and to ensure that the counter-narcotics-related components within

the Department have that data and are appropriately focused on

the meth threat.

As you have pointed out, and I think as everyone has acknowledged, methamphetamine is now largely moving across the borders,

which makes it a Department of Homeland Security issue and, as

far as I am concerned, a Department of Homeland Security priority

in the counter-narcotics realm.

So the answer to your question is, yes, we will be looking at the

data and we will be ensuring that the counter-narcotics-related

components that you have mentioned have that data, and will be

emphasizing the importance of including methamphetamine interdiction in the overall counter-narcotics strategy.

Mr. SOUDER. Dr. Young, one of my concerns, and I have talked

to Director Curry about this as well, is that methamphetamine—

one of the pattern differences is it tends to be, less so for crystal

meth, but where it has been so far in the mom-and-pop labs, tends

to be in the most rural areas of America, that where the drug

treatment programs are, in fact, the least sophisticated.

Much of the type of approaches that HHS recommends are fairly

complicated. And when Director Curry came into my district, the

only group that was implementing it was in Fort Wayne where

they have only had basically three or four cases of meth. One of

the outlying mid-sized cities had been at a conference where that

subject was discussed, and the rural area that was hardest hit with

meth had the least, the most underpaid, the just out of school

trainee who hadn’t even heard of the concept.

Is there an understanding in HHS of these two variables? One

is, is that this, the one type of phenomena tends to be a rural phenomena often coming out of where there are national forest areas

or more rural places because of the smell of labs, they hide out

there.

And then the second, as the crystal meth comes in, you have a

different type of pressure, and that may become a more urban pressure although some of the rural areas may pick it up. Is there that

type of sophistication and analysis internally?

And then, second, the strategy suggested that there was a difference of opinion suggesting that meth treatment does work,

which there are a lot of conflicting opinions on how and how well.

But what are you doing to overcome that and to target it? Are you

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saying that the same treatment programs work for meth that work

elsewhere? Are they particular treatment programs with variations? And could you address some of those type of questions?

Dr. YOUNG. I did not. I would imagine that Mr. Curry gave you

a response to that as well.

The whole problem of health care delivery and substance abuse

treatment as a subset of health care delivery in rural areas is an

extremely difficult one. It is one both of resources, as you point out,

and how to get resources in adequate amounts, but it is also manpower and skilled people, which you pointed out. You can attempt

to deal with some of that through other kind of social programs,

transportation support, but that has limited value as well.

So I think, yes, there is a realization about that in the Department. That realization goes far beyond simply methamphetamines

to other drugs but to other health care services in rural areas, very

different set of problems than in the inner city, although the inner

city has problems as well. They are just a very different kind. So,

yes, I think we are aware of it.

On the issue of treatment, it is very clear treatment does work.

Treatment is very difficult. It is very difficult for any substance

abuse problem, and that includes methamphetamines. But when

one looks at treatment one also has to look at treatment in the context of the individual, the family, their life-style, where they live.

If you treat an individual and they go back to the environment that

they were living in prior to treatment, their chance of recidivism

is much greater. This has to be an integrated approach.

As I mentioned in my testimony, the problem that ACF is dealing with and families, this is a family problem, an individual problem, a medical problem, a social problem. It has to all be approached together. It cannot be approached from a single facet.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

Mr. Cummings.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I want to pick up where we left off there. One

of the things about meth is that it has a very traumatic direct effect upon families and particularly children. Can you tell me about

any new programs coming up that will help these children?

Let me tell you where I am going. I have lived long enough and

seen enough in Baltimore to now see generational cycles of drug

use. As a lawyer prior to coming to Congress, I had an opportunity

to represent the children and sometimes the grandchildren of people that I represented when I first came to practice with regard to

drug crime. So you see these generational cycles. So I am wondering what are we doing to try to stop—and any of you who have

anything else to add, I am curious—to stop the generational cycles

of this continuing to go on.

Dr. YOUNG. Your question is direct to the prevention side or to

the treatment side or both?

Mr. CUMMINGS. You can talk about—I am talking about when

these kids are found in these houses, these labs, there are a lot of

issues; foster care problems arise. As we have traveled across the

country, so many local officials have said that we have been overburdened with regard to kid issues.

I am just wondering—you can talk about it any kind of way you

want. I am trying to figure out—we have a major agency here that

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deals with health; and I am just wondering exactly what you all

are doing about it, if anything.

Dr. YOUNG. There are various parts of the Department, but in

the issue of the children it would be the Agency for Children and

Families that are involved. Part of what we are doing is making

sure we are coordinating across the new research, the research

which is showing more treatment patterns and what works best

with the service delivery. So one is the integration and the coordination and the sharing of information from those people who are

doing research on what works, whether it is prevention or treatment, and those that are running the programs. Much of that is

done with grants or it can be done through the access to recovery

program.

There will be different approaches taken in different communities. There is no one single one way to do it or one single program to do it. So there is discretion given to the communities in

how they carry out the individual prevention or treatment programs and education. But under all circumstances, though, we do

everything we can to bring the newest state of the knowledge to

those folks.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Burns, I want to go to the Synthetic Drug

Control Strategy.

Dr. Young, by the way, I will get back to you. I think I want a

little bit more information. Perhaps you can do it in writing, but

I was not satisfied with your answer. But let’s go on. We have a

limited amount of time.

Can you explain to me, Mr. Burns, exactly—and I know we are

going to be talking later at another hearing about treatment, but

help me understand how only three and a half pages of the Synthetic Drug Control Strategy was devoted to prevention and treatment. What happened?

Mr. BURNS. Well, Mr. Cummings, the strategy is balanced. There

are no monumental breakthroughs with respect to treatment protocol.

I think one of the things that we all agree upon now, you mentioned in your opening statement that people suffering from the

disease of addiction to methamphetamines can be treated. There

are successes every day across the country. The intent of the strategy was not to equal the pages so that 11 pages were for treatment

and prevention, 11 for supply reduction. It was a strategy that is

comprehensive with respect to what we are facing today.

And in that respect let me say this——

Mr. CUMMINGS. Since we have all this balance here, why don’t

you just specifically tell me what the prevention and treatment

strategies are? Go ahead. I am listening.

You said—I said three and a half pages. You said, well, those

three and a half pages out of 80 something is balanced. Fine. Tell

me what they are. What do we have new here?

The people who are looking at this right now who are sitting in

their rural homes and the mayors and city council people are trying to figure out, to have some hope that they can deal with a problem that is devastating their communities, and I have one of the

top drug people in the Nation, just a wonderful expert, and they

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are looking to hear from your lips. They want to get past the three

and a half pages. So let’s talk about the balance. Talk to me.

Mr. BURNS. The response would be a $12.7 billion request from

this President and this administration, which is $80 million more

than Congress enacted last year. So that is a start.

The second thing I would say——

Mr. SOUDER. On meth?

Mr. BURNS. Overall Federal drug control budget. We have to

start somewhere. We have to start with the premise that the commitment from this administration against illicit drug use in this

country is larger than it has ever been. With respect to treatment,

some $4.5 billion requested by the President in 2007.

Let me address the question about mayors and people sitting in

cities. This administration and the Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy for 2 years now has sent me and other

deputies and a large amount of staff to 25 plus major cities in this

country, including Baltimore, including Sacramento, including Indianapolis; and we have sat down with mayors and chiefs of staffs

and police chiefs and treatment and prevention folks. We have

talked about, do you have community coalitions? Do you have drug

courts? What is happening with Byrne grant money? Is there a balance in your particular city?

For the first time, we have had a national discussion about how

Federal, State and local moneys are applied against a threat in a

particular city.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Let’s put a pin right in that. When you meet

with all these wonderful elected officials and community people, do

they tell you that the HIDTA and COPS grants should be reduced,

the elimination of the Byrne grants? I mean, did they tell you that?

Mr. BURNS. I didn’t hear that.

Mr. CUMMINGS. You didn’t hear that.

Mr. BURNS. They did not tell us that they were in favor of reducing Byrne grants or HIDTA.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Did you ask them how they felt about it? These

are the people who are the front line. These are the people that we

have to face. These are the people who are suffering and trying to

keep their communities together.

And I applaud you. I really do. I think it is wonderful that you

went to the 25 areas. I think that is great. The question is, it is

not the visit. It is what is happening during the visit and what

kind of interaction there is.

Because, as the chairman has said, there are people who are crying out, and they are asking us to do something, and we are trying

to get things done. We want to use the taxpayers’ dollars effectively

and efficiently.

You are telling me you are doing these wonderful tours, but I am

wondering, No. 1, are you presenting to them—saying to them this

is what we are proposing to do and this is why we think it is going

to work. Then I want to know what they are saying back to you,

and I can guess the reason why you are not hearing this is because

a lot of them are very much opposed to this stuff.

Mr. BURNS. Let me tell you one thing that they are all

saying——

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Mr. CUMMINGS. Let me ask you one more question. Then I want

to hear your answer. It is one thing for us to—for all of us to sit

in nice offices and whatever and feel real good about what we are

doing, read nice reports and put them on the shelf or whatever. It

is another thing for that person who is out there dealing with this

every day.

Some of the testimony that we heard, as a matter of fact in Congressman Souder’s district, if I remember correctly, it was just so

alarming and the struggles these people are having. I just want to

know, how do we take your efforts out there, going out and doing

your tour, and combine them and bring back something to your

agency and the President so that we can be presented with something that is more reflective of what we are hearing, so that we can

do for folks who are on the front line. I am not talking about somebody in an ivory tower. I am talking about somebody who is dealing with this every day. Help me with that.

Mr. BURNS. You are looking at the face of the administration of

a person that deals with this every day. I don’t sit in a nice office.

I just spent the last few days in Chicago meeting with people from

all over the country dealing with fentanyl. I’ve been to the chairman’s district twice. We talked about drug-endangered children.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Then why are we——

Mr. BURNS. Let me just finish. I met with his prosecutor and the

treatment officials, and we came up with a strategy for that particular part of the country. And I do it every day from California

to Maine, Congressman—that is what the Office of National Drug

Control Policy does—to bring forth a balanced strategy of prevention, treatment and law enforcement.

We may disagree on the numbers, we may disagree on the outcomes, but I can tell you in a lot of cities what they say is, thank

God, there has been a 19.1 percent reduction in drug use among

our young people. Thank God that methamphetamine use, as measured by the tool that we have used for a long time, shows a 30 percent plus reduction in methamphetamines among 8th, 10th and

12th graders.

Is there more work to do? Absolutely.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Did they say thank you for trying to cut our

HIDTA program and to cut our COPS program? Did they say

thank you for that, too?

Mr. BURNS. I think I answered that.

Mr. CUMMINGS. The answer is, no, is that right?

Mr. BURNS. That’s correct.

Mr. SOUDER. My frustration—and I’m sorry Mr. Burns—I want

to say Scott, but Mr. Burns, officially—I really appreciate that you

came to my district. When you say we came up with a strategy,

that is not the way local law enforcement would view what would

happen in my district. They were already working on it. They don’t

view that ONDCP or that the meetings we held, which were good,

came up with a strategy for meth. That was a slight overexaggeration of the meetings that we held.

And, second, when Mr. Cummings asked you what you were proposing to do on meth treatment, you didn’t say anything. You had

no answer. You filibustered for a while, but you had no answer.

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I think a better representation of what ONDCP’s position has

been—not necessarily yours personally—was to say we don’t like to

do strategies on specific drugs which you had in the official testimony and because of that, it is very hard to answer.

In a couple of weeks, we will be holding a hearing in Montana.

I venture to say that I will be able to ask every single witness a

question like Mr. Cummings just said, what are you doing on treatment, and they will give a specific answer. There a businessman

went in to Montana who wasn’t from Montana. We’re trying to figure out what impact it’s had and all those type of questions.

But bottom line is they’re going to give specifics. They’re going

to say, we put money in an ad campaign, we did this on treatment,

we’re doing this in the schools, we’re having kids do pledges, this

is our meth strategy. That is what we are looking for here, not

some compilation of what Congress has passed and what State and

locals are going to do, which, by the way, the administration proposed to cut, and that is part of our frustration.

Mr. BURNS. Can I respond to that briefly? Because you brought

up the National Youth Media Campaign a couple of times.

Director Walters launched methamphetamine ads. As you know,

they are targeted toward 23 major markets in this country. I think

that the dialog that you and other members of this subcommittee

had with Director Walters has been positive, and those ads are

going forward today.

Mr. SOUDER. What was the total amount?

Mr. BURNS. The amount of the money? I do not know.

Mr. SOUDER. I think it is less than 5 percent.

I also know that Congressman Wolf designated that in an appropriations bill. It was not something that was necessarily voluntarily done, in that it was opposed when he designated it.

That is part of our frustration, that when Congress takes an action and then the administration does the minimalist strategy with

it and then claims like it is a big meth initiative, we are not very

impressed.

Mr. BURNS. Can I just say, as you know, Mr. Chairman, the National Youth Media Campaign is directed toward young people, 12

to 17 years old. Methamphetamine, the initiation age is 22. That’s

been part of the discussion that we have had with respect to how

the media campaign is focused and directed. Our intent is to prevent young people from ever starting. We know if we can get a kid

to 18 or 20 there is a 98 percent chance they will never be addicted

to any drug. That’s the policy and that’s the strategy.

Mr. SOUDER. Ms. Watson.

Ms. WATSON. From my own experience in Sacramento, I looked

for years for a program; and I think you just hit the real concern,

is that possibly there was something for teenagers but this niece

of mine died at age 22. I could not find a program that would take

her.

Dr. Young said that you cannot put them back into the same

community, to the same household where the problem existed. So

you want to have somewhere, maybe a transition, after they got

out of the hospital. And she was hospitalized almost every other

month. After she got out of the hospital, she had to come back

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home. The hospital would release her, put her in a taxi cab and put

her on her mother’s doorstep.

I would go from Washington, DC, to Sacramento. I represent Los

Angeles. I live in Los Angeles, but I was involved as often as I

could be.

What is missing out in the community are programs, halfway

houses, places where a person who has just been emancipated, 18

years old but still young, can go for treatment and care and being

taken out of the community. I want you to know in the Sacramento

area meth is readily available. They bring it to you. You do not

have to go to them. They bring it to you.

What I tried to do was to get her in a place. There were none.

I had to get her in something called Teen Challenge. She was to

go in on that Monday. She died Monday morning at 7:13 a.m. at

age 22. I could not even get the hospitals to understand what we

needed. They say, she’s been here and there is nothing else we can

do. Send her home. The last thing she said to me, 2 weeks before

she died, Aunt Diane, I need help. I couldn’t find the program.

Teen Challenge, they take them up to 24, thank God. So I thought

I could get her in there for 2 years at least. But there really aren’t

programs.

My question is, is there a way—and I have been reading through

your report, and I appreciate the statistics that I find in here. But

is there some way we can learn about programs in our local community that will take young people who have been emancipated, 18

and beyond?

We can go to the schools, and we can talk about it, but there

really are not any real effective programs of prevention in schools.

Because the health programs are the ones that are—usually have

very low attendance, and we cut down on the staff and the faculty

that would be providing the information. So what we need are community based kinds of walk-in programs if we are really going to

do the job, because I think all the literature shows that meth use

is done in the suburbs and the rural areas.

So I would like to see if you go to Sacramento, if you go to other

parts of the country and you’ve talked to the medical community,

law enforcement community, social services community, programs

that they provide that we can put people in who are in great need

but might not have the resources personally to deal with their

problem. That would be very, very helpful. Then I think we could

really feel the outreach.

I think it is out of control in the Sacramento area. I do not necessarily have that problem in my district. I have a crack cocaine

problem in the central Los Angeles district, but

methamphetamines, the use attacks the vital organs and will result in death. How can we stop it? What programs are available?

Can you get information?

You can start with me with the Sacramento area. At least I can

help somebody else in that area where I lived for 20 years, help

families and so on. So if you could provide that information, what

programs are available and what is the criteria for eligibility for

those programs and what are the age spans, that would be very

helpful to us. And I am sure in Baltimore it would be helpful and

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Chicago and other areas where the problem is increasing—not decreasing, increasing.

Mr. BURNS. Let me just say this, and part of the challenge that

we face nationally—if we have 19.1 million people using illegal

drugs, we know about 7 million meet the definition of clinical addiction and about 2 million are currently in treatment. Part of the

challenge we face nationally is getting the 5 million that are addicted to, No. 1, understand that they have a problem, because

they don’t think they do; and, No. 2, once that realization comes

about, whether it is a crash of an automobile or an arrest at a

nightclub when somebody is charged with a criminal offense, is

then getting them into treatment.

I am sorry for your loss, and I mean that sincerely.

Ms. WATSON. Let me just interrupt you, because I have another

committee I must go to, but we understand all of that. I am a

former school psychologist in my other life. I understand that.

Where can we go and get the kind of treatment—a person between

these ages 18 and, say, 35, where can we go? What is available?

Is there a directory? How do we access that information? How do

we make the connection?

I could have called and said to her mother, take her here. I got

to the social worker, and they looked all over the country, and

there was nothing, there was nothing.

So your going to Sacramento, I don’t know what it resulted in,

but I can tell you what—and this is just recently. She died May

29th. You see, there was nothing except Teen Challenge, and they

stretched it to let me get her in there.

Mr. BURNS. Well, I will provide for you the information with respect to treatment that is available in Sacramento area.

Ms. WATSON. That’s what I need.

Mr. BURNS. I just wanted to finish my point. One of the things

that we have funded and the national drug control policy is doing—

and I give this to you by way of example following my last point

of getting people into treatment—is funding what’s called a screening or brief intervention program. We have professionals in emergency rooms and in division of family services offices trying to identify those people that are suffering from addiction and then get

them into treatment. So there is a national effort to help those that

are undergoing this condition.

Ms. WATSON. Can you supply—and I know I have been very personal with this, but I am sure my colleagues have the same needs,

because in our offices walks every kind of issue imaginable. Is

there a directory that is being developed that will put it in categories where people can go, numbers to call?

Because I went to social services in the county, and I could not

find anything. So I went to a private organization, and that is

where I found Teen Challenge. So if you could supply—and you

might want to work on it nationally, wherever, you know, we have

programs under the control of your program and Department. If

you could supply it to all of us it would be a tremendous help. We

will do the leg work, don’t mind doing that, but we need to know

on the other end of that there are those resources.

Mr. BURNS. Thank you.

Ms. WATSON. Thank you.

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Mr. SOUDER. We are going to be voting shortly, but I wanted to

ask Dr. Young one question. We may have some additional written

questions from each of us as well.

But we had contacted FDA about what you were doing on

pseudoephedrine and precursor chemicals some time ago and then

received a letter back saying that was DEA that is in charge of

that. But in your testimony you stated that FDA was co-chair with

DEA. You said foreign pseudoephedrine co-chaired by FDA and

DOJ; online diversion co-chaired by FDA and DEA. When we contacted you, you said, oh, we’re not involved in this. This is DEA.

What are you doing in those areas?

Dr. YOUNG. I will have to get back to you with more information

for the record. So I will gather that together and get back to you

for the record.

Mr. SOUDER. OK, I would appreciate that. Because we have this

outstanding letter from a couple of months ago, and we just heard

back before the hearing that we don’t do that. But your testimony

says you do, and we would like that reconciled.

Dr. YOUNG. I will get back to you, sir.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you very much.

I want to thank each of you for what I know is hard work. I

know the Department of Homeland Security will be continuing to

track in your position as we see this become more and more of a

border issue and an issue related to how it is getting into the

United States. Your agency is going to be critical with that.

As we watch this move on line, I am sure a lot of the follow

through, it is going to move and methamphetamine is going to

start to behave like crack, marijuana, heroin and other types of

drugs as it moves into these underground networks, and we will be

working with you over time.

The treatment question is coming up in another hearing; and we

will continue to work with Director Curry as well as you, Dr.

Young. I look forward to your work.

Mr. Burns, continue to go out and talk with the State and locals.

We hope the administration will hear a little bit more of what they

are saying, particularly in the budget request.

With that, we will dismiss each of you. Thank you for coming.

Could the second panel come forward?

The second panel is the Honorable Eric Coleman, Oakland County commissioner in Michigan, a Detroit suburb, representing the

National Association of Counties; Dr. Lewis Gallant, executive director, National Association of State Alcohol and Drug Abuse Directors; Ms. Sherry Green, the executive director of the National Alliance for Model State Drug Laws; Ms. Sue Thau, public policy consultant for the Community Anti-Drug Coalition of America; and

Mr. Ron Brooks, president of the National Narcotics Officers’ Associations’ Coalition; director, Northern California Division HIDTA.

As an oversight committee, it is our standard practice to swear

in all witnesses.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. SOUDER. Let the record show that each of the witnesses responded in the affirmative.

We thank you for coming; and, Mr. Coleman, we will start with

you.

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STATEMENTS OF ERIC COLEMAN, OAKLAND COUNTY COMMISSIONER, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF COUNTIES; LEWIS E.

GALLANT, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION

OF STATE ALCOHOL AND DRUG ABUSE DIRECTORS; SHERRY

GREEN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NATIONAL ALLIANCE FOR

MODEL STATE DRUG LAWS; SUE THAU, PUBLIC POLICY CONSULTANT, COMMUNITY ANTI-DRUG COALITIONS OF AMERICA; AND RON BROOKS, PRESIDENT, NATIONAL NARCOTICS

OFFICERS’ ASSOCIATIONS’ COALITION, DIRECTOR, NORTHERN CALIFORNIA HIDTA

STATEMENT OF ERIC COLEMAN

Mr. COLEMAN. Thank you, Chairman Souder, for allowing me to

appear this morning on behalf of the National Association of Counties on this critical issue of methamphetamine abuse and the recent release of the Synthetic Drug Control Strategy.

My name is Eric Coleman, and I am a county commissioner from

Oakland County, MI. In addition, I am currently serving as first

vice president of the National Association of Counties. The National Association of Counties [NACo], is the only organization that

represents county government. With over 2,000 member counties

we represent 85 percent of the Nation’s population.

Abuse of a methamphetamine or meth is a growing issue for

counties across the Nation. It is consuming a greater share of county resources because of its devastating and addictive nature.

In response to the administration’s new Synthetic Drug Control

Strategy, I would like to make two key points.

First, NACo commends the administration for now recognizing

the dangerous threat posed by methamphetamines and developing

a synthetic drug strategy to deal with this threat. However, NACo

believes that the State and local government and law enforcement

should have been consulted during the development of this strategy.

Second, NACo hopes that this strategy will translate into future

budget requests for programs that are critical to fight methamphetamine abuse such as the Justice Assessment Grant program and

the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area program.

To illustrate the severity of the meth crises, NACo commissioned

four surveys on the impact to county governments. Very briefly, our

results have found that meth is the top drug threat facing county

sheriff departments, that meth is leading to the alarming number

of child out-of-home placements, that meth is the top drug seen at

emergency rooms, and that the need for meth treatment is growing. These statistics confirm that meth is a national crisis that requires national leadership and a comprehensive strategy to fight

this epidemic.

Consequently, we would like to commend the administration for

recognizing the challenges of the meth crisis and putting forth a

plan. However, a major weakness in this strategy is a lack of input

from State and local governments and law enforcement. We hope

that this disregard for State and local stakeholders can be remedied by the four inclusive meth summits that are planned for

2006.

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If we had been consulted, NACo would have told the administration that their timeline to address the environmental dangers of

meth production and use is unacceptable. The administration’s

plan to release voluntary clean-up standards in January 2011, is

far too late. NACo has been a champion of the House-passed Meth

Remediation Act and hopes that the Senate will pass the bill soon.

These guidelines are desperately needed to provide direction to

State and local governments and property owners on how to clean

up a former meth lab.

Additionally, the strategy fails to mention the Substance Abuse

Prevention and Treatment Block Grant, which amounts to about 40

percent of the total public funds spent on drug abuse prevention

and treatment. NACo urges Congress to increase funding for this

important program.

In contrast, NACo views administration’s commitment to tightened control on the distribution of bulk pseudoephedrine on the

international level as a positive. As a proponent to the Combat

Meth Epidemic Act, which you sponsored, Mr. Chairman, we applaud their players who fully implement the legislation. Also,

NACo supports the development and training of additional Drug

Endangered Children teams. These teams play a vital role in responding to the needs of children affected by meth.

For this strategy to be an effective tool, the administration must

commit additional resources to meth-related programs such as local

enforcement, treatment and prevention. Programs such as JAG and

HIDTA are critical to the local law enforcement’s ability to tackle

the meth crises. They have proven to be effective, and we urge Congress to reject the administration’s budget proposal on these programs. Without a change in future budget requests for meth-related programs, this strategy will be nothing more than a government

document sitting on a shelf.

In conclusion, I would like to thank you for the opportunity to

appear before you today on behalf of NACo. We will be conducting

further surveys on meth abuse and look forward to reporting our

findings and working with you in resolving the meth crisis in this

country. Thank you, and I will be happy to answer any questions

you might have.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Coleman follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Dr. Gallant, it is good to have you back.

STATEMENT OF LEWIS E. GALLANT

Mr. GALLANT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman Souder, Ranking Member Cummings, and Congresswoman Watson, I am Dr. Lewis Gallant, executive director of the

National Association of State Alcohol and Drug Abuse Directors

[NASADAD]. Thank you for your leadership and seeking input regarding the Synthetic Drug Control Strategy.

NASADAD members have the front-line responsibility of managing our Nation’s publicly funded substance abuse system.

NASADAD’s mission is to promote an effective and efficient substance abuse system.

The Association’s No. 1 message is this: People suffering from

methamphetamine addiction, just like those suffering from addiction to other substances of abuse, can recover and do recover. This

message of hope, grounded in science, proven through data and illustrated every day by countless Americans living in recovery

serves as a linchpin of our work.

Turning to the Synthetic Drug Control Strategy, the Association

agrees with the administration’s assessment that a comprehensive

approach is needed in order to achieve success and that the manifestation of the synthetic drug problem in one State may be very

different from that in another State. I offer to the committee five

core recommendations: First, coordinate and collaborate with single

State Authorities for Substance Abuse [SSAs]. The job of each SSA

is to plan, implement and evaluate a comprehensive system of care.

As a former State substance abuse director of Virginia, I know

firsthand the benefits of promoting interagency coordination. From

public safety to child care, transportation to employment, State addiction agencies need to be at the table when initiatives are developed and implemented.

Second, expand access to treatment and treatment infrastructure. The No. 1 priority for NASADAD is the Substance Abuse Prevention and Treatment Block Grant, the foundation of our treatment system and a program not mentioned in the Synthetic Drug

Control Strategy. Sample data from three States demonstrate the

following for block grant support service for methamphetamine addiction: In Colorado, 80 percent of the methamphetamine users

were abstinent at discharge in fiscal year 2003. A 2003 study found

that 71.2 percent of methamphetamine users were abstinent 6

months after treatment, and in Tennessee over 65 percent of methamphetamine users were abstinent 6 months after treatment.

NASADAD is aware of this committee’s interest in improved data

reporting. The Association is partnering with SAMHSA to make excellent progress in implementing the National Outcome Measures

[NOMs], initiative. NOMs is designed to improve our system by

emphasizing performance and accountability through data reporting on core sets of measures from all States, across all SAMHSA

grants, including the SAPT Block Grant.

Moving on to No. 3, enhanced prevention services and infrastructure. Once again, the SAPT Block Grant is vital, dedicating 20 percent of its funding, or $351 million, to support important prevention services that help keep our kids drug free.

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The Association strongly supports SAMHSA’s Strategic Prevention Framework State Incentive Grants. However, we remain concerned with the administration’s proposed cut of $11 million to the

framework and extremely concerned with the proposal to eliminate

altogether the Safe and Drug Free Schools State Grant Program.

No. 4, solid support for research is vital, especially at the National Institute on Drug Abuse, so that we may build on the Institute’s impressive portfolio.

No. 5, enhance tools to share knowledge and best practices. The

Addiction Technology Transfer Centers [ATTCs], and the Centers

for the Application of Prevention Technologies [CAPTs], are regional centers funded by SAMHSA that help train our work force

through distance learning and other mechanisms and share best

practices to help ensure that we are implementing effective programs backed by the latest science.

I have run out of time, but let me say that States across the

country are moving forward to implement cutting-edge initiatives.

We look forward to working with all stakeholders to continue the

momentum and improve our collective work on methamphetamine

and prescription drug abuse. I welcome any questions you might

have.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Gallant follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Ms. Green.

STATEMENT OF SHERRY GREEN

Ms. GREEN. Chairman Souder, Ranking Member Cummings,

Congresswoman Watson and staff, my name is Sherry Green, and

I want to thank you very much for this opportunity on behalf of

the National Alliance for Model State Drug Laws to testify regarding the recently released Synthetic Drug Control Strategy plan.

I also want to take a few moments to thank Members of Congress, particularly this committee, for your strong role in working

with State and locals on addressing synthetic drug issues.

As you may know, my organization works with States to

strengthen their drug and alcohol laws to create a more comprehensive, coordinated and efficient continuum of drug and alcohol services throughout the State. We work with State and local

professionals on over 40 different drug and alcohol issues. Over the

last 2 years, the overwhelming majority of requests that we have

received for legislative and policy assistance are unquestionably on

the issues of methamphetamine and prescription and drug addiction and diversion issues as well.

Based on our legislative and policy work I offer the following

comments on the strategy: We do appreciate the fact that the strategy actually recognizes the leadership role of States in enacting

measures to reduce and restrict over-the-counter purchases and

sales of pseudoephedrine products. Despite this recognition, however, I see no description of an ongoing mechanism to gather the

valuable input of these recognized leaders. So, apparently, under

this strategy, it is OK for State and local leaders to play a strong

leadership role when that means doing the hard work of creating

and implementing solutions to drug and alcohol problems, but it

does not mean that they should take a strong leadership role in developing a national strategy.

Moreover, these recognized State and local leaders had to accomplish their gains in over-the-counter restrictions without the benefit

of any comprehensive national and compiled data on methamphetamine, including the cost related to methamphetamines laboratories.

State and locals have repeatedly requested the need and expressed the need for a national mechanism which would collect

available methamphetamine information, organize it in a cogent

manner, indicate the policy implications of that particular information and disseminate the information to State legislatures and

other policymakers in a timely manner so they can use the information to make informed, educated decisions. Nothing in the strategy suggests a response to this need for comprehensive, coordinated data at a national level.

Despite our great disappointment over this obvious gap, we are

somewhat encouraged the strategy at least mentions treatment and

prevention. However, the strategy right up front admits there is a

common misperception about the fact that methamphetamine addiction can be treated. Based on our experience, the very people

who hold that misperception are State legislators and other policymakers who are charged with making funding, policy and proVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:22 Mar 30, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00120 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\33394.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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grammatic decisions. But I see nothing in the strategy that offers

proactive options for actually correcting this perception.

From our experience, the failure to actually aggressively address

this gap in knowledge leads to a further misperception that there

is no current understanding of what works in terms of treating

methamphetamine addiction. So we have found in our work certain

State and local policymakers who are actually more inclined to try

to put scarce resources in their State toward researching what we

already know, rather than providing direct services.

So it is our sincere hope that our Federal colleagues will actually

try to address these gaps that I have mentioned; and I would tell

you that it is also our overall hope that, in terms of any strategy

that the Federal Government puts together on synthetic drugs,

that it becomes more than just 63 or 53 pages of lip service. We

are not going to know if we are actually going to actualize that

hope until we actually see a demonstrated commitment to turning

those principles and ideas into action plans.

In closing, I would just like to thank my colleagues on the panel

for their generosity and their hard work at the State and local

level, because they have allowed us to coordinate with them so that

our work can actually reflect the valuable experience and expertise

of their constituents. And of course at the appropriate time I am

more than happy to answer any questions that you might have.

Thank you.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Green follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Ms. Thau.

STATEMENT OF SUE THAU

Ms. THAU. Chairman Souder, Ranking Member Cummings, Congresswoman Watson, thank you for the opportunity to testify today

on behalf of the Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America and

our more than 5,000 coalition members nationwide. I am pleased

to provide you with CADCA’s perspective on the Synthetic Drug

Control Strategy.

During my tenure as an OMB Budget Examiner, I analyzed

many proposed national strategies. I know firsthand that the ones

with the most impact had sufficient budgetary and other resources

allocated to them to ensure they achieved results. The Synthetic

Drug Control Strategy seems comprehensive. However, it simply

repackages the administration’s existing budget priorities. The

Strategy ignores key programs that provide the majority of the

community infrastructure and core support to local law enforcement prevention and treatment efforts to deal with meth where it

has emerged as a crisis.

Prevention is the first line of defense in protecting communities

from drug abuse, and it is not a one-size-fits-all proposition. It

hinges on the extent to which schools, parents, law enforcement,

business and the faith community work comprehensively to implement a full array of education, prevention, enforcement and treatment initiatives.

Unfortunately, the prevention portion of the strategy is very

weak and only highlights three programs. It totally ignores two of

the main Federal programs that have been addressing meth, the

Drug Free Communities program and the State grants portion of

the Safe and Drug Free Schools program. These programs are vitally important because they fund community and school-based prevention infrastructures that can immediately incorporate meth

components where meth is a problem.

We know people do not usually start their drug-using careers

with meth, because, as we mentioned before, the mean age at

which people initiate meth use is 22. The epidemiology of drug use

indicates that use trends often spread to adolescents. So although

meth is not currently a major issue among most school-aged youth,

it certainly could become one. In fact, in many communities where

meth is a crisis, use rates for school-aged youth are way above

State and national averages.

The prevention lesson to be learned from meth use, given its relatively late onset, is that the more successful we are at general

drug prevention, the less we will have to deal with meth use and

addiction.

CADCA knows from its members that this is already happening.

Coalitions know what their local drug problems are and take the

necessary steps across community sectors to counteract them. The

strategy itself points out that States and cities must be organized

to recognize and deal with meth, yet it totally fails to mention the

Drug Free Communities program which has been very successful in

addressing meth issues. Communities with existing anti-drug coalitions can identify and combat meth problems quickly and before

they attain crisis proportion.

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Coalitions throughout the country have effectively responded to

the meth crises and have seen reductions in its use. For example,

the Salida Build a Generation coalition in Salida, CO, used local

school survey data to ascertain that meth was a problem in their

community. When compared to Monitoring the Future data for the

same time period, their community’s rate of lifetime meth use for

10th graders was 61.9 percent above the national rate. As a result

of implementing a multi-sector approach, the Salida coalition has

contributed to a 59 percent reduction in meth use among 10th

graders, from 13.9 percent in 2004 to 5.7 percent in 2006.

School-based prevention should also be a vital component of any

comprehensive strategy to deal with meth. Where meth is identified as an issue, schools have incorporated meth education into

their existing evidence-based programs. The Safe and Drug Free

Schools and Communities program has contributed to significant

reductions in meth use among school-aged youth in many States

hit by the meth epidemic.

For example, in Idaho, the Safe and Drug Free School program

contributed to a decrease of 51.9 percent in lifetime meth use

among 12th graders, from 10.4 percent in 1996 to 5 percent in

2004.

In addition, the 20 percent Governor’s setaside for this program

has been used to address meth. For example, Washington State has

used their setaside to develop meth action teams in every county

in the State.

Communities and schools must have effective prevention infrastructures in place to be able to address meth and prescription

drug abuse. Media campaigns and student drug testing are beneficial but not sufficient to provide the stable and effective community wide prevention systems required to implement data-driven

programs and strategies to deal with all of the community’s drug

issues, including meth.

As my testimony has shown, communities with these capabilities

have actually beaten back their meth problems among school-age

youth before they reach crisis proportions.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify. I would be happy to answer any questions you may have.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Thau follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Brooks.

STATEMENT OF RON BROOKS

Mr. BROOKS. Chairman Souder, Ranking Member Cummings,

Congresswoman Watson, thank you for inviting me to discuss the

Synthetic Drug Control Strategy. This strategy is a welcome development from the administration, but, on behalf of the 62,000 law

enforcement officers I represent as the president of the National

Narcotic Officers’ Associations’ Coalition I have concerns about serious shortcomings which may put the laudable goals of this strategy in jeopardy.

The strategy is an important first step, but why did it take so

long for ONDCP to prepare it? Why weren’t more partners consulted in its development? The strategy is not supported by original

and meaningful recommendations for action. Without action and,

more importantly, without buy-in from key stakeholders, the Synthetic Drug Control Strategy is in danger of becoming irrelevant

before it has a chance to succeed.

In 1995, California was inundated with meth. After I alerted

DEA and ONDCP leadership, they convened a series of stakeholder

meetings that resulted in the first methamphetamine strategy by

the Department of Justice. Collaboration continued and progress

was being made on the West Coast, but meth was slowly creeping

eastward. As meth began to overrun the Midwest and Appalachia,

by 2001 collaboration with ONDCP began to wane. By 2004, groups

across the country were calling for help from Congress; and Congress responded to their constituents by drafting the Combat Meth

Act, which passed earlier this year.

While the NNOAC and other key stakeholders worked closely

with Congress to refine and pass this legislation, ONDCP was absent. I personally heard complaints from staff that they could not

get assistance from ONDCP despite repeated attempts to obtain

their support.

Attorney General Gonzales broke the administration’s silence on

meth on July 18, 2005, when he said, in terms of damage to children and to our society, meth is now the most dangerous drug in

America.

Shortly thereafter, an ONDCP spokesperson wrote off the focus

on meth by saying that people are crying meth because it is a hot

new drug.

Of course people were crying meth. But those of us in law enforcement, treatment and prevention knew that we were facing a

problem that was growing worse by the day. Cops, doctors, treatment providers, DAs, child protective agencies and community coalitions were being overwhelmed by meth problems in many parts

of our Nation. They weren’t crying meth just to make noise. They

were asking for help. ONDCP not only ignored them, they even

tried to tell them that they didn’t really have a problem.

This is inexcusable, Mr. Chairman; and this Synthetic Drug Control Strategy continues to reflect ONDCP’s disregard for the experience and perspective of the experts on the ground.

If the NNOAC had been consulted by ONDCP, we would have

made the following recommendations: Support law enforcement

task forces that have seized thousands of meth labs by fully fundVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:22 Mar 30, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00172 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\33394.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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ing the Byrne Justice Assistance Grant program at the currently

authorized $1.1 billion level.

Fund the COPS Methamphetamines Hot Spot program, which

has provided resources to hard-hit areas to train, equip and mobilize law enforcement resources to address the meth issues.

Call on Congress to authorize the Center for Task Force Training

at the Bureau of Justice Assistance, which provides much-needed

training for drug task force commanders and meth investigators.

Ensure that the OCDETF Fusion Center is coordinated with Regional Information Sharing Systems and the HIDTA Intel Centers

and ensure that the OCDETF Fusion Center follows the guidelines

of the National Criminal Intelligence Sharing Plan which was implemented by the Department of Justice.

State and local drug task forces funded through Byrne were responsible for seizing 5,400 meth labs in 2004 alone. How effective

is a strategy that establishes lab seizures as a goal and then takes

away funding from the Byrne-funded task forces that make a large

percentage of those seizures? Less law enforcement equals fewer

labs seized. That is not success. That is surrender.

The strategy states that the administration will continue to partner with State, county, tribal and city governments over the next

3 years to attack the illicit use of methamphetamine. Yet the administration has proposed in the past 2 years to disengage from

State and local partnerships by recommending termination of key

assistance and training programs such as Byrne, JAG, COPS Hot

Spots and the Center for Task Force Training.

Paying lip service to the importance of Federal, State local law

enforcement partnerships without putting resources and actions behind the words is a recipe for a failed Synthetic Drug Control

Strategy.

Mr. Chairman, I have always believed that treatment, education

and prevention hold the keys for reducing America’s drug problem.

As long as drug traffickers ply their trade, narcotics officers will be

there to stop them. Clinically appropriate treatment must be made

available, but stopping use before it starts should be our ultimate

goal. The things I have seen meth addicts do to themselves and

others would make members of this subcommittee cringe. Collectively, we must do all we can to prevent first use, but the synthetic

strategy fails to address prevention in a comprehensive way.

Community Anti-Drug Coalitions are critical. Effective schoolbased anti-drug curriculum is important. Aggressive enforcement

against drug producers and traffickers is absolutely essential.

ONDCP has had an opportunity to really step up to the plate by

issuing a strategy. I am truly disappointed that it provides little

new strategic direction to address the meth problem. I am hoping

that, with the continued leadership of this subcommittee, the strategy will be re-thought in a collaborative environment with input

from all of the key constituents and that a new, more robust, wellthought-out Synthetic Drug Control Strategy will be the result.

Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Brooks follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Well, when your panel starts out with the Association of Counties saying ‘‘had we been consulted’’ and finishes with

the narcotics officer saying ‘‘had we been consulted,’’ you are less

impressed with the first panel’s assertion that you were consulted.

Let me ask a broad question, because I am kind of confused that,

in Mr. Burns’ testimony, I felt it was very significant that the administration says that they don’t do strategies by subgroups. In

other words, we kind of have a general—I am trying to figure out

from a private business approach that—normally, what you would

have is a sweeping national strategy of things that are in common.

But I can’t hardly imagine that you wouldn’t have a substrategy

that would have either in two different ways or different components that relate different ways.

So, first, why wouldn’t you have a cocaine strategy, a heroin

strategy, a prescription drug strategy, a meth strategy, a marijuana strategy that would then take into account some fundamental things that we are hearing here? For example, cocaine is not

everywhere, but it certainly is concentrated. It is a major drug, and

it tends to be more urban. Crack tends to be historically younger,

but I don’t know. We have an Intelligence Center that does a lot

of this kind of stuff. But heroin is a superhuge problem in some

cities like Seattle historically and less in others to varying degrees;

and then we had it pop up, as it did a few years ago, in Plano or

Orlando or different types of things. Oxycontin will pop up in different areas. Why wouldn’t you have then tailored strategies that

fit inside your national strategy as a regular course of doing business?

Also, the HIDTAs on the law enforcement side were meant to

kind of be regionalized because some of these problems are regional. So if meth pops up as a challenge you would have HIDTAs

that dealt with meth. I am kind of baffled by a principle that says

we don’t break these out and then work in subgroup.

Let me ask one followup with this. I made kind of a derogatory

comment about conferences. I am not against conferences, and I

just could not believe that was the primary strategy.

On the other hand, Ms. Green, you outlined some of the—what

the purpose of these conferences were, which is hopefully to get

very specific on what is needed at the State level, what is needed

in coordination. Why wouldn’t that be done before you issued a

strategy?

In other words, isn’t that what you think you would do as you

approach cocaine, as you approach meth, as you approach each of

these types of things, that there would be regional efforts to pull

together the principles in wherever these are problems? You would

get them together and say what laws do we have on this? What are

you doing at the local level? What more can be done at the Federal

level? What funding sources do you need? Why wouldn’t you do

what they are proposing to do after they issue the strategy before

you develop—as a process of developing a strategy and why

wouldn’t you be doing this on multiple drugs?

Ms. WATSON. Mr. Chairman, would you yield for a minute to ask

a question. I will go on to the floor, and I will take it in writing.

But in listening to this panel on the ground, those of you who

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ate and assess the various programs that are being described by

the administration? Do they work? What are the best practices?

I listened very intently to you, Ms. Green. I think you came closer to my concerns.

And, Mr. Coleman, as heading up an organization in northern

California, I would like to hear from you as to what actually is

going on in various areas of our State, the largest in the Union,

and what is working.

Mr. Brooks, what do we need in terms of law enforcement, what

kinds of coordination? Because I join my colleagues—you know, we

sit here in Washington, and we come up with these plans. We have

a vision for where we want to go. But there seems to be a disconnect when it gets down to the local community, and I find my

community void of the resources and the programs. We work

through our counties in California, and they are not funded to the

point they should be to address these programs.

So, my general question, Mr. Chairman, is there some way to

evaluate the plans that are coming from the administration, the

HIDTA program and all these others so that we then can come

back and make decisions as it deals with appropriating funds to

some specific local community, their programs?

So I just throw that out. You can respond in writing. This is who

I am; and these are broad, general concerns that I have about this

whole synthetic drug control program.

Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman. I am going to go on to the

floor.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

Ms. Green.

Ms. GREEN. Yes, Mr. Chairman.

The process that you described, if one were to use a rational and

logical process for determining what would be the components of a

particular strategy, you would follow the particular process that

you outlined. Because the purpose of understanding the particular

action plans and recommendations and problems and concerns that

are going on at the various State and local level is to determine

when you do a strategy what it is that is common in terms of overall themes, what is different, as you indicated. Because that difference can be among drugs. It can be among counties. It can be

in localities. All of those would have to be taken into consideration.

Then what happens is all of that information helps you determine what the overall themes are, and those become the common

principles of the overall strategy. Then you do in very specific action steps and action plans lay out what needs to be done to address the particular differences between the drugs, the particular

differences between systems. That would be the rational process.

We have not actually been very successful in persuading ONDCP

that they should follow a particular rational process in developing

a strategy. We often do not have the opportunity, because we have

actually never been consulted in terms of the national drug strategy at all.

Mr. SOUDER. But you do model State drug laws.

Ms. GREEN. We do model State drug laws; and part of our process is actually to assess how these laws are working. Are they

working, are there similarities among the different kinds of laws,

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are there different options that can have the same theme but

maybe vary based upon the needs of State?

Mr. SOUDER. Do States listen to you?

Ms. GREEN. Yes, actually, we work with, at any given time, about

3 different States; and we work with all 50 States on over 40 different drug and alcohol issues.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Just very briefly, I want, first of all, to thank all

of you for your testimony. I think it was good that you had an opportunity to sit in the audience and hear the folks that came before

you. I am also glad that you had an opportunity to hear our frustration.

There was an amendment on the floor which said that ONDCP

should work with and collaborate with folks on the ground. That

is incredible. And we are going to continue to do what we can because we realize—again, we are trying to figure out—I tell people,

you know, we do not have but so long to be on this Earth, and we

do not have time to waste time, and we do not have time to waste

money. And if you all are on the ground and you are dealing with

these kinds of things on a daily basis in whatever arenas you may

be in, it just makes sense to me that this should not be an us and

them. It should be all of us working together to achieve these goals

in some kind of way.

I just want to thank you all for your willingness to come to the

table, and now we just have to get the other folks to come to the

table so that we can achieve the things that we need to achieve.

But, again, I want to thank you, and I will have some followup

questions, but I will put those in writing.

Mr. SOUDER. The subcommittee will stand in recess for this vote.

I plan to reconvene for a couple of additional questions. Thanks.

[Recess.]

Mr. SOUDER. The subcommittee will come back to order.

I had a couple of questions I wanted to finish the hearing with.

I appreciate your patience. If I could return to the question of the

statewide conferences that are proposed. Is there any assurances

of, as to—I have been to many conferences, and some conferences

you go and hear speakers and then sit kind of laissez faire how you

apply it. And then other conferences, you go, and at the end of the

day, there are resolutions that tend to be almost like us trying to

negotiate a bill going to the floor depending on how diverse the

group is. Then there are other times where it is, you have—it is

almost like you have to have a pre-conference group that sets out

some things that are more specific that can move to an action plan.

Ms. Green, you outlined in your testimony fairly specific goals for

the conference that I didn’t hear the same specificity out of the

ONDCP. On the other hand, we didn’t ask them precisely the same

question. Do you believe and do the others believe that there is a

way to structure these such that we can in fact get more specific

and effective kind of regional plans and specific State plans? Or basically, will this just be a verification of those States that are organized? Indiana has been getting organized; Hawaii has been organized for quite a while. How do you see this evolving? And how can

we make sure that it then gets somehow assimilated to a very specific national plan where the threads that are in common that are

national, such as crystal meth coming across the border, need for

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certain type of treatments, can be nationalized, and things that are

regionalized and implemented at regional—can be regionalized? I

would like the input of anyone here on how—do you sense that

ONDCP is committed to having more than a hand-holding conference? And, second, how can we make it such that it has specific

plans?

Ms. GREEN. Mr. Chairman, I will start since we are the ones that

the three agencies, the Justice Department, ONDCP, and HHS,

have asked to conduct these conferences.

Do I believe there is a way to make these conferences productive

and to have them come out with very specific action plans? Yes,

precisely because of the very specific process that I outlined. Now,

the key to that process, though, is to have those individuals who

actually know specifically what is going on at the State and local

level can identify the concerns, can identify what is actually working, can identify particular gaps that they are seeing and put that

information together. Now, the key to that is that all of the individuals that are on this panel with me are actually going to be involved in those particular conferences. At the same time, we are

going to hold four of them in different regions.

At the same time, we are working with certain evaluations and

certain specialists, such as Dr. Carnivalie, who has a specialty in

being able to help identify certain common themes and certain specific differences that may, for example, apply to one region, for example the southeast region which is more a preventive mode as opposed to the western region which has actually got a great deal of

experience on more issues such as clean-up and remediation of

meth labs.

So we have a group of State and locals that are going to actually

discuss very specific needs, goals, what is happening, what is not

happening, what is working, what is not working. They are going

to talk to us about the information that they actually have that indicates successes or positive benefits. Some of the type of information that I suggest in my testimony we can’t get from the Federal

level. And then we are going to work again with a group of individuals who have a base of experience in looking at that information

and being able to help assess, what does that mean in terms of

similarities, common themes?

Now, as to, do I believe that ONDCP is committed? My experience is that ONDCP is never committed to action. ONDCP is primarily committed to being able to say what they need to say to try

to be able to either checkmark something that they believe that

they are committed to do; but when it comes to me believing that

they are actually committed to action, I’d have to say, historically,

I’ve never actually seen that. Individuals within ONDCP, for example, Scott Burns, yes. I believe he is committed to action. But since

he is not the drug czar at this current moment, I couldn’t tell you

that my experience with ONDCP under this particular drug czar’s

office suggests that they are going to commit to any action.

Now, one of the things we are doing to offset what I perceive may

happen, which may be an attempt to either try to sanitize what

comes out of it or somehow the information to inadvertently get

lost, my staff and I are actually going to put together the information, work with, as I said, Dr. Carnivalie and others to see what

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it says. We are going to retain that information so that we can disseminate it to all the Federal, State and local policymakers and our

partners so that everyone is very clear about what is coming out

of these.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Brooks.

Mr. BROOKS. I would have to agree on that. I want to start by

saying that, first of all, they did this all backward. I mean, the conferences should have come before the strategy. In the old days,

when we developed the National Drug Control Strategy or the first

meth control strategy out of DOJ with DEA and ONDCP, we came

together, we had plenary sessions with experts, and then we broke

into groups, and we developed action plans in really robust facilitated focused groups that represented all of the key constituencies,

parents groups, treatment, the lawyers side of the house, the cops,

everybody. Then we came up with strategies. These were true collaborative strategies where people bought in as real stakeholders,

where they had a feeling of ownership and were then able to go out

and implement strategies. And had ONDCP done that, which they

haven’t—this administration and ONDCP has never done. They

don’t hold key constituent meetings. We have never had focused

groups and constituent meetings to develop the National Drug Control Strategy or this strategy or the Southwest Border Strategy.

The newly emerging Fentanyl threat is being driven by the

HIDTA directors in the Chicago and Philadelphia police departments, not by ONDCP as it should. And let me add by saying that

ONDCP—I was cornered in the hallway, and they were outraged

at my testimony, my written statement, because I affirmed that

they had not been collaborative. They said, well, we sent an e-mail

to the HIDTA directors. And I said, you know what? An e-mail,

without knowing what you are working on or where it is coming

from, a simple one e-mail traffic is not a collaborative process.

When we sit down with all of the stakeholders, the people on this

panel and all of the groups that they represent, that would be a

collaborative process. That would have been a strategy that we and

you could buy into. But they didn’t do it.

Mr. SOUDER. Any other comments on that?

Mr. COLEMAN. Yes, I do. We think what ONDCP did was put the

cart before the horse. They should have had the meth summits

prior to listen to what was coming out of them. Now, the counties

are to be involved with the summits in which we look at the regional plan and all of that coming at the national plan and which

will be addressing this problem. But to come out with all these

plans without the stakeholders being involved doesn’t help, doesn’t

solve the problem; it only creates a problem. And then when you

don’t put the money with it, it also creates additional problems. So

we are looking forward to the summits. We will be involved in that,

and we will come up with a national plan.

Mr. SOUDER. It is pretty massive when you look at all the different narcotics and you look at all the different challenges in the

regional variations. But one of the things is—with meth—that is so

unusual is that we could see it coming. And that is what is so exasperating here, is now we are kind of maybe at least at a flattening

if not a decline in the mom-and-pop labs. But I remember years

ago, the Asians in our international narcotics legislators—anti-narVerDate 11-MAY-2000 14:22 Mar 30, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00198 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\33394.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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cotics legislators groups raising synthetic drugs. And the Europeans and the South Americans and the North Americans going,

well, we don’t even know really what you’re particularly talking

about at this point. But in Hawaii, they did. So they have a long

track record in Hawaii. And then it hits our West Coast, and it just

marches. And in a hearing in Minnesota, I asked if it had been in

any of the Native American areas, and they said, it is devastating

them, and yet that had never come up as a subcategory that—what

I heard from the U.S. attorney who works with the northern U.S.

Indian nations that it had become a bigger problem than alcohol.

That is a pretty extraordinary statement for the government not to

be aggressive and saying this isn’t a national problem if it is in the

Indian nations. And then there was this mythology that developed

that somehow—I literally heard this at two different hearings out

of the Federal Government, more speculative as to why this was

in rural areas and not urban areas, that somehow African-Americans wouldn’t be attracted to meth. And then in one in Minneapolis, the police chief there I believe said that in one neighborhood

the particular distribution groups switched over, and all of a sudden, 20 percent of the cases in that city were African-American because one neighborhood switched over from crack and to crystal

meth. And it appeared to be more of a distribution question. Well,

that is a pretty fundamental misunderstanding in the Federal Government, to not understand the distribution patterns of how meth

goes.

And I am just—Dr. Gallant, I saw you were going to add something here, too, in these conferences. But I am wondering whether,

what kind of early warning system do we have for future things

when—we talked about Chicago, Philadelphia. Some of these

things pop up, and you can get them down quick enough. But this

one was like a train that’s been rolling for over a decade.

Mr. GALLANT. In terms of early warning, I think one of the

things that our Federal partners, particularly SAMHSA, can do is

to put into place early warning systems that are current. Many of

the early warning systems they have currently are dated. You

know, they go back 20, 30 years and really haven’t caught up with

what we are facing today. So a national strategy to get data, current data, usable data rather than just collect data based on some

mythology from the past or some issue from the past that currently

doesn’t exist I think needs to be addressed.

Mr. SOUDER. For drug treatment and health questions, wouldn’t

we—much of the surveys I see and so often are like 3 years old.

They will be 2001, 2002, 2003, and you’re in 2006 trying to make

legislative funding priorities. And that is helpful because that data

will be more comprehensive, plus we have trend lines on some of

that. But why wouldn’t that in a logical way be supplemented with

almost, in the days of Internet, instantaneous data on emergency

room, drug court, which are two frontline groups.

Another would be, what we are picking up on the border on a

daily basis. In other words, it is not like we are not accounting for

this when the Department of Homeland Security picks this up if

our suppositions are correct in that after certain States in the

southwest start in that pseudoephedrine law, we should have seen

if crystal meth’s coming into the United States, and in fact, 60 to

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70 to 80 percent of meth is crystal meth, and if it is coming across

the southwest border and if we are actually intercepting anything,

which is debatable, but if we are intercepting things, we should

have seen a bump up, and it should have been almost instantaneous data that when a policeman makes an arrest on the street,

that data gets fed into EPIC. It is like, why can’t you have kind

of an ongoing kind of daily tracking, which presumably some drug

intelligence centers and EPIC do, but it doesn’t seem to get to us?

What we tend to get in our hearings are historical data. Any comments on whether you see more contemporary things than we see

here?

Mr. BROOKS. Well, I think, again, the issue is a great example.

As Fentanyl began to hit, as there was a seizure of Fentanyl coming across the border in San Diego, the San Diego HIDTA, the

CBAG issued the first bulletin. It went out to law enforcement and

ONDCP. We started to see Fentanyl deaths first in Chicago and

then in Philadelphia and then in the Midwest, in the Kansas City

area. And bulletins began coming out, and it was those emergency

medical personnel and law enforcement and treatment folks in

those cities that began to collaborate. So I think things do happen

regionally. NDIC has just come out with an excellent Fentanyl bulletin out to law enforcement that is addressing the threat, and this

is a breaking emerging tread. So things do happen. But there is

disconnect, and it is really a shame, I think, that ONDCP is not

the coordinator of pushing out this data, because they can get it

out to all the constituent groups, to all the prevention folks, to the

community coalitions, the law enforcement. But there is a disconnect there.

Mr. SOUDER. Do you get information as to, why Chicago and

Philadelphia?

Mr. BROOKS. You know what, we are only surmising that there

are some distribution groups that had the ability—that were in

place there that had the ability to bring this Fentanyl from labs

in Mexico. We believe anecdotally that the labs are in Mexico. Now,

we have seen domestic labs in this country, Fentanyl labs. We

struggled with a tough Fentanyl problem in California in the mid

1980’s. I personally raided two labs back in those days. But we believe now it is coming out of Mexico. These tend to be controlled

by drug, DTOs and families, and so it is probably just where they

ended up.

Now, it’s interesting, we just had three overdoses of Fentanyl in

a California prison; one death, two recovered. So somehow the

Fentanyl made its way into that prison. But we have not seen

Fentanyl on the street in California yet. But I could tell you that,

every single day, the HIDTA directors are communicating by e-mail

not only with ourselves but with all of the law enforcement partners that we represent every day as this Fentanyl crisis is emerging.

Mr. SOUDER. I want to ask you a couple of questions leading to

one broad one. But on the community anti-drug coalitions, do you

get—how many are there? There are well over 100 now.

Ms. THAU. Nationwide, there are about—drug-free communities

funded, are like 1,000. We have about 5,000 members.

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Mr. SOUDER. You have 5,000 members; 1,000 are funded now

through ONDCP. Now, in that thousand, do you get access to this

kind of information of what is happening regionally?

Ms. THAU. We get access to them as far as what is going on in

their coalitions. We actually collect the data, which is how we came

up with the outcomes to put in this package.

Mr. SOUDER. Like if Fentanyl all of a sudden pops up in two

markets, you would see your data collection pop up?

Ms. THAU. They would be, because they have police and law enforcement—every single one of these coalitions has law enforcement sitting there for exactly that reason; because if you are going

to comprehensively look at what you are doing in a community, you

have to talk to your emergency room people, you have to have police at the table. And the school survey datas may be every 2 years,

but the point I was going to make is the stuff that you hear from

the Federal Government is monitoring the future, which is a survey sample nationally, which masks all of the richness of what is

happening in regions and specific communities in the country. And

that’s probably why they haven’t seen it, because they are not looking at what communities and States are looking at, which is their

data. And as you know, the data issue is that a lot of these Federal

agencies like Safe and Drug-Free Schools don’t even ask for the

data from the States and the States have it. The States that have

had big meth issues have seen, as we said, higher usage rates

among their students than States that didn’t have a big meth

issue.

So the States and the communities get it, but it is never aggregated up to the point that it comes to you, other than these national samples that mask all of the variation in local and regional

data.

Mr. SOUDER. In the community anti-drug initiative, you are not

limited just to youth?

Ms. THAU. No.

Mr. SOUDER. One of the things that came up in the National Ad

Campaign is we addressed meth, and in your testimony, you

showed kind of the introductory process of alcohol, tobacco, marijuana, cocaine, and how the process ages. Our National Ad Campaign is geared toward youth. The theory was—is that, if we tackle, kind of break—at the current time, it is marijuana. Everything

else will be controlled.

How do we do a post-analysis to say that strategy failed? In

other words, that it is hard to say how much it failed because, in

fact, marijuana use was going down, yet a methamphetamine epidemic would hit a community and wipe it out regardless of whether

the kids have gone to Safe and Drug-Free Schools and had the

other things or not, and yet our ad campaign was just focused on

below 18. We suddenly have a problem that is devastating our local

task forces. Our hospitals, everything, drug courts everything else

are overwhelmed when it hit a market, and yet we say, well, we

addressed this back when they were 16. Do you have any thoughts

on whether or not our policy in many areas in prevention—DrugFree Schools would be one example. International youth ad campaign doesn’t really tackle the richness of the assumption.

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I have asked these questions for years because I have a theory

that the reason we went to youth campaigns was not just to prevent at an early age. It is because it is easier to get kids to agree

than it is to get adults to agree. And that it was the ease of having

kids go, yes, I think drugs are terrible. And then we move it down

farther because—and yet the tough ages are junior high and into

high school, and it gets even tougher when you are dealing with

somebody on an assembly line. A woman is trying to lose weight,

and they want to use methamphetamines. They don’t necessarily

remember back in fifth grade. How do we—any thoughts on this

subject? And, for example, why weren’t the community anti-drug

coalition systems oriented toward youth? If this whole thing could

be solved if we addressed youth, you obviously when you worked

with the development of this program wanted to go beyond youth.

Ms. THAU. Well, ONDCP is focused on youth. However, it is community-wide. And what we know is that drug trends do start in

using populations, but then they go down. Like ecstasy started in

older populations and ended up in high school kids.

Part of the issue is what you said before about, how do you do

a strategy? One, do you need basic prevention for everybody? Yes.

Do you need then to hit specifically specific drugs within that? You

do. You can do the base prevention, but if we know that risk—perception of risk and social disapproval for specific drugs is what

drives the trends on those, you can’t just think that general drug

prevention is going to totally do it. You have to build into it components for the emerging drug trends as they are coming up. And you

have to be very cognizant of what age groups are using what substances.

Mr. SOUDER. Any other thoughts on this? I wanted to touch on

one other point with treatment and Dr. Gallant. And we have

heard multiple witnesses and including in my opening statement

say that a mythology developed that meth—there wasn’t really a

good treatment for meth. Part of the way this mythology developed,

quite frankly, because sometimes we hold up the grassroots as all

knowing. It came from the grassroots. Because I have conducted at

least 10 hearings on meth, and I have had at least 5 hearings

where treatment experts testified at regional level that meth was

different in treatment, that it was hard to treat, unsolvable to

treat; that local places—this was not some kind of mythology developed in Congress. This was a mythology that developed at the

grassroots. Are you telling me that meth can be treated like any

other drug? That it is harder, easier to treat? It is like what? Because it is important if we are going to clarify the record here to

try to figure out how to clarify the record.

Mr. GALLANT. We do believe that meth can be treated like any

other drug. But one of the distinct differences in meth is duration

of treatment. And I think as, Congresswoman Watson pointed out,

when she went to the one program that she felt might have some

value for her niece, it was a long-term program of up to 24 months

individualized for the person entering in the program. So the feature we found with the meth is that it is such a powerful drug; it

is such an addictive drug, that in order to get the person clean and

sober and into recovery, it takes much longer than for some of the

other drugs that our system encounters.

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Mr. SOUDER. I believe it was in your testimony that you listed

some of these drug programs that had the——

Mr. GALLANT. Yes. Colorado, Tennessee.

Mr. SOUDER. I think one of them said in Utah, if I remember—

Utah that 60.8 percent of methamphetamine users were abstaining

at the point of discharge. Which means that 40 percent were still

using meth at discharge?

Mr. GALLANT. True. At some level.

Mr. SOUDER. Is that indicative more of what you were saying

about the length of time that they may have had short programs

or that they—because you—discharge, could discharge in that case

also mean that they were expelled from the program or withdrew

from the program? It is not completion of a program.

Mr. GALLANT. Right.

The CHAIRMAN. So that helps me understand that figure because

it is a wide range. Some had—where you have 80 percent after 6

months, that is a different standard than—but would the word discharge, which you used in your testimony in a number of places,

does discharge usually mean that the person—would that include

withdrawal? And when you say—so let me—I am trying to sort out

the data here, because you kind of had apples and oranges mixed

here, and I am just trying to compare them.

If Utah had a 60 percent in their State division who are abstinent at time of discharge, that would mean everybody who entered

the program, including those who withdrew, failed, were kicked

out, maybe it was voluntary people who left. Then if you say, in

Tennessee, that 65 percent were abstinent 6 months after treatment, that wouldn’t necessarily—those would be probably people

who completed the program, and then 65 percent. Because it

wouldn’t—do you know of any surveys that surveyed the people

that dropped out in trying to measure whether people are impacted

afterwards? It is usually if they’ve completed the program when

they do the measurement.

Mr. GALLANT. The data that we presented probably would not include those who dropped out and did not have a positive outcome.

Mr. SOUDER. And in the data that you presented, I know these

are difficult questions because there are, in the prepared testimony, a few examples, and didn’t examine all the subcomponents

of that. But would this data that you had for Colorado, Idaho—and

the written testimony, Colorado, Iowa, Minnesota, Tennessee,

Texas, Utah, which ranges from the kind of the extremes of only

60 percent in effect being abstinent, who went in, and statewide in

all treatment, to 80-some percent being abstinent at discharge,

which is a 60, 80, Colorado, Utah, to 73 percent 6 months after in

Minnesota? Is that comparable to the range of type of things we

would see if this survey had been cocaine?

Mr. GALLANT. Probably. What we are trying to demonstrate

there is that treatment is effective, and it is effective long range.

At discharge, the person was clean. Six months later, we went back

and interviewed the person again to try to determine if they had

reverted to use. The data suggests that they had not reverted to

use, that they were clean 6 months post-discharge from the program as a success.

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Mr. SOUDER. As we move toward our treatment hearing, one of

the questions that—because I am sure at least somebody from your

association will be involved in that, if not you directly. Could you

look and see how this data that you have been collecting on meth,

how that compares to other drugs? And if it is substantially different, meaning substantial variation, minimum 5 percent—10 percent would be pretty significant—if it is by 10 percent different, I

mean actual 10 percent range, that would be more like 15 percent

actual over the top, if it is significantly different—because we know

there is going to be differences, because we—where it is newer and

some States were farther along, some States were more rural than

urban, what they pay their treatment people. I understand all the

variations. That is why a normal statistical difference might be

five. I am looking for a lot more than five. If there are statistical

differences in meth effectiveness from cocaine, heroin, marijuana,

other drugs. Then, second, whether that gap has closed in the last

few years because SAMHSA has been looking at doing more directed meth treatment.

And then, if there is a gap and it is not closing, is part of what

I suggested earlier part of this problem that rural treatment facilities do not—where many of the meth addicts are—are not there?

And in fact, it isn’t a treatment question; it is that the longer-term,

higher professional, more expensive treatment is not available in

the areas where the meth is?

Because if, in fact, it is the same, then my premise, that there

was a difference in rural health care from urban health care,

wouldn’t really be there. In other words, if in fact you are finding

right now that meth treatment is just as effective as cocaine treatment, then we don’t really need to look at whether we need special

programs in rural meth treatment, because in fact it is working as

well as everything else. If there is a gap, then we need to figure

out whether we need to do something particularly for meth. And

that is going to be one of the main focuses of our hearing, what

unique challenges are there. Because if the data is good, that is

where you go. Look, you don’t need to customize everything strategy if there are certain basic principles that work, if length of time

is a major variable, if it is training of the individual.

Now, we have had a lot of testimony particularly from grassroots

providers that meth seizes the body differently in that it has a different impact on the brain. Do you agree with that?

Mr. GALLANT. I would agree with that.

Mr. SOUDER. And so that is why the treatment would be longer?

Mr. GALLANT. Well, again, I think that the addictive properties

of meth are such that it just sort of wraps the person up. In order

to get the person clean takes a longer length of stay than you

might find with other drugs.

But to answer your other question about rural versus urban, one

of the things we know we have to attend to, if we are not, is work

force development and provider development. You know, we can get

all the money in the world, but if you don’t have a competent work

force to deliver the service regardless of wherever they are, you are

not going to achieve your objective. So our goal as an association

is to ensure that we work with SAMHSA and HHS to ensure that

we have a good solid provider development program, a good solid

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work force development program. They have two mechanisms in

place currently that allows them to get to that. One is the Addiction Technology Transfer Services, and the other is the centers for

the application of prevention technologies. They are underfunded.

I think ATTSs are funded at about $11 million. That is not a good

work force strategy. You can’t adequately cover the country with a

work force strategy involving $11 million. So our goal is to look at

getting a more competent work force in place, having a variety of

mechanisms to do that; you know, not only through conferences but

basic education, community colleges, secondary; you know, universities, graduate school programs, to help those who want to enter

this field get into it and get the skill sets they need to be competent in their work. And then for providers. Providers sometimes

get into this business thinking that they want to do good but don’t

have the ability to run a business. So we need to help them understand how you run a business, how you access funding, how you

write a grant, how you hire people, and how you manage a facility.

Those are basic tenets of trying to run a good business. And that

is one thing that our system currently does not pay a lot of attention to.

Mr. SOUDER. Let me finish with a series of questions around this

subject, because having worked with this for a long time, it has

really reared its head in the meth question, and that is that, how

do you deal with the different intensity of impacts of some drugs

versus other drugs? And even within that drug, a disproportionate

impact from one type of that drug versus the other? So let me give

you—let me relate this particularly.

Part of the reason that the politics of this are different—and it

isn’t the politics just at the Federal level. There is no question that

the most important significant thing in moving us to a national

meth strategy was the National Association of County Survey. And

we can never thank you enough. Because by nationalizing it

through your county organizations and surveying them and having

them respond, which if there is ever a doubt that, at a local level,

that a survey like this or the input works, this one did, because we

constantly heard it was a regional question. It is a regional question. Yeah, but you know what? If you add up every region, it’s a

national question. The only place it wasn’t there really was New

England, and now we are learning that Florida has much more of

a problem than they thought they had, and they supposedly in the

southeast didn’t have much. But as it is rolling around, we found

out, well, they did, they just weren’t paying as much of it—it

wasn’t as big a focus. Because part of the difference here was the

mom-and-pop labs so devastated our drug infrastructure that the

impact of the narcotic became—you know, we would have a regional hearing. And I could see the crowd get restless every time

DEA said the basic same testimony: That two-thirds, which is now

they say 80 percent, is crystal meth. And the local community

would get all restless. First off, they wouldn’t necessarily see the

crystal meth as much. But the mom-and-pop, the Nazi lab type

things would tie up your local drug force so that you couldn’t even

find out whether you had crystal meth. You couldn’t find out

whether you had crack. You couldn’t find out whether you had

marijuana because your drug task force in one of my counties was

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sitting there 6, 8 hours at a house. So they couldn’t pick up anybody else. And so it had a disproportionate impact on the ability

of our drug task forces to work. That, we would go into a community in—Ramsey County is one that sticks out, but I know Lee

Terry told me similar things happened in Omaha. We heard similar testimony in Oregon, that when meth would hit a community

in the mom-and-pop labs, which would tend to be picked up first

because local law enforcement can’t let these idiots explode the

buildings in their towns, blow up kids in the house and so on, get

ammonia and everything else into the water in the community, so

that obviously had to be a takedown. So they would take down

those first. So the emergency room admissions were more likely to

be mom-and-pop lab people tying up the emergency rooms because

that is who the law enforcement were having to deal with because,

like in my area, they catch a building on fire and whatever.

California was the first State that really had this devastating—

which led to their law. Now, that disproportionate impact we heard

in Ramsey County. Then the next thing is that they went from a

standing start to, 6 months, 80 percent of the kids in child custody

were meth users, from zero to 80 percent in 6 months, which

meant that the child custody program was overwhelmed, because

when you have some idiot cooker in their home with little kids

present, you can’t leave the little kids in there that—so they are

going to wind up in child custody. So all of a sudden, kids who are

in child abuse homes, conventional child abuse, don’t have a place

to go because 80 percent of your people are being taken up with

urgent meth cases; that we heard in drug courts, in different cities,

drug courts would go from 10 or 20 percent to all of a sudden 80

percent. In Elkhart County in my district, the county, the jail went

from nothing to 90 percent being meth users, which meant that you

couldn’t—you can talk all you want about marijuana laws, but you

can’t arrest anybody for marijuana if your jail is full. You don’t

have any place to put them. I mean, you can give them a ticket

or something, but you don’t have any place to put them. You don’t

have any place to put people who stole a car because your jail is

full of meth users.

Now my question is, do we have an adequate way in our system

to measure in our targeting that if something kind of rips the guts

out of the system, what is the point of us funding a diverse drug

task force if one drug is wiping out the task forces? If it is hitting

the emergency rooms? If it is hitting the drug courts? And part of

the political frustration here is the politicians understood that. Because if you’re a county commissioner, you have to figure out how

to pay for it; that the police, the narcotics officers were on to this

because they were standing at a house waiting forever for DEA or

EPA to come over, to get there. And yet the political system was

saying, well, it’s only 4 percent; who gives a rip if it’s 4 percent?

It’s wiping out your budget.

How do you suggest that we kind of incorporate into our national

drug strategies intensity? Because that is really what we are talking about here. And that is why, should there be a measure that

emergency that I just gave you, a series of variables that potentially could do that. But that seems to be some of what we are fencing around here, is because when they unveiled the meth raids and

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they came to the meth caucus and told the meth caucus: That problem’s kind of under control; it is declining and so on. And it is, like,

where? It’s certainly, even in my district, they will say it is declining. Now, instead of being 30 percent over budget on overtime, they

are 10 percent over budget on overtime. Instead of having 60 labs,

they have 40 labs. Instead of not being able to get to all the meth

people, they are now able to get to maybe 60 percent of it. But still

in Allen County, my home, which had very little, and in multiple

other counties, we are getting—and this comes to the treatment

question—that—well, in Noble County, that the prosecutor said he

had one guy, he was up the third time and he still hadn’t been sentenced by the judge for the first time.

Now, this is what’s driving the locals crazy. And when anybody

who watches this saying, well, meth seems to be getting under control, it is not measuring the intensity of the impact that it is having on the child support system, on the local law enforcement system, on the jail capacity. And even if this declines 15 percent, 15

percent doesn’t alleviate the pressure, unless the 15 percent—or 25

percent, I guess it was for mom-and-pop labs. I am not sure 25 percent alleviates the pressure. It may be that we have to go 50 percent on the mom-and-pop labs. Because if there is not an intensity

measure here, it is just some kind of number we picked out of the

sky. And I want to get your reaction to that. I know you basically

agree with that. But as you go into these conferences, one of the

questions is, how do you pick up intensity? Fentanyl is an example.

I mean, all of a sudden, a whole bunch of deaths. That is as many

deaths from one drug that nobody ever heard of than you have in

a city with all the other drugs combined for that same period. How

do you measure intensity, and how do we factor that into our planning?

Mr. GALLANT. Well, I think one way we can do it is to work with

SAMHSA and HHS to develop a national data system to collect

data regarding use, intensity of use, and so forth. Right now, the

block grant moneys that come to States we do provide client level

data, but that is the only Federal money that comes to States that

require client level data. So you have a whole other set of dollars

coming out of the Justice Department, coming out of other agencies

that don’t collect or don’t provide the single State authority data

that they then can roll up to SAMHSA to give a national picture

of use.

So one of the recommendations I would have is that anyone receiving Federal dollars should be required to link with the SSA, to

ensure that SSA is collecting client level data so we can get a

whole picture of what is going on nationally regarding use.

The other piece that I think would be good is to have data flow

up. And the National Household Data Survey, I think as pointed

out by Sue Thau, really—doesn’t really give you sub-state level indications of use. It gives you a national picture, but it doesn’t allow

you to say what is going on in the bowels of—how or what’s going

on in the counties of Indiana or the cities of Indiana. That can only

be done by developing a system that allows States to take a real

good snapshot of what’s going on within their areas, and then feed

that data up to our Federal partners to get a national picture.

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Mr. SOUDER. Because in Indiana, for example, I think we were

fifth in labs, but really less than 20 percent of the State is impacted by meth labs. In my own district, I have three of the major

counties, and then I have two counties that don’t have a single one,

basically, or minimal even in the same geographical area, and one

county is next to another county. One county had I think 80, and

the other county had zero labs, and they are both rural counties

next to each other. That, trying to understand the intensity of the

panic and how to deal with this is one of our huge challenges. Mr.

Coleman.

Mr. COLEMAN. We agree with your statements, Mr. Chairman.

We don’t have the answers and the numbers that you are looking

for, but we would be willing to work with you. We do know one

thing: It is affecting county budgets across this country untold. The

amount of cases being heard in the drug courts is phenomenal.

From 1 year to the next, it seems to be doubling and tripling. Yet

we are all looking for these answers, and we hope that, by working

together as a collective group, we can come up with these answers

and start addressing this problem immediately, not in 2011.

Mr. SOUDER. And it’s a challenge that isn’t just meth. I was trying to address it as we look in the overall drug strategy, because,

as you well know, that in the early 1980’s, crack is still a huge—

and cocaine—is still the biggest problem in my biggest city, Fort

Wayne, which is not that far from Detroit. And there was at one

point where we were very high in the number of crack houses, and

crack was devastating the city of Fort Wayne. And literally, the

way we learned what was leading to this huge growth of gangs was

in the course of a—the prosecutor and my then boss Congressman

Coats, we put together a thing where one of the things the prosecutor initiated was giving a urine test to the kids at the youth center.

Found that almost all of them were tested for crack. And it’s like,

crack. That was up in Detroit; that is not down in Fort Wayne,

which then, when they start to go through some of the gang kids,

realized that there was a connection to some of the groups that

were coming down. And at one point, there were 155 crack houses

in the city of Fort Wayne. Now, that doesn’t mean 155 working on

a given night. What it means is there were 155 houses where they

were moving through that were abandoned in the urban area,

which then often led to a reaction: Well, you tear all that down,

and then you have all these vacancies, and then people wonder

why you can’t get a grocery store to work in a community. And we

have watched in our urban areas kind of this reaction and overreaction to how you deal with those kind of drugs. Because when

an intensity grabs a community, whether it is meth or whether it

is cocaine or whether it is Fentanyl, it has a disproportionate reaction. And unless we are reacting to some degree to the topic at

hand, we are not relevant. And then we can’t get by into the overall narcotics strategy, because people go, well, why are you doing

that when I have this problem here? Because ultimately you do

have to have some threat of a national strategy that is common

with all this. You can’t go jerk into whatever the drug is of the day.

But if you don’t have any responsiveness, local law enforcement

goes: What are you doing? This isn’t my problem.

Any other comments on this on how you might address it?

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Mr. BROOKS. Well, I don’t know exactly how to address it, but

you have hit the nail on the head. There are really two meth problems in America. There are the small toxic labs which are really

the face of meth. I mean, when communities think of meth, they

think of all of the medical and law enforcement and child protective

services that are tied up with drug-endangered children, with environmental issues, with law enforcement issues. But DEA and DOJ

is probably correct: 80 percent of our meth probably is from large

drug trafficking organizations, super labs in California, and now increasingly more in Mexico. And these are poly drug issues. I mean,

when we buy meth in California, traditionally they will say, OK,

you want 50 pounds of meth, but you have to take 3 pounds of heroin and 10 kilos of coke, because we are a poly—you know, because

that’s their business plan.

So we can’t lose sight of one problem for the other. And that is

traditionally what it seems like we do, is we chase our tail a little

bit and we run around. We have to be more flexible. And I think

part of being more flexible and responsive—and that is my frustration in this Synthetic Drug Control Strategy, is the fact that nobody talked to the treatment docs, to the cops, to the community

anti-drug coalitions, to the trial protective services workers. Because if you talk to them, you will have a pretty good picture of

what is going on in America. You will understand pretty much how

we need to craft the strategy. And so if we stay—if we keep that

in sight—and I think Congressman Cummings made the point earlier in his comments, that we have to talk to the people that are

on the ground doing the job, and be able to respond immediately,

as we are responding to Fentanyl, as we responded to meth in the

early days in 1995 and 1996 as it became an emerging problem

when DEA ramped up.

You mentioned the tribal lands issue, and I have to give credit

to the U.S. DOJ, especially the Bureau of Justice Assistance. They

are ramping up training for tribal lands’ meth issues. They have

ramped up on the National Criminal Intelligence Sharing Plan, on

the risk projects that help us share all this information and work

smarter. They are working on an incentive program that helps

train us and let us work smarter. DEA is doing an outstanding job.

The Office of State and Local Affairs at ONDCP is working diligently with the HIDTAs to do a good job, and the disconnect appears to be at the leadership from ONDCP.

Mr. SOUDER. Any other comments?

Ms. GREEN. Mr. Chairman, one of the things that would help,

and it relates to everything we are saying, is to have an infrastructure. And, again, this is not my forte. But in terms of the work that

we do with all of our colleagues, it would help to have an infrastructure that could actually pull information on a number of different variables, meth lab seizures, foster care placements, county

budgets, treatment admissions, community coalition information,

and people who are qualified at a national level to review all of

that information and hopefully assess what that means in terms of

intensities on the other impacts.

Some of the things that we ran into earlier on when we were

working on the meth issue is that some people would only focus on

usage numbers and completely ignore the massive drain on system

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resources that were occurring in a number of the States. So rather

than get into those particular fights involving resources, it would

have been helpful to have someone who was actually pulling all

this information and saying, well, look what’s happening with

treatment admissions, look what’s happening on county budgets,

look at lab seizures, look what’s happening in schools. We never

had that. And so we ended up with individuals, at least in our

work at State and local levels, fighting over, well, usage numbers

are really this. And yet we had Ron and his colleagues and Sue and

her colleagues and Eric and his colleagues and Dr. Gallant, his colleagues saying: Well, yes, but we’re having a—we’re feeling a significant impact on this.

So it would be helpful to have that kind of infrastructure, not

just on meth. Because if the infrastructure is set up properly, then

it can respond quickly. Part of the frustration for all of us on the

meth is that without that kind of infrastructure there was a lot of

crisis management going. When we were working with States on

State legislation, mostly people were not coming to us in a preventive mode with the exception of the last year. They were coming to

us in a crisis mode, saying, we’ve got 1,400 labs, we’ve got to do

something.

If there had been a proper infrastructure in place to do the kind

of early warning that you are suggesting, somebody would have

known in advance, wait, a minute, it’s impacting law enforcement,

foster care placements, county budgets, treatment admissions, communities, and schools. None of us had that information available

to us. We didn’t have anybody saying that to us. It was because

we decided to coordinate with each other and said: Well, what are

you seeing? What are you seeing? What are you seeing? What are

you seeing? That is how we figured it out. And one of the frustrations for us is that early on when we were trying to work with

State and local legislatures, part of it was, who is just looking at

usage numbers saying, you know, really this isn’t a problem is

ONDCP.

Mr. SOUDER. I thank you all for your comments. One of the

things that—I mean, because, ultimately, this is what ONDCP is

supposed to be doing. And the question is, why aren’t they? Is it

structural, or is it individual, or is it both? To the degree it is

structural, we passed our House version; the Senate is moving it.

But as we move to conference, maybe we can look at, is there a

way to build in a structural way to get the kind of input into the

ONDCP reauthorization. Individuals change; the structure outlasts

the individuals. And we need to look at how we need to work some

of these big questions through as we are working the HIDTAs, as

we are working the community anti-drug coalitions. But then, part

of it is that we’ve got things in multiple agencies: DOJ; Safe and

Drug Free Schools is over in education; treatments in HHS. And

how—that was why we created a drug czar’s office, was to try to

at least influence and coordinate the information as these things

are in multiple agencies. It has been pretty frustrating to me that

the Department of Justice clearly has been involved in meth longer

and at the grassroots, and yet Members of Congress basically—and

I don’t know how many hearings I had, it was like, why wouldn’t

the administration just come out and say that they were involved?

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It was like pulling teeth. And I think part of it is that I’m not even

sure the Department of Justice was aware at the grassroots how

involved their local DEA agents were in the task forces, how involved their—what exactly was being done with their grants. They

were anti-drug grants. And then in the communities, when they

started dealing with it, it was meth. And the information was just

seeping back to Washington that they were up to their eyeballs in

meth, and they didn’t know it. But what it meant was we didn’t

have any cohesion to trying to address what was overwhelming at

the grassroots. And I think your input here has been helpful. We

appreciate that. We will have this continuing dialog. We have a

couple more field hearings coming up yet this summer. And thank

you once again.

Does anybody have any closing comment you would like to make?

Then, with that, the subcommittee stands adjourned.

[Whereupon, at 12:09 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]

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