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STOPPING THE METHAMPHETAMINE EPIDEMIC:

LESSONS FROM OREGON’S EXPERIENCE

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

FIRST SESSION

OCTOBER 14, 2005

Serial No. 109–144

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

GINNY BROWN-WAITE, Florida

JON C. PORTER, Nevada

KENNY MARCHANT, Texas

LYNN A. WESTMORELAND, Georgia

PATRICK T. MCHENRY, North Carolina

CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania

VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina

——— ———

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)

MELISSA WOJCIAK, Staff Director

DAVID MARIN, Deputy Staff Director/Communications Director

ROB BORDEN, Parliamentarian/Senior Counsel

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

GINNY BROWN-WAITE, Florida

VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina

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

MARC WHEAT, Staff Director

NICK COLEMAN, Professional Staff Member

MARK PFUNDSTEIN, Professional Staff Member

MALIA HOLST, Clerk

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on October 14, 2005 .......................................................................... 1

Statement of:

Benson, Rodney, Special Agent in Charge, Seattle Field Division, Drug

Enforcement Administration; Chuck Karl, Oregon HIDTA; and Dave

Rodriguez, Northwest HIDTA ...................................................................... 11

Benson, Rodney ......................................................................................... 11

Karl, Chuck ................................................................................................ 21

Rodriguez, Dave ......................................................................................... 41

Evinger, Tim, sheriff, Klamath County; Karen Ashbeck, mother and

grandmother; John Trumbo, sheriff, Umatilla County; Rick Jones,

Choices Counseling Center; Kathleen Deatherage, director of public

policy, Oregon Partnership, Governor’s Meth Task Force; Tammy

Baney, Chair, Deschutes County Commission on Children and Families; and Shawn Miller, Oregon Grocery Association ................................. 74

Ashbeck, Karen .......................................................................................... 116

Baney, Tammy ........................................................................................... 135

Deatherage, Kathleen ............................................................................... 128

Evinger, Tim .............................................................................................. 74

Jones, Rick ................................................................................................. 124

Miller, Shawn ............................................................................................ 139

Trumbo, John ............................................................................................. 118

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

Baney, Tammy, Chair, Deschutes County Commission on Children and

Families, prepared statement of .................................................................. 137

Benson, Rodney, Special Agent in Charge, Seattle Field Division, Drug

Enforcement Administration, prepared statement of ................................ 14

Deatherage, Kathleen, director of public policy, Oregon Partnership, Governor’s Meth Task Force, prepared statement of ....................................... 131

Evinger, Tim, sheriff, Klamath County, prepared statement of ................... 78

Jones, Rick, Choices Counseling Center, prepared statement of ................. 127

Karl, Chuck, Oregon HIDTA, prepared statement of .................................... 24

Miller, Shawn, Oregon Grocery Association, prepared statement of ........... 141

Rodriguez, Dave, Northwest HIDTA, prepared statement of ....................... 43

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

of Indiana, prepared statement of ............................................................... 6

Trumbo, John, sheriff, Umatilla County, prepared statement of ................. 121

(1)

STOPPING THE METHAMPHETAMINE EPIDEMIC: LESSONS FROM OREGON’S EXPERIENCE

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 14, 2005

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIMINAL JUSTICE, DRUG POLICY,

AND HUMAN RESOURCES,

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM,

Pendleton, OR.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:20 p.m., at the

Pendleton City Council Chambers, 500 S.W. Dorion Avenue, Pendleton, OR, Hon. Mark E. Souder (chairman of the subcommittee)

presiding.

Present: Representatives Souder and Walden.

Staff present: Nick Coleman and Mark Pfundstein, professional

staff members; and Malia Holst, clerk.

Mr. SOUDER. Before we formally start the hearing, I’m going to

yield to Congressman Walden to make some opening comments.

Mr. WALDEN. Thank you very much, Chairman Souder. We appreciate you being here. I want to, first of all, welcome you and

your staff, and let you know that we’re sitting in the same room

where on March 4th I hosted nearly a 3-hour methamphetamine

town hall summit with a crowd about this big or a little larger.

It was our seventh in a series. And it took place on a Friday

night. And we had a big turnout, which I think showed the level

of concern in this region and this community about the problems

of methamphetamine.

I’d certainly like to recognize and thank a number of dignitaries

who are in the audience today, and start with State representative

Bob Jensen who is here. Bob, we welcome you and the work that

you’ve done back there in the legislature along with your colleagues

to really put Oregon out in the forefront in the battle on methamphetamine.

I’d like to welcome our Umatilla County commissioners; Dennis

Doherty, Emile Holeman, and Bill Hansell. And, as you know, Bill

is chairman of the National Association of Counties and has made

the fight on methamphetamine his signature issue as head of this

national organization.

I know he’s going to be in your State tomorrow as part of the Indiana Counties Association meeting and will be speaking there. I

believe Congressman Lamoreau—or, excuse me—Commissioner

Lamoreau and Commissioner McClure are both here from Union

County. We welcome them as well.

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I think Judge Tallman from Morrow County will be joining us

soon, if he’s not arrived already. And, obviously, we have a lot of

local law enforcement officials. I won’t go through and introduce

them all, Mr. Chairman, but you met with most of them in our

meeting prior to this one.

And I want to tell you it’s this law enforcement community—and

I’ve said it before private and public—that really put this issue on

my agenda because of the passion they felt about the problem they

faced. And it is from that that’s led all the way to here and the

hearing that you’re hosting.

I’d also like to welcome representatives from my friend and colleague Senator Gordon Smith’s office, Larry Garthy and Rich

Cricket I believe are both here, along with the U.S. Attorney’s Office, U.S. Attorney Karin Immergut.

And so I’d like to thank our witnesses, I’d like to thank the city

of Pendleton for opening up this room for us. And for those of you

who were here in time to see this DVD—and, Mr. Chairman, I’ll

make sure you have a copy of it. It’s called ‘‘Messed Up.’’ This was

produced and funded by a company out of Klamath Falls called

Jeldwin Corp.

And I don’t know what you all thought of it, but I thought it was

one of the most powerful messages I’ve seen on this issue, and I

know that they will make it available to organizations and individuals.

I also want to thank Ken McGee who I know is here in the front

row. Ken is with the DEA. And I’ve got to tell you, Mr. Chairman,

he attended all seven of our methamphetamine summits, and that

included one at I think 8 a.m. in Grants Pass and one here at 7

p.m. So, Kenny, good to see you and thanks for being here.

Mr. Chairman, I’ll yield back to you and welcome you here to

Pendleton, OR.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you very much.

The subcommittee will come to order. Good afternoon, and thank

you all for being here. This hearing continues our subcommittee’s

work on the growing epidemic of methamphetamine trafficking and

abuse. I’d like to thank my colleague, Congressman Greg Walden,

for inviting me to Pendleton today.

Congressman Walden has been a strong advocate in the House

for a more effective anti-meth strategy, and I am grateful both for

his leadership and for the assistance that he and his staff provided

in setting up this hearing.

With the exceptions of California and Hawaii, the Pacific Northwest has been dealing with meth longer than any other region in

the country, so I don’t have to tell anyone here about how powerful,

dangerous, and destructive a drug it is. In fact, as the title of this

hearing indicates, our purpose is to learn from you about how your

communities have been suffering from meth and how you have responded. Congress is currently working on several key pieces of

anti-meth legislation, and I hope the information we gather at this

hearing will help us in that effort.

This is actually the 11th hearing focusing on meth held by this

subcommittee since I became chairman in 2001 and the seventh

field hearing. In places as diverse as Indiana, Arkansas, Hawaii,

Minnesota, and Ohio, I have heard gripping testimony about how

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this drug has devastated lives and families. This is in addition to

meetings in Louisiana, Washington State and others, with local

law enforcement like we had here this morning.

But I have also learned about the many positive ways that communities have fought back, targeting the meth cooks and dealers,

trying to get addicts into treatment, and working to educate young

people about the risks of meth abuse.

At each hearing we try to get a picture of the state of meth trafficking and abuse in the local area by asking three questions. First,

where does the meth in the area come from and how do we reduce

the supply?

Second, how do agencies and organizations in the area get people

into treatment, and how do we try to keep young people from starting meth use in the first place?

And, finally, how is the Federal Government partnering with

State and local agencies to deal with this problem, and how can

that partnership be improved?

The question of meth supply divides into two separate issues, because this drug comes from two major sources. The most significant

source—in terms of the amount produced—comes from the so-called

super labs, which until recently were mainly in California, but are

now increasingly located in northern Mexico.

By the end of the 1990’s, these superlabs produced over 70 percent of the Nation’s supply of meth, and today it is believed that

90 percent or more comes from Mexican superlabs. The national

trend holds true here in the Pacific Northwest, as well; for example, it is estimated that 80 to 90 percent of the meth in Portland

is brought in by Mexican drug traffickers.

The second major source of meth comes from small, local labs

that are generally unaffiliated with major trafficking organizations.

These labs, often called clandestine or clan labs, have proliferated

here as they have throughout the country, often in rural areas. For

example, Oregon reported 352 such lab seizures, and Washington

State 422. These are high numbers, although by comparison Indiana reported 587 labs and Missouri 1,115 labs during the same

year.

And, by the way, I want to make a note. Any of you who want

a lab rate on this are fine. Every State is on the report. I believe

that’s probably a third of my district, local law enforcement has

taken down more than 587 in the whole State.

But the total amount of meth actually supplied by these labs is

relatively small; however, the environmental damage and health

hazard they create—in the form of toxic chemical pollution and

chemical fires—make them a serious problem for local communities, particularly the State and local law enforcement agencies

forced to uncover and clean them up.

Children are often found at the meth labs and frequently suffer

from severe health problems as a result of the hazardous chemicals

used.

So how do we reduce the supply? Since meth has no single

source, no single regulation will be able to control it effectively. To

deal with the local meth lab problem, many States have passed

various forms of retail restrictions on meth precursor chemicals

like pseudoephedrine—used in cold medicines. Some States limit

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the number of packages a customer can buy; others have forced

cold medicines behind the counter in pharmacies.

Here in Oregon, the State government has gone so far as to

make pseudoephedrine prescription-only medication. I have some

concerns about whether the law enforcement benefit of these restrictions is significant enough to justify the burden on consumers,

retailers, and the health care system, but I’m looking forward to

hearing from our witnesses today about that subject.

However, regardless of which retail sales regulations are enacted

by the State or Federal Government, they will not reduce the largescale production of meth in Mexico. That problem will require either better control of the amount of pseudoephedrine going into

Mexico, which appears to be on the rise, or better control of drug

smuggling on our Southwest border, or both.

The Federal Government, in particular the Departments of Justice, State, and Homeland Security, will have to take the lead if we

are to get results.

The next major question is demand reduction—how do we get

meth addicts to stop using? How do we get young people not to try

meth in the first place? I am encouraged by the work of a number

of programs at the State and local level, with assistance from the

Federal Government, including Drug Court programs—which seek

to get meth drug offenders into treatment programs in lieu of prison time; the Drug-Free Communities Support Program—which assists community anti-drug coalitions with drug use prevention; and

the President’s Access to Recovery treatment initiative—which

seeks to broaden the number of treatment providers.

But we should not minimize the task ahead; this is one of the

most addictive drugs, and treatment programs nationwide have not

had a very good success rate with meth.

The final question we need to address is how the Federal Government can best partner with State and local agencies to deal

with meth and its consequences. Perhaps the best example of this

kind of partnership is the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas

[HIDTA] program, which brings together Federal, State, and local

law enforcement agencies in cooperative, anti-drug operations and

intelligence sharing.

There are HIDTAs in both Oregon and Washington State, and I

am pleased that the directors of both were able to join us today.

Other programs designed to help State and local communities include the Byrne grants and COPS; Meth Hot Spots programs—

which help fund anti-meth law enforcement task forces; the DEA’s

fund for meth lab cleanup costs; and the Safe and Drug-Free

Schools program, which ideally should help schools provide antimeth education.

However, we will never have enough money, at any level of government, to do everything we might want to do with respect to

meth. That means that Congress and State and local policymakers

need to make some tough choices about which activities and programs to fund, and at what level.

We also need to strike the appropriate balance between the

needs of law enforcement and consumers, and between supply reduction and demand reduction.

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The House and Senate are currently considering a number of different bills concerning meth, and I am hopeful that we will be able

to take strong, effective action before the end of the year. Together

with Jim Sensenbrenner, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Majority Leader Roy Blunt, the four co-chairs of the Congressional Meth Caucus, Congressman Walden, and over 40 other

Members, I recently introduced H.R. 3889, the Methamphetamine

Epidemic Elimination Act, which would authorize new regulations

of precursor chemicals, tougher criminal penalties for major meth

traffickers, and monitoring of the international market for precursors.

We may be able to get that bill to the House floor for a vote by

next month. But numerous other proposals, including classifying

pseudoephedrine as a ‘‘Schedule V’’ narcotic under Federal law, will

have to be considered by Congress as well.

We have an excellent group of witnesses today who will help us

make sense of these complicated issues. On our first panel, which

by tradition of this committee is always the Federal panel as our

first priority as oversight of the Federal Government, we are joined

by Mr. Rodney Benson, Special Agent in Charge of DEA’s Seattle

Field Division; and Directors Chuck Karl of the Oregon HIDTA and

Dave Rodriguez of the Northwest HIDTA.

On our second panel, we are pleased to be joined by Karen

Ashbeck, a mother and grandmother who has spoken out about

meth abuse within her own family; Sheriff John Trumbo of

Umatilla County and Sheriff Tim Evinger of Klamath County; Rick

Jones of Choices Counseling Center; Kathleen Deatherage, Director

of Public Policy for the Oregon Partnership—Governor’s Meth Task

Force; Tammy Baney—is that right?—Chair of the Deschutes

County Commission on Children and Families; and Shawn Miller

of the Oregon Grocery Association.

We thank each and every one of you for taking the time to join

us today and look forward to your testimony.

I yield to Congressman Walden.

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

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Mr. WALDEN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Again,

thank you for being here. I also want to recognize the mayor of

Pendleton, Phil Houk, who is in the back of the room, or was, and

we appreciate his participation in this as well.

I’m looking forward today to hearing from our witnesses, so I’ll

keep my remarks brief. But one of the things that I think where

we’ve achieved some success is getting the HIDTA designation for

Umatilla County. And just last week, it’s my understanding HIDTA

has freed up the first $100,000 for distribution, so I look forward,

Mr. Karl, to hearing your comments about what that really means

on the ground for the law enforcement community.

There are a number of issues from the Drug Enforcement Administration. I met with a group in my office in Washington last week

to talk about some of these, but I’d be curious to hear what you

have to say about the drug trafficking issues, as well as hopefully

we can get back to getting some additional help in this part of the

region.

For a while there was a DEA agent that was assigned to help

in this area. I worked with Asa Hutchinson when he was at DEA,

trying to get that done, and I continue to hear the request for that

help. And so I continue to convey that at every level.

But I also want to hear, too, about the proposal, if you know, the

pilot program in Kentucky dealing with the cleanup efforts in rural

areas, the Container Program. I’d be curious to hear what Oregon

has to say about that as well. Because, again, one of the issues I

hear about in the rural areas is the high cost of the cleanup. Not

the cleanup itself necessarily, but having to assign officers to watch

over one of these sites until the cleanup crew can arrive.

And I guess Kentucky has experimented with some Container

Programs that can—my understanding is cost per lab cleanup

there is down to $290, where nationwide it’s $1.940. I know there

are some other issues associated with that, but we welcome your

comments on that.

And, finally, Mr. Chairman, I’ve been after my own committee,

the Energy and Commerce Committee, to also do some oversight

hearings on the jurisdiction we have on environmental issues and

health issues. And I’m pleased to announce that Chairman Barton

has agreed to begin that process I understand maybe as early as

next week we’ll begin to have some hearings on the jurisdiction we

have in Energy and Commerce on this issue.

Clearly, we’re all in this together, whether in the Congress, in

the city council, or grandparent or parent. This is a problem that

is tearing apart the fabric of our community, our State, and our

country. It has international implications and it has local implications. And we’re here today to hear how best we can resolve the

problems we face and take what we learn here back to Washington

and hopefully be a better partner.

So with that, Mr. Chairman, thank you again for coming out and

enjoy the great Northwest and holding this hearing. Thank you.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

First, I’d like to do a couple of procedural matters. I’d ask that

all Members present submit their statements and questions into

the hearing record. Any written answers to questions provided by

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them will also be included in the record without objection. So ordered.

I’d request that all Members present be permitted to participate

in the hearing without objection. So ordered.

Let me just briefly explain what this committee is and how we

proceed here. First off, what’s been unusual about much of what

we’ve been doing is it’s very bipartisan. My ranking member, Elijah

Cummings, has been aligned with this. It is not the easiest thing

in various parts of Congress to be able to get clearances to be able

to do what I just read there.

Basically what that means is that in this particular case, Mr.

Cummings isn’t here today, but he’s letting the hearing go ahead

because we don’t have a partisan position on this issue. We also

allow Members from the region or the individuals to participate in

our subcommittee, which is not always true in other committees.

And so while that sounded technical, it was critical and it shows

the bipartisan nature of what we’re doing.

The second thing is, to briefly explain, in the congressional process, an authorizing committee like the committee that Mr. Walden

was just referring to on Energy and Commerce, would pass legislation out of Congress that sets parameters on how the law works.

The appropriations committee then can fund inside the limits in

the policies that are set by the authorizing committee.

The Government Reform Committee then has jurisdiction to review those policies to see if they’re being implemented by the executive branch in the way that Congress intended.

Actually, the oversight committee preceded the authorizing committee. It used to just be oversight and appropriations, and the authorizers came in later.

And we have a wide scope, probably the best, while our committee did lapse on the oversight over the last administration’s adventures, probably the best thing we’re known for right now is Mark

McGwire basically said he didn’t want to talk about the past.

You’ll see each of the witnesses has to be sworn in, as an oversight committee, and Rafael Palmeiro is learning what it means to

violate that oath. And the only question was, was he on steroids

while he testified or not. If he was, he’s going to go to jail for perjury. So we don’t take it lightly.

We also, as an oversight committee, have a right to subpoena

any records, e-mails, phone calls, as we did in the travel office

questions, as we did in other things with the administration.

Now, what’s a little unusual about this subcommittee is we’re

also an authorizing subcommittee on ONDCP. So Nick Coleman,

the counsel of this subcommittee, has already met most of the

HIDTAs around the country as we drafted the bill that passed

through the committee and is pending coming to the House floor,

mostly held up right now with the steroids fight, who has jurisdiction over the steroids legislation, but defines the parameters of

what the HIDTAs do, how many HIDTAs we’re going to need, how

much money goes into the HIDTAs, as well as the National Ad

Campaign and other things.

So we’re both an authorizing and oversight committee. But I

wanted to give you that idea of what this committee is and how

it differs from a lot of the other committees that you see.

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We usually do our hearings in Washington, but in my subcommittee, we’ve been trying to get out in the field more because

we can hear a little more diversity and it costs a lot less than everybody coming to Washington.

Now, our first panel is composed, as I said, of Rodney Benson,

Special Agent in charge of the Seattle Field Division of DEA;

Chuck Karl, Director of the Oregon High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area; and Dave Rodriguez, Director of the Northwest High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area.

I mentioned that we have to swear you all in, so if you’ll each

stand and raise your right hands.

[Witnesses sworn.]

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

We have a little light here that basically is 5 minutes; theoretically, the yellow comes on at 4. In a field hearing we’re a little

more generous with that, but that enables us to have time for questioning that will also be inserted in the record. And I look forward

to your testimony. Mr. Benson.

STATEMENTS OF RODNEY BENSON, SPECIAL AGENT IN

CHARGE, SEATTLE FIELD DIVISION, DRUG ENFORCEMENT

ADMINISTRATION; CHUCK KARL, OREGON HIDTA; AND DAVE

RODRIGUEZ, NORTHWEST HIDTA

STATEMENT OF RODNEY BENSON

Mr. BENSON. Chairman Souder, Congressman Walden, thank you

very much. My name is Rodney Benson. I’m the Special Agent in

charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration’s Seattle Field Division which encompasses the States of Washington, Oregon, Idaho,

and Alaska.

On behalf of DEA’s Administrator, Karen Tandy, I appreciate

your invitation today regarding DEA’s efforts in the Pacific Northwest to combat methamphetamine.

Unlike some regions of the country, for the Pacific Northwest

methamphetamine is not a new phenomenon. Law enforcement in

the Pacific Northwest for well over 20 years has been dealing firsthand with the devastating effects of this drug, which has spread

eastward and is now impacting communities across the Nation.

In the Pacific Northwest and across the Nation, we have initiated

and led successful enforcement efforts focusing on methamphetamine and its precursor chemicals, and have worked jointly with

our Federal, State, and local law enforcement partners to combat

this drug.

Methamphetamines found in the United States originates from

two general sources controlled by two distinct groups. Most of the

methamphetamines found in the United States is produced by Mexico-based and California-based Mexican traffickers whose organizations control superlabs and produce the majority of methamphetamine available throughout the country. Current data suggests

that roughly two-thirds of the methamphetamine consumed in the

United States comes from larger labs increasingly in Mexico.

The second source for methamphetamines in this country comes

from small toxic labs which produce relatively small amounts of

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methamphetamine and are not generally affiliated with major trafficking organizations. A precise breakdown is not available, but it

is estimated that these labs are responsible for approximately onethird of the methamphetamine consumed in this country.

Methamphetamine is very significant, it is a very significant illicit drug threat that faces the Seattle field Division. Demand,

availability, and abuse of methamphetamine remain high in all

areas of the Pacific Northwest. The market for methamphetamine

both in powder and crystal form in Oregon and Washington is

dominated by Mexican drug trafficking organizations.

Small toxic labs producing anywhere from a few grams to several

ounces of methamphetamine operate within each State. These labs

present unique problems to law enforcement and communities of

all facets. The DEA both nationally and in the Seattle Field Division focuses its overall enforcement operations on the large regional, national, and international drug trafficking organizations

responsible for the majority of the illicit drug supply in the United

States.

The Seattle Field Division’s enforcement efforts are led by DEA

special agents and task force officers from the State and local agencies who, along with our diversion investigators and intelligence research specialists, work to combat drug threats facing Oregon and

Washington.

During the last 4 years, the efforts of our offices in Oregon and

Washington have resulted in approximately 1,600 methamphetamine-related arrests, many of which occurred as part of investigations conducted under the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement

Task Force Program and the Priority Target Organizations Investigations Program.

The DEA feels that training is vital to all officers involved in

these hazardous situations, and since 1998, our office of training

has provided training to over 9,300 officers from across the country.

Within the Seattle Field Division, since fiscal year 2002 the DEA’s

office of training has provided clandestine laboratory training to

more than 320 officers from Oregon and Washington.

In 1990, the DEA established a hazardous waste cleanup program to address environmental concerns from the seizure of clandestine drug laboratories. This program promotes the safety of law

enforcement personnel and the public by using qualified companies

with specialized training and equipment to remove hazardous

waste.

The DEA’s Hazardous Waste Program, with the assistance of

grants from State and local law enforcement, supports and funds

the cleanup of the majority of laboratories seized in the United

States.

In fiscal year 2004, the cost of administering these cleanups was

approximately $17.8 million. Through our Hazardous Waste Program, since fiscal year 2002 the DEA has administered nearly

1,400 laboratory cleanups in Oregon and Washington at a cost of

over $2.9 million.

The DEA is keenly aware that we must continue our fight

against methamphetamine. Nationally and within the Seattle Field

Division we continue to fight methamphetamine on multiple fronts.

Our enforcement efforts are focused against methamphetamine

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trafficking organizations and those who provide the precursors necessary to manufacture this drug. We are also providing vital training and lab cleanups to our State and local partners as they combat methamphetamine.

Law enforcement has experienced some success in this fight,

though much work needs to be done. Thank you for your recognition of this important issue and the opportunity to testify here

today.

I’d be happy to answer any questions that you have. Thank you.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Benson follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Karl.

STATEMENT OF CHUCK KARL

Mr. KARL. Chairman Souder, distinguished members of the council, Congressman Walden, I’d like to begin my testimony by expressing my sincere appreciation for the opportunity to address you

today and for your efforts to seek out the nature of the methamphetamine threat and epidemic in the Northwest and the rest

of our country and seek solutions to that.

Oregon, as has been testified, has had an escalating meth problem for many years. So what’s new? The methamphetamine threat

in Oregon and the rest of the Nation is clearly a threat to our children, families, natural environment, government services, business

communities, and neighborhood livability.

In the last 2 years, from my perspective, with the HIDTA programing and through HIDTA intelligence working with task forces,

the available methamphetamine in Oregon has changed from predominantly the powder form of methamphetamine to the smokeable and nearly pure crystal form of methamphetamine. In my

opinion, the crystal form of methamphetamine is the single most

addictive and damaging drug to come along in my law enforcement

experience.

Its initial use is said to provide an intense and unforgettable

pleasure which can cause an immediate addiction. This can also

immediately cause——

Mr. SOUDER. Could you hold for a second? Is there a way to adjust the mic?

Mr. WALDEN. Maybe put that back away from you just a little

bit.

Mr. KARL. With a very little amount of methamphetamine abuse,

numerous wards of the community are created and may continue

to be wards of the community for a lifetime. These include drugaffected babies and children, abused and neglected children, learning disabled children, family, friends, the crippled addicts themselves, not to mention the often innocent victims of their drug related crimes.

A recent study conducted in Marion County by the District Attorney’s Office during August of this year found that five meth affected babies were born in 1 week. That’s almost one a day. A

treatment provider advised me this week that 90 percent of women

in treatment in Oregon are involved with meth. In Lane County,

State and child welfare programs hit a lamentable milestone, more

than 1,000 children living in foster homes.

Workers and job applicants in Oregon are failing drug tests this

year at a 30 percent higher rate than last year. In my opinion, Oregon and the Nation are looking into the face of another call to action to secure our homeland from those who will harm us personally, socially, and economically by poisoning us with a tasty piece

of crystal candy called methamphetamine. These predators are no

less than narco-terrorists.

Concerning Oregon’s solutions, the single most effective solution

in Oregon today responsible for stopping the escalating of meth

labs being discovered by law enforcement has been the recent State

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regulations and legislation intended to control the primary precursor chemical ingredient of ephedrine and pseudoephedrine.

The Oregon Department of Justice HIDTA Intelligence Center

has seen a 60 percent reduction in reported meth labs during 2005,

as compared to the period of 2004. And by the way, in Umatilla

County, there was one meth lab for every 800 residents in 2004.

And that’s probably underreported.

Please refer to my written testimony for some other solutions already implemented in Oregon. I’d like to spend the remaining time

addressing some remarks toward other potential solutions that relate to how the Federal Government can assist State and local communities.

First and foremost—and I know you’re aware of this—illegal immigration enforcement and border access still needs to be addressed at the Federal level. This is by far the greatest threat to

homeland security and safety from drug terrorism, as well as traditional terrorism.

The response to this issue involves numerous components such

as personal identification controls and requirements for obtaining

work permits, credit cards, Social Security cards, and driver’s licenses across the country.

Identity theft is a major crime in Oregon and a regional task

force has been established. Currently, a case being currently prosecuted in Washington County, OR, is one of the largest fraudulent

schemes for obtaining driver’s licenses in the United States.

Over 70,000 fraudulent Oregon driver’s licenses were issued. People were flying in from other States to obtain a fraudulent Oregon

driver’s license for identification. The potential threat and impact

of this case as it relates to traditional terrorism and drug trafficking is clear.

Additionally, the investigation and enforcement of immigration

violations is not coordinated and standardized across the country.

In Oregon, this represents a huge communication and cooperation

barrier between Federal, State, and local law enforcement agencies

working to ensure homeland security and conduct drug investigations.

For example, State and local law enforcement officers in Oregon

cannot inquire about or investigate the immigration status of anyone due to current State law. Further, they cannot take enforcement action against an illegal immigrant based solely on their status, nor can they use any State and local resources to assist any

Federal agency with immigration due to the State law.

My final remarks are meant to bring some perspective to our Nation’s drug problem as it relates to the issue of homeland security.

The threats from the drug problems facing our country are as great

as those facing our country from traditional terrorism. Be assured

I do not wish to diminish the threat from September 11th-type terrorism and the pain it has caused our country.

However, I do wish to state that this country has suffered far

more pain and loss of life and human potential, as well as the damage to our economy and infrastructure, from the gorilla drug terrorism being waged quietly and not so quietly in our cities and neighborhoods by these drug predators.

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SAMHSA data, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services

Administration, in just 34 metro areas of various sizes in 2002 reported 10,087 people died from drug-related deaths, not including

alcohol, leading drug treatment professionals to liken it to cancer

on a planet.

And I thank you for the opportunity and would be happy to answer questions about the HIDTA program.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Karl follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Rodriguez, good to see you again.

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. You as well, Chairman.

STATEMENT OF DAVE RODRIGUEZ

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. Chairman Souder, Congressman Walden, members of the community, my name is Dave Rodriguez, and I’ve been

the HIDTA director since 1997. I want to thank the committee for

giving me the opportunity to testify today.

Mr. WALDEN. Can you hear him in the back? Yours might need

to be moved closer.

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. The Northwest HIDTA fosters partnerships between law enforcement agencies. At last count, we had the participation of 392 task force officers and support staff representing 96

law enforcement agencies Statewide. We emphasize information

sharing, case support, deconfliction practices, and training.

As indicated in the 2005 HIDTA Threat Assessment, methamphetamine abuse, availability, and production continues to pose

a significant threat to Washington State. The data from the National Drug Intelligence Center indicates that 91.1 percent of the

State and local law enforcement agencies in Washington described

methamphetamine as the greatest drug threat in the area.

The number of reported meth labs in Washington began to decrease in 2002, when the State ranked third nationally with 1,445

lab-related seizures as reported by the El Paso Intelligence Center.

Washington then dropped to sixth in the Nation in 2003 with 928

seizures, and again ranked sixth in 2004 with 935.

Production creates and introduces toxic and hazardous waste in

the environment that endangers law enforcement personnel and

emergency response teams, as well as adults and children visiting

or residing in or near the homes of methamphetamine producers.

The dangers associated with meth production are not limited to

chemical toxicities. Oftentimes individuals addicted to this drug are

extremely violent. On March 17, 2005, DEA task force agents and

officers of Yakima, WA, working in a HIDTA-supported investigation, conducted an undercover operation to buy 1 pound of methamphetamine ice from a male and female suspected of being drug

traffickers.

During the course of the arrest, agency task force officers were

fired upon and were involved in a high speed pursuit of the subject.

The male subject jumped out of the vehicle in front of a convenience store where he had taken a female hostage and held her at

gunpoint for about 2 hours before he surrendered.

Pseudoephedrine and ephedrine are the most commonly diverted

precursor chemicals used in illicit drug production in Washington

State. An increasingly popular method of acquiring precursor

chemicals in Washington is through Internet sales. Although moving pseudoephedrine from Canada to the United States has decreased, increasing quantities of ephedrine are being smuggled

across the U.S.-Canada border.

Data reported from the western sector in Washington of the U.S.-

Canada border indicates that 1,462 pounds of ephedrine has been

seized in calendar year 2005, representing a 48 percent increase

from calendar year 2004. There has been no pseudoephedrine seizures reported in calendar year 2004 or 2005.

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In spite of reports of a declining number of meth labs in Washington State, the level of methamphetamine abuse remains high.

Data from the Treatment Episode Data Set indicates a significant

increase in amphetamine-related treatment admissions in 2004—

9,356—, ending the previous downward trend from a peak in

2001—8,260.

High purity, low-cost methamphetamine is readily available

throughout the State. The National Drug Survey shows that 98

percent of State and local law enforcement agencies in Washington

described meth availability as high or moderate in their jurisdictions. The availability and demand for crystal methamphetamine is

also increasing throughout the State.

Most of meth available in Washington is produced in large-scale

superlabs primarily located in Mexico and California. The Federalwide Drug Seizure System data indicates that Washington ranked

sixth in the Nation, based on weight, for Federal seizures of methamphetamine in calendar year 2004, down from fourth in calendar

year 2003.

Although the use of meth itself is a crime, there are several other

crimes that have been increasing because of the prolific use of the

drug. There is a strong correlation within areas with high levels of

meth abuse with increased levels of identity theft, auto theft, burglary, assaults, and domestic violence.

As the meth threat from clan labs has declined, the transportation of meth from other States has increased. On February 13,

2005, 24 suspects were arrested for conspiracy and possession with

intent to distribute meth and cocaine throughout the Northwest.

This was the result of a 21⁄2 year multi-agency cooperative investigation of a significant drug trafficking organization involved in

bringing large quantities of meth and cocaine from Mexico through

the Tri-Cities to the greater Spokane area, and then distributing

these drugs to customers throughout the Northwest, including the

States of Idaho and Montana.

Agents and officers obtained 10 Federal search warrants for residences in Spokane and Franklin County of Tri-Cities, as well as

Kootenai County in Idaho. During the investigation and execution

of search warrants and other enforcement operations, agents and

officers seized 10 pounds of methamphetamine, 8 pounds of cocaine, one semi-automatic handgun, 10 vehicles, and approximately

$60,000 in currency.

Also, agents and officers were able to establish a direct link between this criminal organization and the drug traffickers operating

out of Mexico.

In 2004, the Northwest HIDTA provided over 53,000 pieces of

print and electronic meth education material, as well as provided

information with the HIDTA Web site M-Files, which received over

2,000,000 hits and 80,000 visitors.

To conclude, I would like to thank you for the opportunity to testify today regarding the methamphetamine epidemic, and at this

time if you have any questions, I’d be pleased to answer them.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Rodriguez follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Lots of questions. First, I just need to—we may provide a most likely series of some written questions because there’s

no way to try and get all these.

I want to ask some basic factual questions. You’ve all provided

great specific data which is really helpful. Because as we went into

this hearing process a couple years ago, the data was not as specific and often we’d just have kind of general national information.

And this is real interesting.

AUDIENCE MEMBER. We can’t hear.

Mr. SOUDER. When did Washington State——

AUDIENCE MEMBER. Can’t hear.

Mr. SOUDER. When did Washington State pass a precursor chemical—is it behind the counter? Is it a ‘‘Schedule V’’.

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. The latest rendition of the Washington State law

limits the access of pseudoephedrine. It is behind the counter or is

locked up. It also has an age requirement of 18 years or older. It

also maintains a law where you have to show ID, and you’re limited to two packs of pseudoephedrine in a 2-hour period.

Mr. SOUDER. When did that law take affect.

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. Took effect in July.

Mr. SOUDER. So bottom line is there were already 3 years of decline in Washington prior to the law.

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. Yes, but we had already subjected

pseudoephedrine to other controls not as strict as these, but there

were regulations passed including increasing penalties on meth

cooks, as well as penalties for drugs endangering children from the

meth labs.

Mr. SOUDER. Part of the difficulty of looking at what’s having

what impact, I was trying to sort out, based on the data, because

Washington still has a lot of labs. When did Meth Watch get implemented?

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. Meth Watch is approximately 3 years in our

State. It started in Spokane and it spread from there. It’s in approximately 29 of 39 counties.

Mr. SOUDER. And when did the initial—in other words, when you

hit your peak in 2001 and 2002, Meth Watch was the first reaction

with increased law enforcement also prior to that.

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. Meth Watch was implemented around that same

period, but I would suspect that the results of our State drop had

to do with our State summit and the fact that we formed meth action teams in each of our counties. Each of our counties has an

interdisciplinary meth action team of law enforcement, prosecutors,

treatment prevention, education professionals. And that’s when we

started getting our hands around the meth issues.

Mr. SOUDER. Because you had a 33 percent decline in the number of meth labs, even though it’s still high, and that’s before any

control law, which is interesting because what we’re finding is this

is a pretty typical pattern, that any action has an impact. And it’s

one of the methods, and often it’s implied that it’s the only method.

In Oregon, it looked like the data was up and down a little bit

more. Mr. Karl, why do you——

Mr. KARL. Well, I think our Meth Watch program started about

3 years ago and kind of got really implemented about 2 years ago

Statewide. And we did have from 2001 a slow decline in the numVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:49 Dec 14, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00061 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\27723.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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ber of reported meth labs. I attribute that primarily to the economic downturn in the lack of law enforcement resources.

There were over 100 State police officers laid off, and there just

wasn’t the number of police officers, even in small jurisdictions,

that were able to investigate or respond to leads about meth labs

and underreporting because of that. Only in November of last year

did precursor controls in the form of putting pseudoephedrine behind the counter, mandated by—that was November of last year—

they put it behind the counter by the Medical Board in Oregon, and

since then we’ve seen a huge drop.

Now, the State legislature enacted a bill that will take effect in

2006 that will make it actually a prescription requirement here to

obtain pseudoephedrine products. And so we, like I said, have seen

a 60 percent drop during the same period in the number of reported labs.

Counties like Umatilla that are on State borders, and even Portland which is on the State border, although in Eastern Oregon

there’s several borders that they state where pseudoephedrine controls are not as strict as in Washington or Oregon, and so there’s

still some, a lot of pseudoephedrine being brought in from other

States and there’s some being smuggled in as well from Canada

and Mexico.

But primarily what I see in Oregon is the shift, and I talked to

a treatment provider this week who said we haven’t seen a reduction in the demand of treatment because of the pseudo control laws

because the addiction caused from it is still being fed, but now it’s

being fed by this crystal meth coming in from Mexico, and coming

in in large quantities.

One pound in Portland can be bought at any time for $9,000,

which is about 1,800 individual uses and a profit of over $20,000,

so——

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Benson and Mr. Rodriguez, we talked a second

about the Canadian border. I understood Mr. Rodriguez’s statement where you have HIDTA teams and a very aggressive watch

on hydroponic marijuana and swapping for cocaine and guns and

heroin at that border.

In Detroit, the DEA’s sting took down looked like 40 percent of

the entire pseudoephedrine market in the United States at that

time. It’s interesting, because I believe Mr. Rodriguez’s testimony

says there was a drop in the pseudoephedrine, but moving to

ephedrine, which you believe is moving to California.

You had in your written testimony, Mr. Benson, an example of

where you took down a superlab in Salem. Are you convinced—

could you explain a little bit what you mean by the difference between pseudoephedrine and ephedrine? Why couldn’t ephedrine

also be broken in and become a source of supply to the mom and

pop and what we would call the slightly larger than mom and pop

operations? Is that likely to be a variation response to it going behind the counter?

Mr. BENSON. Mr. Chairman, they very well could bring in ephedrine into those smaller labs as well. What we saw at that superlab

outside of Salem was obviously members of a Mexican criminal organization where they chose to just really deploy some of their

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workers up, and they felt that they were comfortable in that particular location and created a massive lab that was taken down.

But we have seen an increase just over the last—it’s not a lot of

seizures. It was three seizures that totaled a little over 500 kilograms of ephedrine that have come across from Canada this year.

Mr. SOUDER. Do you have any comments on that, Mr. Rodriguez,

on how you think this—do you think the ephedrine will get into

what used to be the mom and pop labs, as far as Canada? And let

me ask you another question, both of those, and Mr. Karl as well,

both of you, I know in my district, which isn’t on the Canada border, but there’s a huge business in seniors’ prescriptions.

The question is, when is this going to move to the mom and pop

lab just to go on the Internet and get it shipped in, which will be

much harder to find than the Meth Watch programs going through

pharmacies and grocery stores. Have you seen any of that?

Do we have any monitoring efforts to see whether it’s coming in,

any friendly working relationships with UPS and Fed-Ex, trying to

figure out what’s happening here? Hydroponic marijuana plants

are being shipped across. We track that to some degree.

Mr. BENSON. Mr. Chairman, we do track with our Canadian colleagues and we have a close working relationship with the RCMP

on looking at ephedrine moving through Canada. And we have

seen, you know, this year an increase mainly in three seizures coming in.

And it’s clearly—our intelligence indicated it was going down

into California to be manufactured in the superlab operations.

Mr. SOUDER. Anything on the Internet.

Mr. BENSON. We have seen a couple of examples of

pseudoephedrine being sold on the Internet here in this State.

Mr. SOUDER. Let me make this comment to you. Most things people think they are buying from Canada are actually fronts coming

up from Mexico. For seniors who think they’re buying Canadian

drugs, those are often fronts—and we’re learning this increasingly—because Canada doesn’t have, whatever drug it is, the

amount that’s coming into the United States right now.

Often those are based, you can see when you go to the Mexican

border, drug stores all along the lines that are shipping in as pharmacies. So just because it’s coming in theoretically from Canada on

the Internet doesn’t even mean it’s coming from Canada.

But I’m wondering whether, in the HIDTAs, have you looked at

this or heard stories on the street? Clearly there’s going to be a reaction to move to crystal meth, and some of it will be try to find

alternative sources for—

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. Mr. Chairman, as far as the Internet, there is

anecdotal information that we have. I talked to one of the officersin-charge of the Pierce County Special Investigation Unit.

Pierce County is the county in Washington where we have the

most meth labs. There were over 500 reported in just that one

county. It’s always led Washington State, and at one time it was

No. 3 in the West Coast behind San Bernardino and Riverside

Counties.

The officer-in-charge told me that when they raided this one lab

in the county, after they had entered the lab, secured the suspects,

that there was a delivery of pseudoephedrine through UPS that

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had arrived at the residence. And the pseudoephedrine, they found

out, was ordered over the Internet. It came out of India.

And it was contained in—there were 10 jars in the box. Each jar

had about I believe it was 500 tablets of 30 or 60 milligrams of

pseudoephedrine. And he had been ordering numerous amounts of

this pseudoephedrine over the Internet, not only from India but

also from New Zealand.

And so that, I can report that’s one of the issues that we have,

as well.

Mr. SOUDER. I mean, this is really troubling, because it means

it will be harder than if we monitored it wholesale going into

local—because one of your big sting operations you have written in

here, too, and you all refer to is working with the wholesalers and

taking down some of the wholesalers because you can see where it

went to a retail pharmacy or grocery store because they all have

to buy from the wholesale.

So we have methods of tracking that. What we don’t have is

methods of tracking it over the Internet coming from India.

Mr. WALDEN. Mr. Chairman, I actually have legislation that will

help deal with that. Congressman Jim Davis, a Democrat out of

Florida and I put in last session and have it in this session that

deals with this whole issue of Internet drug sales by requiring a

standard which the National Boards of Pharmacy have agreed to

and you would label the site.

Now, you say you could counterfeit the site, but we link back to

the control mechanism being the credit card companies, that they

can’t process a transaction on the Internet that isn’t from a certified site. Then you would know that the drugs you were purchasing on the Internet were as safe and secure as the drugs you purchase down the street at your local pharmacy.

As you can imagine, the credit card companies don’t like any

piece of this because they don’t want to be in that part of the business. But if you can’t track the money, I don’t know any way to

track the Internet sales. And you’re absolutely right, this thing is

going to get ahead of us in that respect.

Mr. Karl, I want to followup on some of your testimony involving

Oregon and the issuance of 70,000 Oregon driver’s licenses that

were issued fraudulently.

Mr. KARL. That’s conservative. It’s up toward the top end, toward

80,000 is what I understand. I do not have access to the exact details, but I know it’s currently in prosecution by the Oregon Department of Justice in Washington County, and that’s phenomenal.

Mr. WALDEN. And was it, just on the legal side, wasn’t Oregon

one of the States that had no requirement to prove citizenship to

get a driver’s license.

Mr. KARL. At the time, I believe that is correct. The process that

was followed was a citizen of the United States, a Hispanic citizen

of the United States, was running a business to provide false identification to the Department of Motor Vehicles in order for people

to prove that they were a resident and could get a valid Oregon

driver’s license.

That process has been tightened up, obviously, as a result of this

case, but it’s a—I bring it up as an example of how a lot of the

identification processes need to be tightened nationwide.

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Mr. WALDEN. Well, as you know, we passed the Real ID Act to

do precisely that, or at least to try to drive it federally, which you

kind of hate to do as a States’ rights guy. But at some point we

have a disintegration problem, this national ID problem.

And we know from the 9/11 Commission report some of the

highjackers had gotten driver’s licenses from I believe Virginia and

some other State that they were getting ID cards that they were

using to board the plane that they used to drive into the Pentagon,

as well as the Twin Towers. So hopefully we can tighten up, as we

have on the Federal level, the ID process.

I’d like to know more, now that Umatilla County has been declared a HIDTA, what you’re seeing and what’s flowing this way

and what can be expected on the ground here and how it will affect

the whole region out here.

Mr. KARL. Well, clearly, Mexican drug trafficking organizations

are operating, have been operating for several years in Umatilla

County, in Eastern Oregon, and most rural parts of Eastern Oregon. As recently as last month, over 20,000 plants in six separate

groves were taken off that was run by a drug trafficking organization.

The response—and some of these are in Umatilla County and

neighboring counties. The response, thanks to HIDTA funding basically, is not to just cut the plants and arrest whoever might be

there at the time, but to conduct a thorough investigation before

those plants are cut, when it’s first discovered, and subsequently.

And so currently we have an OCDETF case going that impacts

the whole region where law enforcement agencies that are participating, like the Blue Mountain Narcotics Enforcement Team and

other narcotics investigators in Eastern Oregon, are participating

with the DEA and the other agencies involved in the OCDETF to

do an investigation that will result in dismantling of these drug

trafficking organizations.

So the HIDTA funding brings resources to target the organizations to disrupt the supply that provides resources to do that.

Mr. WALDEN. OK. Mr. Benson, I want to followup on the question I posed in my opening remarks about the continued requests

I get from this area for more, greater DEA presence on the ground

here.

What’s the likelihood of that potentiality?

Mr. BENSON. Right now, how we respond to the region is

through—there are a couple different ways. One is through our

Portland office, which is obviously a distance away. And then we

have our office in Tri-Cities. We have two agents that have been

deployed there since around 1995, 1996, or so. That’s how we’ve responded.

Clearly, there’s a continuing threat here and there needs to be

more response. One thing that we’ve done nationwide is we’ve

begun deploying our mobile enforcement teams to focus on methamphetamine. We just did that in Idaho. That is deploy based on

the request from a sheriff or police chief in a particular area. I

would encourage that for here.

It’s a team of nine agents that, based on a request from a sheriff,

an assessment will come in, we’ll conduct that, and then they get

deployed anywhere from 90, 120 days, 6 months, working side by

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side with our State, local counter- parts to deal with the specific

drug threat in that region.

Mr. WALDEN. Do you think that 60 or 90-day assignments is

going to do the job here.

Mr. BENSON. We would go in looking with the mind-set of looking

at the targets that the local law enforcement authorities have identified that are the most significant, and we would attempt to do as

much as we could in that timeframe. Now, when that meth team

would leave, again that would pick up more responsibility on the

part of our Tri-Cities office and our agency report.

Mr. WALDEN. And you’ve got, what, two agents in Tri-Cities.

Mr. BENSON. That’s correct.

Mr. WALDEN. And then how many do you have this side of the

Cascades, Eastern Oregon.

Mr. BENSON. We have offices in Oregon: Portland, Salem, Eugene, Medford. And then in Washington on the east side, we have

an office in Yakima, Tri-Cities, and Spokane.

Mr. WALDEN. All right. So nothing east of Bend, then.

Mr. BENSON. No, we don’t.

Mr. WALDEN. Does the office you have in Idaho cross back over

on the Ontario side.

Mr. BENSON. We have one office in Idaho, and that’s in Boise.

Mr. WALDEN. OK. Well, I just know it’s a continuing issue here.

Consider it popularity, I guess. Everybody wants you. Well, except

the bad guys. But clearly that’s an ongoing issue. I know when, as

I said, Asa Hutchinson was head of the DEA, I talked directly with

him about it, and we got some help for a while.

And I continue to hear that. And I hope as you’re evaluating your

resources, you’ll take a look at Northeast Oregon as a place where

there’s certainly demand for additional assistance. And I know

you’re constricted on budgets, too.

Mr. BENSON. Yeah. I will give you my word we’ll do our best to

help our partners in law enforcement out here.

Mr. WALDEN. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SOUDER. Let me do some additional questions here. Mr. Benson, if you can’t answer these today, if you’ll respond in writing—

how much assistance in dollars is DEA providing to State and local

law enforcement agencies in Oregon and Washington in finding

and cleaning up meth labs, including smaller labs?

In other words, one of the things we’re trying to sort through is

because our Federal agencies are basically structured to take down

bigger trafficking organizations, it’s clear—and I think it was just

yesterday in a memo from Director Tandy’s office that we had requested at an earlier hearing of what some of the national DEA efforts are, and what I think that they’re learning at the Federal

level is because of market demand in the different regions, DEA

has actually been doing more on the ground with meth than they

realized even at the Washington level.

But do you know off the top of your head what you’ve spent on

meth labs in this zone?

Mr. BENSON. I have a figure here, Mr. Chairman, in Oregon in

2004, $516,000.

Mr. SOUDER. And do you have a trend line on that.

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Mr. BENSON. No, but I can get that for you. And then in Washington, $44,230.

Mr. SOUDER. At the end of your written statement, you had a cumulative figure. If you could break that down for us by year in the

followup.

Mr. BENSON. Sure.

Mr. SOUDER. Also, if you could give us a dollar value of the methrelated training provided to State and local law enforcement in Oregon and Washington, so we could have that for the record.

And to any of you who know the answer to this question, in addition to the HIDTAs for Oregon and Washington, do you know how

many drug task forces are funded by Byrne grants here? Do you

have any idea? Is DEA a participant in drug task forces as well as

in the HIDTAs?

Mr. BENSON. Pretty much every office we have in my division,

Mr. Chairman, is a task force component. So we have that merger

of DEA agents and State local officers. I couldn’t give you the number on Byrne grant task forces.

Mr. SOUDER. And, generally speaking, around the country do you

know of any case where it isn’t a Meth Hot Spots proposal or, in

other words, a drug task force usually has to have some kind of

funding base with which it gets funded.

Could you—we’ll ask—individual sheriffs may know here, too,

but could you do a quick check of those different offices and ask

them, in the drug task forces they’re participating in, how many of

those came through a COPS, Meth Hot Spots grant and how many

of those came from a Byrne grant? And if they didn’t come from

either the Byrne grant or Meth Hot Spots, where did they get the

money?

Because I don’t think DEA generally funds the task force directly. I think you provide the agents to a task force that is usually

funded.

Mr. BENSON. Or our task force operations would be funded from

within our agency budget.

Mr. SOUDER. So some of your agents may be participating in

those kind of task forces.

Mr. BENSON. Yes.

Mr. SOUDER. If you could break that out so we can get a picture

because Byrne grant money is used in multiple different ways. The

COPS grants are used in certain ways. But certain members have

designated their COPS money to be used for meth hot spots. And

in other cases they use COPS money for meth and it isn’t designated a hot spot, but that’s how they fund the task force. And

we’re trying to figure out, when we do certain funding shifts, how

that works.

How many meth cases in Oregon and Washington State are

funded by OCDETF? Do you know how many currently are being

funded?

Mr. BENSON. We have several OCDETF cases ongoing at any

given time. I could get you the exact number. It’s probably—our

priority target investigations are usually OCDETF and we’re usually around 50 or so at any given time that are open and active.

64

Mr. SOUDER. Would you off the top of your head, and you could

also then give us the backup info, do you have any idea of how

many of those are meth cases? 10 percent? 30 percent? 50 percent?

Mr. BENSON. I would say probably in my division, overall casewise, probably 30 or 40 percent are methamphetamine cases.

Mr. SOUDER. The first time I heard that statistic was at a closed

briefing in Washington just a few weeks ago. And that fits what

we heard from national DEA. But what I’m trying to get a handle

on here is that if 30 to 40 percent of the meth use—the OCDETF

cases are meth, then where are we getting this 8 percent figure in

usage.

In other words, there’s some kind of disconnect here that I’m trying to sort through. Because we’re constantly being told by ONDCP

and others that meth is 8 percent. And nowhere, including the previous hearings and now you today in a formal hearing, you’re saying that this zone has been hit a little harder, but if 30 to 40 percent of your cases, you know, you’ve got this 25 to 50 range, that’s

a significant percentage of the organized crime cases.

This isn’t mom and pop where they’re cooking for three people,

because you wouldn’t deal with somebody who’s cooking for three

people in an OCDETF case. These would be a higher level case.

Mr. BENSON. Right.

Mr. SOUDER. One other thing we’ve been having trouble getting

data on is where we come up with the 70 percent or 30 percent figure or two-thirds, one-third. Is that partly where this is coming

from, that your OCDETF cases are suggesting that they’re so

large?

Let me ask you another question before you answer that one.

How many of the cases are kind of major distribution ephedrine

and pseudophedrine, how many of those, roughly, you can break it

out in more detail, I’m just trying to get at is it half, is it a quarter,

is it 10 percent, how many of them are going to superlabs and how

many of these are this medium type lab that you did in Salem, you

know, where you have—it’s not a mom and pop cooking for three

people? There it was cooking for a large number of people, maybe

eight houses strung together, something like that.

Mr. WALDEN. And before you do all that, can you, for the audience, define OCDETF? We’re using the acronym.

Mr. BENSON. Sure. That’s the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force Program that’s managed by the Department of

Justice.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

Mr. BENSON. Mr. Chairman, that laboratory south of Salem had

80-pound production capability. So it was—I believe it’s the largest

lab we’ve ever seized in this State.

Percentage-wise, most of our OCDETF cases targeting methamphetamine trafficking organizations are, again, targeting the

major distributors. They’re moving multiple pounds of crystallized

methamphetamine. And we trace it, as Mr. Rodriguez mentioned

that one case that was tied to Spokane to Tri-Cities to Los Angeles

to Phoenix all the way down into Mexico.

And our goal on every case is to take out that biggest piece of

the organization as possible. But most of our cases, to answer your

question, are focusing on those larger methamphetamine traffickVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:49 Dec 14, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00068 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\27723.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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ers. We do have some that are looking at those responsible for

chemical supply, but the number is lower. But I could get the

exact.

Mr. KARL. I think a key component here is also that these are

polyrung organizations and so likely many of them—and my knowledge of Oregon’s OCDETF cases involve polydrugs. So organizations taking the B.C. bud from Canada to San Diego and picking

up the cocaine and bringing it back and distributing it every place

along the way, as well as bringing in marijuana with methamphetamine with pseudoephedrine together so that it—they’re diversified

clearly. And so those organizations are the bigger organizations

that are doing that in large quantities.

Mr. SOUDER. Two more questions, and then we may ask some followup, see if Congressman Walden has any more. One of the tricks

in this lab reporting is how much of this—it’s been a constant question in law enforcement and drug enforcement in general. And that

is that if you’re successful in arresting people, it looks like drug

abuse went up.

And then people say we’ve been spending all this money and the

problem went up, but it may just be that law enforcement got aggressive. And then on the other hand, if you cut back that law enforcement, then it looks like you’re making progress when, in fact,

it just means you’re not arresting.

One of the questions here is—and the interesting thing about the

Washington State decline is that if there wasn’t any—Oregon becomes more complicated because you threw a variable in, that

there were fewer people to do the arresting, therefore the decline

might not have been a decline.

Is that true in Washington, or do you believe there have been

changes in the numbers? Or do you believe that, in fact, to some

degree, as we increase awareness, we get a bump up in labs, and

then how can we, as policymakers, look at an area? It’s almost like

when the area becomes aware, the number of labs go up. And then

we see the turn a couple years later. It’s very hard for us to figure

out when you’re trying—unlike other drugs, you can chart this

across the country.

And you can see it around national forest areas in Arkansas and

Missouri and other areas, and then it’s in the rural areas, and then

it goes into some suburban and eventually it hits Omaha, Minneapolis, Portland.

The chart you have there for Washington State, it’s like this is

happening in every State in the county. Now, it’s in Titusville, PA;

Western North Carolina; hopping into some of upstate New York.

Just marching east. Same pattern. It doesn’t just go into the city.

It goes out.

And mom and pop superlabs move in, and it’s like how many

years of watching this do we have to see the pattern here? But part

of this is trying to figure out early warning signs in areas that

haven’t been hit yet, is how do we account for the numbers, and

the awareness leads to more arrests, more people understanding

the smell next to them, watching the impact of peopling coming

into the pharmacies, teachers reporting kids, exposure.

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. I think it is a paradox. Clearly, there is going

to be a short-term bump up as you increase community awareness

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through different means, whether it’s prevention, whether it’s education, or whether it’s just law enforcement. So we’ve seen a bump

up.

However, going back to my example with Pierce County, which

again leads Washington State in the number of labs, we probably

have most of our resources in that county. We probably have the

most aggressive type of campaign in that county, and yet we’ve

been able to drive those numbers down a little bit, but not much.

And talking to the task force managers is that they have a very

aggressive street program with the community, with the various

partners to make sure that this meth awareness issue is rampant

throughout the community. And they say that’s what’s keeping

their numbers up, because they keep getting more and more information from the community regarding meth labs and meth dump

sites, etc.

So would we have the same reaction in other counties if they

were as aggressive? We don’t know. We do feel, though, as far as

the national numbers just like you mentioned, they are being

underreported. Because if we look at the numbers from the Department of Ecology, those numbers are considerably higher than the

EPIC numbers would be.

That’s because they count everything, whereas EPIC numbers

you only count those where you have law enforcement present. But

that’s due to the reporting.

Mr. SOUDER. My last question is, one of the unique challenges we

have with this, just let me briefly say, for example, the EPA, who

isn’t here today, one of the things that they aren’t used to dealing

with is the size of the small lab type things. They’re used to dealing with hazardous waste sites.

But particularly if you look at where many mom and pop labs

are, they’re in rural areas, often around watersheds. And it’s a little like when you go down to Columbia, you fly over, there were

lots of different labs flowing into the Amazon Basin, and it accumulates on the Amazon, even if no single lab was there.

But that’s not the way we’re used to looking at EPA questions.

Similar in how DEA, historically, HIDTAs have been set up. They

were looking at the major drug traffickers; take down the majors,

and local law enforcement would get the smaller mom and pop.

Now we have an epidemic that’s in the rural areas where we historically have not structured our Federal response to deal with

that.

We also have local communities that don’t have big drug task

forces. Their treatment programs aren’t as big. The prevention programs, they may have gotten $2,500 at the schools, not $15,000 at

the school. May have gotten $6,000. They can afford part of the

payment for one speaker to come in or a few pencils. It’s a different

challenge for us.

What do you think we could do at the Federal level that takes

into account the leg of this? I personally believe we’re going to be

able to tackle the crystal meth much like we tackle other types of

national things. It means we’ll be fairly ineffective, but we’ll work

at it hard and get some of the big guys.

But we really don’t have a Federal clearcut strategy of how to

deal with these scattered multiple addicts who maybe go into the

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county jail for a brief period and then they come right back out and

startup again.

Do you have any suggestions of what we can do in the HIDTA

program? Should there be a subpart of the HIDTA program that

we designate to underfunded rural areas? How do we do this? Because clearly the cost is disproportionate to the population. The

cost is disproportionate to the number of users.

We’re dealing with a low number of addicts, low number of users,

but it’s a huge impact on areas that don’t have resources, much

like some urban centers where they don’t have as many cash resources.

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. My suggestion would be to, first of all, gather

good documentation, good data on the rural areas. And then possibly devise a national program through the HIDTA program, possibly using a certain amount of funding to do that, to address that

issue. But, again, I think we have to know what we’re looking at

before we can decide what we want to do on it.

Mr. SOUDER. Why do you think that isn’t being done?

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. Well, I think it is being done in a sporadic manner. I don’t think it’s being done by all reporting entities in a systemic or uniform manner. And there might be something that——

Mr. SOUDER. Have you ever heard of anybody, without endangering yourselves, have you ever had anybody from Washington ask

you that question, from ONDCP or anybody? Does there appear to

be any kind of national awareness of it?

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. Not from ONDCP.

Mr. SOUDER. Anybody else?

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. Well, we get, just like you, we get the concerns

from the rural community. And, again, they’re saying they’re being

stretched, they have limited resources, and they are petitioning the

State to be more proactive.

And we’re fortunate in that we have a State agency, the Washington State Patrol, that is able to re-allocate resources within the

State to meet this. They have, matter of fact, we have them as a

HIDTA initiative. It’s called Washington State Proactive Meth

Team. And that’s all they do is work on meth-related issues,

whether it’s clan lab or whether it’s trafficking issues.

And they’ll go as a fly away team to any part of the State that

they need to be at. That’s currently in place right now. And they

do address in a certain manner rural areas with that problem.

Mr. SOUDER. If members—and you have this kind of now in your

HIDTAs. If rural areas came to you and said, we would like to get

the information on what other rural communities are doing across

the country to try to address this, like the Kentucky Cleanup Program, like the Montana Prevention Program, like this program

here in Oregon, like the Partnership for a Drug-Free America, is

there a clearinghouse?

Has anybody suggested there’s a clearinghouse? Where would

you send people to get any national info?

Mr. KARL. I don’t have an answer to that. I know that this is a

serious issue. Because as I stated a moment ago, clearly the cartels

are taking advantage of rural America and are taking advantage

of rural Eastern Oregon. And we know that. I know that sitting in

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Salem. We know that in downtown Portland, where a lot of resources are to investigate those.

Now, with the National Marijuana Initiative, Oregon received $250,000 to assist in investigating these organizations operating in

rural Oregon. And so we have begun a process of providing resources to those who are stakeholders in that investigation.

And we have linked with, through the HIDTA model, Federal,

State, and local together onto that task. That deals with the upper

echelon, the organizational level.

But to respond to your question about the small folks, I don’t

know how the locals—and that’s the rub, is how do the locals do

both? How do they help participate with the big investigations, still

take care of the neighborhood issues, livability issues that they

have with mom and pop labs, from the crimes related to drug addiction, and so forth? That’s a difficult one.

It’s a resource issue, and resources are short. So the beauty of

the HIDTA structure is that it leverages Federal, State, and local.

For example, in some recent cases, we brought together most of the

Federal agencies and local agencies to do some major cases in Eastern Oregon. Hundreds of officers.

And that will take care of some things, but it won’t take care of

the day to day. Those are the once or twice a year big cases that

come along. So at the lower level, they need more resources. They

clearly need more resources.

Mr. SOUDER. The DEA has done, I presume, lots of drug lab

training in this zone, as well as they have around the country.

That’s one program. But what I find in Indiana is the training of

how to clean it up isn’t the big problem. It’s having the labs in

which to clean it up and the resources to do that, which is why

DEA has been raising a fuss about the Kentucky model and trying

to find a better way to do this.

I have not understood in the CTAC program—is the CTAC program run separate at a regional level from the HIDTAs? Do you

have any input into that? Or is that just one of the separate divisions of the ONDCP?

Mr. KARL. The technology program.

Mr. SOUDER. Yeah, where local law enforcement can——

Mr. KARL [continuing]. Access technology? Yeah. Eastern Oregon

has taken advantage of that program.

Mr. SOUDER. Do you determine what products are that they’re eligible for, or is that done out of Washington?

Mr. KARL. No. I can help them access the program. Some have

accessed the program independently of the HIDTA program, and

the HIDTA program has also referred agencies. Because I can’t

apply for the agency. The agency has to apply. And some have gotten very technical equipment.

Mr. SOUDER. What I’ve seen in my district is that a lot of times

this is basically everything from listening to goggles to all this type

of thing to better work at organizational.

But I haven’t heard of anything, partly because they’re a bigger

costly item, but have you ever looked at or is anybody looking at

possibly making the mobile cleanup labs and things part of the

technology that a region could apply for if several counties went together so it wouldn’t be so far away?

69

Because I know in Indiana, often they’re sitting there for 6

hours. And these vehicles cost $250,000. But isn’t that one way we

could kind of look at how to help local law enforcement, and have

you heard in CTAC, particularly, looking at things that could be

helping local law enforcement in meth mom and pop lab cases, as

opposed to the traditional way we’ve provided equipment?

Mr. KARL. I had a call this last week on the very issue from another legislator, and it was, what do you think of the idea of pooling chemicals in a particular place and then have them picked up,

you know, when the supply gets large?

There are a lot of issues involved. And it implies that the police

officers doing the investigation will actually collect those chemicals,

haul them to this site, and that’s not going to happen. I don’t know

many law enforcement chiefs and sheriffs that want their officers,

who aren’t trained, to do that pickup.

So it falls then back to the fire department. OK. Is the fire department going to pick that up? They’re trained in HAZMAT and

how to deal with them and put them into a pool resource. That’s

the way we did it in the old days, and we found we were in danger

of exploding the place because we were mixing chemicals.

So we then went to a different hazmat response. So a mobile lab

or mobile cleanup lab is still going to be faced with those issues.

Mr. SOUDER. That’s what they’re supposed to be training them

to do.

Mr. KARL. No, but you’re still going to have costs related to the

cleanup. And I think you’re trying to cut those costs by designing

some mechanism to cut those costs. And so I’m not sure—I’m more

than willing to explore any ways, and I’m sure the sheriffs and

chiefs, they don’t want their people tied up on cleanups. They want

them doing the investigations.

But I’m not sure that there’s an easy way to cut those costs because of the hazards involved in dealing with the chemicals. And

there very well may be. And I think you need to explore those solutions. And there’s been a tremendous amount of training in Oregon

by DEA and through the HIDTA program as well, separately from

DEA, on certification of officers for entry and cleanup.

But still, bottom line, we have to call a contractor who’s going

to take possession of those after we’ve done the initial evidence

gathering and cleanup, and that contractor costs money. And we

used to take it down to the police property room in the old days,

and we had all these chemicals laying around, and pretty soon

somebody said, hey—the fire department comes in and says, you’re

condemned.

And so there’s got to be some way to cut our costs because, I

agree, they are very high, too high. I’m not sure how to get there.

There are many issues—and that’s my point—there are many

issues involved in that solution.

Mr. WALDEN. I just have a couple of brief questions. I want to

followup on this issue of the contractor. Right now, where does the

contractor come from to do clean up, let’s say, in this county or

Union County?

Mr. BENSON. Congressman Walden, in my region there are several contract companies that we have contracts with. There is a

70

company based out here in this region that has responded and

asked—we have actually six in Oregon, six companies.

Mr. WALDEN. And so there is one out—when you say ‘‘out here,’’

is that here in Pendleton.

Mr. BENSON. I believe it’s here in Pendleton.

Mr. WALDEN. OK. So no longer does the—I’m getting the shaking

of the head from the sheriff, but—can you name that contractor?

Maybe that would—name that contractor?

Mr. BENSON. I can get the name of the company.

Mr. WALDEN. Well, Sheriff, you’re going to be up next. This has

been—and I’m sure you’re acutely aware of it, an issue that gets

raised with me is the lag time between—my understanding is there

is a Statewide contract, and people had to come from the Portland

area out to cleanup.

Mr. BENSON. It’s on rotational basis. So they end up rotating the

companies. So there might be one in Pendleton, and that company,

that would be their turn, so they would respond.

Mr. WALDEN. So like every 6th lab or 10th lab.

Mr. BENSON. That’s something we’re trying to work out with our

contracting folks. The best way would be for the lab seized in Pendleton, that the company——

Mr. WALDEN. Maybe we could do that fighting fires, and every

sixth fire in Portland, we could send in the fire engine from Pendleton. Do you think that would be very effective?

I don’t mean to make fun of it, but, you know, when you represent a district like this, you’ve got to jump up and down a little

harder because of the distances. And that’s why I’m jumping up

and down on the lack of a DEA agent, other than the Tri-Cities,

but my understanding is they don’t get across the river very often.

And everything is up and down the I–5 corridor. And I understand that’s where 80 percent of the population is, but in this case,

I think a lot of the meth problems are out here and a lot of the

delay means costs for agencies that are understaffed and underbudgeted.

Mr. BENSON. I agree there’s a significant methamphetamine

problem here. And we will continue to, through Tri-Cities, Portland, and then I, again, strongly offer that, the assistance of our

mobile enforcement to go into the region, to help address the problem.

Mr. WALDEN. All right. Appreciate that. Just one final question

for each of you. What’s the one thing that Congressman Souder and

I could do to change Federal law, Federal action, Federal something, that would be the most helpful in this fight? What can we

do? What would be the most effective thing we could do?

You can always say more money, and we’ll just give that as a

given. But what is the most effective way—what most needs to be

done by the Federal Government to help you do what you all do

so well?

Mr. BENSON. Congressman Walden, I think this hearing is raising the issue of what’s happening, the threat that methamphetamine poses to this country, is a very positive——

Mr. WALDEN. So public awareness. But statutorily there’s nothing you want to lay on the table.

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Mr. BENSON. The criminal penalties in the Federal system are,

I believe, fairly significant.

Mr. WALDEN. OK. Mr. Karl.

Mr. KARL. Well, my sense is that you’re aware of the extreme

epidemic that Hawaii has gone through in prior years. That’s hit

the West Coast in the last 2 to 3 years, and it’s just starting.

And as you travel around and take testimony and get a sense of

the methamphetamine problem on the East Coast, it’s not there

yet. A thousand kids in Lane County in foster homes is a good indicator. Track those kids, and you will track the spread of meth.

Its addictive power is extreme and its physical damage to people

is extreme, which creates those wards of the community that I referred to. And that will destroy our infrastructure as it moves

along. And I’m not sure, Chairman Souder, that we can show the

destructive nature satisfactorily by showing the pictures to kids of

what happens.

Because if they try it, it is extremely pleasurable to start with,

and that addiction is what scares me the most. It is so much more

powerful than even crack. And I saw crack hit Portland in the

1980’s, and we thought that was so addictive. This makes that look

like kids’ play.

This is really a damaging thing. And I talked to a treatment provider this last week who said that one of the dilemmas that they

have is that under the State law regarding removing children from

homes, or Federal law, I believe, Federal act, Child Protective Act,

that if you remove some child from a home and it’s more than 15

months to 22 months, I’m not exactly certain because I didn’t have

a chance to read it, then they become a ward of the State.

And what they—automatically, I guess, if you fail to get them returned because the parent, the mother or something is in treatment, they’re not able to make those time lines. They are not able

to get some of these meth moms, these families, to a point where

they can take their kids back.

So I was talking to somebody earlier, are we looking at the old

orphanage system? I mean 1,000 kids in one county. Are we talking

now about creating an orphanage for just meth-affected children?

I don’t want to see that happening. But I’m telling you, look at

what happened in Hawaii, look at what’s happening along the West

Coast.

And it’s heading east. And it’s not going to stop because these

people are giving it away in Chicago to create an addiction base.

Mr. WALDEN. Mr. Rodriguez, is there anything we can do to help.

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. Yeah, I have two things. No. 1, we need to have

a stronger engagement with both Mexico and Canada on precursor

control. And No. 2, I think we need to do much better in our education system at the grammar school level on our prevention message on drugs. I know teachers say they’re overburdened with curriculum as it is, but I think this is so important that we need to

keep stressing it at that level.

Those are the two things that would make a big difference.

Mr. WALDEN. Thank you. Mr. Karl, just to followup on your comment about the children in Lane County, I participated in a courtappointed special advocate fundraiser in the Dalles a couple weeks

ago on a Friday night. And they told me there they had 110 chilVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:49 Dec 14, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00075 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\27723.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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dren who lacked a CASA volunteer to help them. And the administrator there told me that virtually every one of those was related

to some sort of meth problem.

And that wasn’t the total number of kids that have CASA volunteers, but that was the number that didn’t have one. And I think

what you’ve said is really an eye opener, that it’s bad and it’s getting worse. And so I appreciate your testimony.

Mr. KARL. Drug courts are very effective, enhanced treatment

clearly, and any educational component. We’ve got to do all of it.

But I’m telling you, this is a very dangerous drug.

Mr. WALDEN. I want to thank all of you for participating in the

hearing. We really appreciate not only your testimony, but for this

Member of Congress, the work that you’re doing in the field. It is

tremendously important and very much appreciated.

Mr. SOUDER. And I want to share that, too. The agents working

in the HIDTAs, which the good news about all the pressure that

happened during the HIDTA debate is now Members of Congress

know what HIDTAs do and more people understand what HIDTAs

do than ever before. Because it leveraged dollars, and people didn’t

understand it was leveraged dollars.

Last week we had our annual U.S.-Canada parliamentary group,

and I co-chair the border subgroup. And it’s real interesting, because methamphetamine has hit western Canada. And there are

legislators in particular, as well as B.C. buzz dominating the nonVancouver-city-legislators’ minds, they’ve had problems with corruption in their system in Vancouver because of marijuana now

being their biggest export product.

But now they’re seeing methamphetamine kind of even compete

with that hydroponic marijuana and even over in Toronto, eastern

Canada. So the good thing about working with Canada is you don’t

have to worry about the law enforcement shooting at you like

DEAs have a problem sometimes at the south border.

And Vincente Fox has improved things on the south border, but

let’s just say the south border and north border are different law

enforcement challenges with the IMET teams and different things

that you have.

And Canada understands, and we had pretty strong language on

trying to tighten the reporting, trying to deal with this. They’re obviously making a lot of money right now in Canadian pharmacies,

and we’re trying to make sure those pharmacies stay legitimate,

don’t become drug laundering vis-a-vis Mexico. They had not realized the penetration of Mexican pharmaceutical companies coming

in and claiming to be Canadian. So we’re working on that border.

The south border, I was just shocked to hear you say we have

to control it. I’m kidding. For the record, that was a joke.

In addition to the methamphetamine legislation that we’re working on over the next few weeks, we are trying to develop a border

control strategy by the end of the year, which will not control the

border, but which will make some steps. There are some scattered

attempts.

The public policy committee has been tasked by the speaker, and

we’ve been having unity dinners to try to figure out a solution to

a realistic immigration work force strategy with a border strategy.

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You cannot control the border when you’re, in effect, bringing in a

million workers.

And we have to somehow separate the illegals, illegal criminals,

from people who are violating immigration law, and work that

thing out, or it will not work. And yet that’s what we’ve learned

is our unity dinners have broken up, in not much unity right now.

But we will have some efforts which should help in some of

these. And then if our bill can get better reporting on the international—part of the question is how much of this is going to be

DEA, FDA? Who’s going to enforce what parts of this law? How do

we do international tracking with the State Department?

But, clearly, the southwest border remains a thorny problem.

Even if we could start to address the local labs, then we move into

a whole other arena where we’ve already established we basically

have no control. So we’re working at it. And it will be a tough process.

And I hope we can effect demand reduction as well as supply reduction. Because if we can’t effect demand reduction, it’s just very

hard. What I hope is that by putting the pressure on the supply

side, you’re working with fewer numbers of people on the demand

side. If we give up on the demand side, we’ll never stop this in

treatment. So we have to somehow keep all prongs of this going.

Thank you again for your testimony. We’re going to take, at maximum, a 3-minute break, but if the next panel could come forward

so we’re all ready to go.

[Recess.]

Mr. SOUDER. The subcommittee will come back to order. I’d now

like to yield to Congressman Walden.

Mr. WALDEN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I wanted to

introduce a couple of other folks who have joined us or who’ve been

in the audience and I missed them early on. First of all, representing U.S. Senator Ron Wyden, Kathleen Gaffey is here. Kathleen, do

you want to stand up in the back, please? Thank you for joining

us today.

We also have State Senator Jason Atkinson, who is also a Republican candidate for Governor. And Alice Nelson, wife of Senator

Dave Nelson, is here as well. So we appreciate all of you being

here. Thank you for your participation.

Do you want me to introduce the panel?

Mr. SOUDER. Yeah. If you want to name the panel and who each

person is, and I’ll have you each stand and we’ll swear you in.

Mr. WALDEN. First of all, Karen Ashbeck, who is the mother and

grandmother of recovering methamphetamine addicts and a lady I

spoke to last time I was here in Umatilla County and offered to tell

her story, and we’re glad you came to do that.

Sheriff John Trumbo, Umatilla County Sheriff’s Office. Probably

nobody has been more effective in influencing me on this issue

than Sheriff Trumbo. Sheriffs have a way of having—well, anyway.

Also, Sheriff Tim Evinger, Klamath County Sheriff’s Office. And,

Mr. Chairman, I meant to tell you this before, but he’s fighting a

time line. He flew himself up here, and he’s fighting weather and

lightening to get back. So if there’s any way he can go first and

be excused——

Mr. SOUDER. We could do that.

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Mr. WALDEN. He’s got across the State to go.

Mr. SOUDER. Is that where all the water stuff is.

Mr. WALDEN. That’s where we—yeah.

Mr. SOUDER. I sat next to Congressman Walden on the Resources

Committee, and I used to hear about the water all the time.

Mr. WALDEN. Yeah, or lack of water.

Mr. SOUDER. We don’t have that problem in Indiana, so it’s new

to me.

Mr. WALDEN. Rick Jones, Choices Counseling Center. Good to see

you.

Kaleen Deatherage, director of public policy, Oregon Partnership,

and member of the Governor’s Meth Task Force.

Tammy Baney, Chair of Deschutes County Commission on Children and Families.

And Shawn Miller, who represents the Oregon Grocery Association.

Mr. Chairman, that’s your second panel.

Mr. SOUDER. He did that so I didn’t have to say Umatilla (mispronounced) instead of Umatilla. Please stand and raise your right

hands.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. SOUDER. Let the record show that all the witnesses responded in the affirmative. And we’re going to start with Sheriff

Evinger.

STATEMENTS OF TIM EVINGER, SHERIFF, KLAMATH COUNTY;

KAREN ASHBECK, MOTHER AND GRANDMOTHER; JOHN

TRUMBO, SHERIFF, UMATILLA COUNTY; RICK JONES,

CHOICES COUNSELING CENTER; KATHLEEN DEATHERAGE,

DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC POLICY, OREGON PARTNERSHIP,

GOVERNOR’S METH TASK FORCE; TAMMY BANEY, CHAIR,

DESCHUTES COUNTY COMMISSION ON CHILDREN AND FAMILIES; AND SHAWN MILLER, OREGON GROCERY ASSOCIATION

STATEMENT OF TIM EVINGER

Mr. EVINGER. Thank you, Chairman Souder. Thank you, Congressman. My name is Tim Evinger. I am the sheriff of Klamath

County, OR. I’ve been in law enforcement for the past 17 years. I’ve

personally witnessed the increased use of methamphetamine in

Klamath County during that time, and I’ve been fortunate enough

to be involved in model programs that have worked well.

Oregon has certainly led the way in the battle against methamphetamine. With the help of the Federal Government, I believe

that we can actually win this battle, although we’d have to stay on

the main target.

Leaders in Oregon have the misfortune of being on the forefront

of the Nation’s methamphetamine epidemic. We now have many

years of failures and successes in an attempt to address this problem. Methamphetamine is rapidly eroding our society’s values and

is threatening future generations as the cycle of addiction continues. The methamphetamine epidemic has spread across our Nation

and must be addressed as a nationwide problem.

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Unlike other drugs that are produced by growing marijuana,

poppy, or coca, methamphetamine is a completely synthetic drug.

And as a result, we have the power to curtail the supply of ephedrine, the primary ingredient used to manufacture methamphetamine.

Significant results could be gained by the Federal Government

enacting legislation, which we’ve already talked about earlier

today, to deal with the ephedrine production. Many suggest our

government should address the commercial manufacture and sale

of ephedrine, at least as aggressively as it has with the cultivation

of poppy in the Mid-East and the growing of coca in South America.

Our government should impose sanctions to countries who refuse

to submit to a standardized reporting and production procedure.

The Federal Government should more strictly control the sale of

products using ephedrine as an ingredient. Oregon’s model has

worked quite well, as we have seen a marked decline in methamphetamine labs since over-the-counter cold medicines containing

ephedrine have been restricted. There are now substitutes available also for cold medicines that do not contain ephedrine.

Perhaps medicines containing ephedrine should be listed in the

Controlled Substance Act. Drug manufacturers might be given incentives to produce cold medicines with other ingredients.

Again, while I come from a law enforcement background, it has

become obvious that, while law enforcement is a critical component,

we cannot adequately address the methamphetamine epidemic, as

it is a social problem as well. Western States have now had several

years to analyze the consequence of this drug. We have learned valuable lessons.

Oregon has the single highest methamphetamine addiction documented in the Nation. More than half of Oregon’s foster children

placement involves methamphetamine abuse in the home. Oregon

has seen a 17 percent—and we can’t forget these victims of collateral damage—17 percent increase in reports of child abuse and neglect in 2001 to 2003.

Clearly, a loving family is the best place for our kids, but when

it’s clear that the kids are being put in a dangerous situation because of their parents’ meth habit, they need protection. Research

shows that almost 4 out of 10 of the children who are re-abused

or neglected, rather than being put in safe foster homes, will become violent criminals.

It’s important we have an appropriate place to put these kids.

And when no safe foster home is available, how does the risk of

further abuse and neglect, how high does that risk have to be before I or DHS has to remove a child from a home? Innocent lives

hang in the balance.

Methamphetamine use has spread disproportionately to suburban and rural areas, and its use is on the rise across the Nation.

This phenomenon has placed a particular burden on rural law enforcement agencies that cannot afford to address the issue. In

Klamath County alone, drug enforcement officers also face another

danger. They seized 140 firearms in the last calendar year.

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Oregon’s medical examiner reported 78 methamphetamine- related deaths in 2003, a 20 percent increase from the year prior and

a 56 percent increase from 2001. This is truly an epidemic.

Methamphetamine is an inexpensive drug that is readily accessible and its effects last as much as 10 times longer than other

drugs. In Klamath County last year, meth-related arrests outnumbered other drug arrests five to one. According to the most recent national data, 607,000 people are current users of methamphetamine, having used the drug within the last 30 days.

Over the past year, 1.3 million people have admitted to methamphetamine use. Nearly one-half of those supervised in Klamath

County by a probation officer are on supervision for meth-related

crimes.

Organizations must tear down the walls and work together in

order to succeed in this endeavor. The problem has spread so rapidly from the Western United States across the Nation that, in my

opinion, it has become a national problem.

To summarize what the Federal Government can do to help, the

stable funding to the State for foster care is critical. The Federal

Government certainly should not institute the proposed funding

cap to States for foster care, in the President’s budget.

States regularly see double digit increases in foster care needs,

mostly due to methamphetamine abuse, and they cannot fund

these increases without help from the Federal Government. Without sufficient funding, our children and future generations will suffer the effects of this drug.

Local law enforcement across the West have suffered funding reductions to the point that we can barely respond to some of the

basic calls for service from our citizens that we are supposed to

protect. Dedicated funding, without long-term obligation from the

hiring authority or excessive bureaucratic red tape, for drug enforcement is a key component to the problem.

This is an especially troubling component because methamphetamine addiction has spread through areas that can least afford to

address the problem.

In closing, I’d like to talk about the model that we have taken

on in Klamath County on a local task force level. We have taken

a multi-disciplinary approach, and Klamath County District Attorney put together a local methamphetamine task force of which

there were six components: Law enforcement, health, business,

treatment, youth, and faith- based.

Law enforcement—we need the help of the Federal Government

to fight the battle. COPS grants, fund grants have been waning,

and as we look at our local funding streams, we can barely keep

our jails open.

State government can make an impact. Narcotics detectives already report an increase in labs that are being dumped or abandoned. This is likely due to the cooks not being able to easily obtain

cold medicine for processing, and they don’t want to be caught with

the lab equipment if they’re not using it.

Now the Federal Government needs to do its part on eliminating

access to precursors entering the country, as well as tightening our

borders against the entry of finished products.

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In health, from the first draft of the report I’ve seen from the

Methamphetamine Task Force in Klamath County, health comes to

the table suggesting that we take up an aggressive education campaign; educating communities, especially children and parents, of

the dangers and the signs of meth use.

In the business community—and Jeldwin, that helped produce

the video that Congressman Walden talked about earlier—sat at a

table on the Methamphetamine Task Force and became involved,

not only in the video, but also talking about drug testing should be

more prevalent in our business community. It should be more costeffective.

One suggestion that came from the business community is that

businesses are offered a tax credit for drug testing versus writing

it off as an expense. Drug testing both private and in the public

sector needs a thorough legal analysis and then simple guidelines

provided to employers.

In the treatment community, we are fortunate in Klamath County that treatment, in my opinion, is a valuable partner to law enforcement. Again, through a consortium approach, recidivism is significantly reduced. Leveraging Federal dollars for treatment is imperative, and those funds must be coordinated to fund the right

treatment and not to pit providers against one another.

Back to our youth. The schools must continue to partner with

law enforcement working on character education, having school resource officers, and making locker and property searches expected

and commonplace in our schools. That is effective prevention. It is

necessary for us to have early intervention and share information

between disciplines to make good risk assessments regarding our

youth.

And faith-based. Our churches and religious organizations have

to be leading their members to be included in these very social programs. Mentoring programs are one way for the faith-based community to be involved. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Evinger follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Before letting you go, I want to ask you a couple

of quick questions.

Mr. EVINGER. I understand.

Mr. SOUDER. Do you use Byrne money through your office.

Mr. EVINGER. We do not get any Byrne money through our office.

The city police in our jurisdiction area in Klamath Falls gets about

$30,000.

Mr. SOUDER. Does that go into the community drug task force?

Mr. EVINGER. Very interesting. Prior to my administration, the

city had their own drug team. The State police and the sheriff’s office had their own drug team. We had two separate drug teams

working in the same town. We have now combined those, and we

use those Byrne moneys, is what they are, that $30,000, and have

combined our efforts.

And it’s very difficult because we’re not able to go after some of

the bigger cases. We’re just taking care of the neighborhood problem. We can only spend $200, $250, generally, on a buy or walk

money.

Mr. SOUDER. Do you get any COPS grant money?

Mr. EVINGER. We do. We’re on our last year of COPS grants, and

it was Homeland Security based.

Mr. SOUDER. That was going to be my next question. The administration testified to this committee that they had moved some of

the money that was Byrne and COPS money over to Homeland Security.

If you had your choice, would you rather have it for Homeland

Security, or would you rather have it for narcotics, or would you

like to have the flexibility?

Mr. EVINGER. The flexibility is very good, based on what problems we’re facing at the time. And I think, I truly think that

they’re interrelated.

Mr. WALDEN. You might point out for the chairman the issue

with Bly.

Mr. EVINGER. The Congressman refers to Bly, OR, which in 1999

was identified as a place where terrorists were setting up a training camp, and several have been indicted and one already convicted, and waiting for extradition from London on one of them now

to face charges on setting up that terrorist training camp in eastern Klamath County.

Mr. SOUDER. Did you use any of your funds for that, or was that

predominantly then Federal that came in?

Mr. EVINGER. We got the Homeland Security money in a 3-year

stepdown that partially funded two deputies. And we have addressed critical infrastructure and extra patrols with that money at

this time.

Mr. SOUDER. And do you feel—I mean, this is what we have to

deal with all the time is a tradeoff. And in the Homeland Security

Committee there is a big question, in my district and elsewhere, as

was alluded to in the first panel and as Elijah Cummings, our

ranking member, says, we’re always talking about the cost, quite

frankly, we had 20,000 people die in the United States last year

in narcotics, and we’ve had 60,000, to 80,000 since September 11th.

And yet we have diverted funds to address those infrastructure

needs because of the potential risks of a catastrophe. Yet a terrorist

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camp like that, that’s really a little bit different than the way you

said you used your dollars.

And infrastructure in my cities and they’re trying to figure out

how to address the power plants, how to do this, long-term there’s

no question, we have to work these through. But these are the dayto-day tradeoffs we’re making right now. And if you had that

money, would you have used it on meth, or would you have used

it on infrastructure, if you had that flexibility?

Mr. EVINGER. I believe today I would apply it to the meth battle.

I used to have two representatives on the inter-agency drug team,

of which I had to pull one back to try to remain whole to meet the

hiring requirements that were associated with the COPS grant to

deal with the calls for service, so I’m supplanting.

Mr. SOUDER. Thanks. Those are tough questions. I appreciate

you being direct. Anything else you want to add?

Mr. WALDEN. (Shook head negatively).

Mr. SOUDER. Good luck on getting back.

Mr. EVINGER. Thank you.

Mr. SOUDER. We now go to Ms. Ashbeck.

STATEMENT OF KAREN ASHBECK

Ms. ASHBECK. Chairman Souder, Congressman Walden, and the

rest of the panel, I’m Karen Ashbeck. And I’m here today to testify

as to how——

Mr. WALDEN. Can you hear her in the back? I’m not sure that

wireless mic really functions unless you’re right on it.

Ms. ASHBECK. Can you hear me now?

Mr. WALDEN. There you go.

Ms. ASHBECK. My name is Karen Ashbeck, and I’m here today—

I guess I addressed you earlier, so may I do that again.

Chairman Souder, Congressman Walden, and the rest of the

panel, I’m here today to testify as to how the blast of meth has left

a hole in my family. I’m a great grandmother raising my great

grandson. I gained custodial guardianship of him when he was 16

months old.

His mother—excuse me—my granddaughter, was deep into the

throes of meth, as well as my daughter. Neither were able to care

for him and meet his needs. My granddaughter was arrested many

times, booked and released.

She refers to meth as the beast. It has a hold on her, and she

knew the only way that she could get away from it was to be locked

up. She also knew that with the matrix system, she would just be

booked and released. Eventually she was jailed several months.

Getting locked up was the only way she was able to escape the hold

meth had on her.

She was sent to Ontario, OR, for drug rehabilitation twice. The

first time they kicked her out, as she was not ready to be serious

about her recovery. When she returned, she joined the work release

program.

My grown daughter lost everything she owned; her car, her furniture, her history, her memorabilia, everything, because of her addiction to meth. I drove by her on the street 1 day, and she was

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ings in that wagon. I can tell you, watching her broke my heart.

All I could do is drive by.

Tough love is hard. Separating emotional feelings from rational

reasoning is necessary for emotional survival. Having a good support system is crucial. Faith, family, and friends sustained me

through the hard times.

My grandson was exposed to alcohol and drugs in vitro and some

environmental exposure after he was born. We don’t know yet what

the ramifications of that exposure will be on his development. So

far, aside from his asthma and allergies, my grandson is on track

developmentally for a 5-year old.

My daughter and granddaughter, both clean now, continue to

fight the methamphetamine battle. There are many others who are

fighting this same battle. Where do they go from here? How do

they regain what they have lost? They know how to cook meth, but

do they know how to cook spaghetti? Can they fill out a job application? Can they re-enter society without the social skills they need

to survive? Do they know where to access community resources to

assist them in their lives? Do we just write them off and say, ‘‘You

made your choice, now stay the hell out of my life?’’

Some in society, including some family and friends, would say

yes. Meth had a domino effect on their family and their friends.

I asked my granddaughter what she regrets most due to her addiction to meth. ‘‘I regret that I abandoned my son and lost the maternal bond that a mother should have with her child.’’

What would have made the difference to get you to stop using?

In her case, she answered, ‘‘getting locked up sooner.’’

My story is not unique when it comes to how methamphetamine

affects family. There are many stories similar to mine. Most, I

imagine, are too embarrassed or have feelings of guilt to tell their

story. I have some case history. I’ll hit a couple of them. The names

are changed.

Brenda, a 22-year-old mother of two who is raising her two

younger brothers. She gained custody of them because her mother

is addicted to meth and cannot care for them. Brenda is challenged

not only with the responsibility of the boys, but also with the responsibility of finding a job and attending school. Juggling is not

her forte.

Brenda’s mother is 42 years old. She looks 80, due to the drug.

Brenda’s dream is to have a mother-daughter relationship some

day. She has never known her mother to be clean. Brenda has

never used drugs. What does Brenda’s future look like?

Julie is a 23-year-old mother of two boys. She was raped when

she was 12 years old by a family friend and became a mother at

13 years old. She adopted her sister’s two little girls, as her sister

and mother were practicing addicts.

Julie is now caring for her 46-year-old mother since her mother

suffered a stroke due to excessive drug use. She is fighting for custody of the children in a divorce battle. Julie does not have a formal education but maintains a fairly good job. Her sister is now

pregnant with another baby. What does Julie’s future look like?

Mary and Frank gained custody of their grandson when he was

2 years old. He walked on all fours and ate out of a bowl on the

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floor. His mother was hooked on meth and neglected his needs because of her need for meth.

He is 4 years old now, and through hours, days, and years of

care, is a much healthier child. He occasionally reverts back to

walking on all fours. What does their future look like?

Becky is a Native American foster mom caring for a 4-month-old

meth baby. She has four children of her own. She hopes to adopt

this child into her family. There’s a great need for more foster

homes in the Native American community. What does the future

hold for these babies?

George is a retired Native American grandpa who has his two

young grandchildren, as their mom is running. This has happened

several times. Mom has a difficult time staying clean. What does

the future look like for them?

These are only a few of the stories of how meth has affected families in our area. I applaud the efforts of our local, State, and Federal Government for recognizing the importance of combating the

menace of methamphetamine. I have accessed the help of our local

city police sheriff and State police in waging my own war in fighting this menace.

I thank them now for their support and continued concern for the

families that are affected by meth. Thank you.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

Next, Sheriff Trumbo.

STATEMENT OF JOHN TRUMBO

Mr. TRUMBO. With your permission, Chairman Souder, I’ll just

hit the high spots of this.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you. And we’ll put all of your full statements

into record.

Mr. TRUMBO. Chairman Souder, Congressman Walden, I’m John

Trumbo, sheriff of Umatilla County, OR. I have 33 years of law enforcement experience, the last 9 years as sheriff. I am currently a

member of the Governor’s Methamphetamine Task Force and a

board member of the Blue Mountain Enforcement Narcotics Team.

As adults, we recognize things fall into two categories, needs and

wants. Our wants can be tabled until extra time and money are

available. Our human needs, the physical, mental, and moral necessities of survival cannot wait for available time and money. This

is why we’re here today.

Our human needs need to be met now. The use and abuse of

methamphetamine affects more than just the abuser. The indirect

costs to our citizens are even greater than the direct costs. Abusers

must burglarize and steal, including identities, to support their

habits.

When a citizen becomes a victim, law enforcement steps in to investigate the crime. The case may be solved, however many times

the victims may not get their property returned. In the case of

identity theft, the victim’s good credit rating may suffer.

When the suspect is arrested, they will be lodged in jail. Normally the defendant will receive a court appointed attorney. The

District Attorney’s Office will be required to prosecute the offender.

A trial will be held to determine guilt or innocence, and if found

guilty, the offender is incarcerated in a State-operated correctional

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facility for a prescribed period of time or placed on supervised probation.

Many offenders have families that require State assistance to

cover food, housing, and medical costs. A portion of these costs associated from the original complaint until such time as the offender

is released from supervised custody must be covered by the original

victim. With this scenario, the victim becomes an unwilling victim

again.

Insurance companies are also indirect victims of meth abuse.

When a claimant suffers a loss, the insurance company steps in to

cover the financial loss. At some point, those costs are seen as

higher insurance rates. The original victim may become a victim

for the third time.

I believe local law enforcement in Oregon needs four things from

the Federal Government: No. 1, restrictive and enforceable laws for

meth production and use. This would include, but not be limited to,

severely restricting the importation of pseudoephedrine and

pseudoephedrine-based products from outside the United States.

No. 2, financial support in order to carry out our public safety

mission. HIDTA grants are very much appreciated and will certainly go a long ways toward fighting the war or drugs. Locally, we

also depend heavily on Byrne grant funds. The Byrne grant fund

program must be renewed as well as serious consideration be given

to increasing individual awards.

Additional resources need to be made available for treatment

services so we can break the cycle of addiction. Law enforcement

does not have the resources to continually deal with the same individuals on the same drug-related issues. In many instances, even

those individuals who no longer are involved in the illegal drug culture suffer from mental illnesses brought on by their previous activities.

No. 3, the Drug Enforcement Administration needs to be taking

a more active role in the local war on drugs. Illegal drug activity

has no geographical boundaries, and an occasional appearance from

a DEA agent is not sufficient to successfully track the larger suppliers of methamphetamine. An active DEA presence will also

allow us to develop cases that will be prosecuted in Federal court.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Oregon is aggressively attacking

the meth problem by prosecuting violations of the Federal law.

Their willingness to prosecute violations of Federal drug law, as

well as related crimes, is only tempered by their inability to do so

adequately because of inadequate financial support.

No. 4, Eastern Oregon needs a minimum of a half- time U.S. Attorney and preferably a full-time prosecutor. For the most part, a

violation of Federal law has consequences that are much more severe than Oregon provides. Locally, people in the drug culture are

not naive to our inability to punish violations of Oregon law as prescribed by State statute.

We need to send a clear and convincing message for those who

continue to proceed with their illegal behaviors; there is an end to

the road, a Federal prison if you violate a Federal law.

This menace called meth is slowly destroying our quality of life.

The cure is not cheap or painless. The solutions to the problem will

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fected. We are in a crisis. Our lawmakers in Washington, DC, must

provide leadership and financial assistance. They must pass laws

to directly address the issue.

Officials on all levels must understand that what is affecting us

in the rural areas is the same plight that is affecting the urban

areas of the United States.

As we say in Eastern Oregon, it’s time to cowboy up and do

what’s right and do what is necessary. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Trumbo follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Cowboy up. We haven’t had that yet in any of our

hearings.

Mr. WALDEN. And then let ’r’ buck.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Jones.

STATEMENT OF RICK JONES

Mr. JONES. Thank you, Chairman Souder, Congressman Walden.

It’s a privilege to be here today. When I was writing this up, I’ve

never really written testimony for Congress before. So, you know,

I have a one-page rule. So I thought I’d hit the highlights.

I’ve been in the substance abuse treatment arena for over 30

years, just close to 30 years in Southern Oregon. I grew up in

Klamath Falls. Spent a decade, actually, using substances when

Tim was a law enforcement officer. I guess he’s only been there

about 17 years.

But my stepfather is actually a retired police officer over there.

And we actually get together and tell war stories every once in a

while.

So I think it’s real clear, I’d like to make it clear that I grew up

in Southern Oregon, and I know something about the drug culture

over the years. In 1975, 1976, I ended up in law enforcement’s

hands as a result of methamphetamine and heroin, and was given

a prison sentence in lieu of—a suspended prison sentence.

Instead, I got to go to treatment in Portland. And I went to a

treatment program, residential program, where I spent 18 months,

live-in, at 19 years old. And I’m really pleased to say that I’m still

clean and sober as a result of that today.

And I’ll be 50 years old here in January also. I’m not pleased to

say that I have a defibrillator, I’ve had three heart attacks, and my

health is not good. I have hepatitis C as a result of methamphetamine and heroin addiction. And so my discussion really covers a

lot of ground.

One of the reasons I like—the title of my presentation was ‘‘A

Nudge from the Judge.’’ I like to refer to Drug Court as a nudge

from the judge, because I think in my career, rarely does anybody

ever walk through the doors and say, ‘‘Gee, I went down to McDonald’s and had some orange juice and an Egg McMuffin, and I just

thought I’d get some help for my meth addiction today.’’

You know, they come to me because somebody said, ‘‘Get over

there,’’ whether that could be the judge, the DA, the sheriff, their

mother, somebody brings them through the door. We need that leverage with this addiction particularly.

I also come here highly qualified in that I’ve raised a couple of

kids as best I could who still decided to test the waters with methamphetamine. My oldest daughter has done two terms at Coffee

Creek Prison for Women for identity theft. Actually, the first time

she went was for racketeering because she was so involved in the

identity theft and checks and those kind of things.

My youngest daughter actually tested positive early in her addiction when she was pregnant, and the doctor told her to go into residential treatment. She did, and she’s still clean. And I have a

bouncing 3-year-old grandson as a result of that.

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I have a 10-year-old grandson who lives in my home and has off

and on since he was 6 months old because of his mother’s addiction. Fortunately, he’s just keeping me young.

I began my career in the treatment business in Klamath Falls

in long-term residential treatment; long-term meaning 90 days,

and then graduated over the years through—into the medical

model and into short-term outpatient treatment, and I actually

started the detox sobering unit in Jackson County back in the

1990’s.

I’ve worked in a lot of different settings. And I think one of the

things that we have run into when it comes to methamphetamine

is real bad timing, because treatment has changed because of

money. We’re under the gun to provide shorter treatment, less

treatment, you know, quicker treatment.

You know, it’s supposed to have a beginning and an end and all

these things that go on in the treatment arena, and what’s come

out recently—and I thought, actually, Eric Martin was going to be

here. I heard rumors he was going to be in Pendleton today. Eric

Martin is director of the Addiction Council Certification Board of

Oregon and has become one of the leading trainers of methamphetamine, as far as I’m concerned, in the country.

And the information that we’re getting about the brain effects of

meth addicts, even short-term use, is incredible to us in the treatment arena, because, you know, we’ve been telling people to quit

using for decades. And what we find out is that the drug really

messes up the part of the brain that says I don’t remember what

you tell me from day to day.

And so in the treatment arena we’ve really had to become more

of a hand holding organization, to some degree, where we actually

call people up and remind them that they have an appointment,

and give them a calendar their first assessment, and maybe do

their assessment in chunks instead of 2-hour blocks because these

folks are not really able to sit there for 2 hours and give us that

information. But yet on the other hand, I’m consistently told, you

know, you’ve got to get these people moving.

APHSA was mentioned earlier, as far as the moms and the kids.

And I knew that was going to be insane to begin with, when it

came to methamphetamine. You know, we’re trying to get these

people on their feet in a year. Many of them, if their children go

into foster care, lose their benefits for treatment anyway.

So one of the problems in Oregon is the different little rules as

far as the availability and what beds you can get into and what

slots are available to you and whatnot.

There’s are a lot of barriers to particularly these women whose

custody of their children, they’re told to go get some treatment, go

do some things in order to get them back, and we’ve got a year to

help them put that together. And that’s a bit tough.

I want to spend a quick minute on Drug Court. I can write a little, but I can talk a lot. Drug Court is a situation where you involve everybody. I’ve really enjoyed it. It’s been a highlight of my

career. I go into staff meetings and I talk with the District Attorney, I talk with the defense attorney, and I talk with the judge,

and we talk about this person.

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And then this person comes up and talks to the judge. And the

judge has the data and the progress report. And the judge gives

them the strokes or gives them the sanctions, whatever they have

coming. And they do that consistently throughout—for our program, it’s a year.

And there’s some transference that takes place. We’ve heard people talk already today about the lack of family. And I, you know,

law enforcement probably kind of cringes when I say this, but there

have been some of our folks that have done well because the judge

did well with them. It was transference. It was like, ‘‘Hey, dad, I’m

here, I’m doing well.’’

They’ve never had anyone with any authority actually pat them

on the back. And I have people that actually have 5 or 6 years

clean that our judge is retiring that have really come up to me and

say, ‘‘Gee, what are we going to do? He’s retiring, dad’s leaving.’’

And it’s like, you can get through it. You can grow up. It’s part of

growing up. It’s part of getting through it.

So I guess the last thing I would say about treatment and Drug

Court being a good treatment for methamphetamine addicts is that

we need the consequences. You know, in the DSM-IV for diagnosing substance abuse disorders, one of the leading ways that we do

that is continued use despite negative consequences.

And so, as a treatment provider, I need that, but I know the consequences are not going to keep the people from using. They’re

using despite those consequences. And my experience with the prison systems and the consequences that somebody already mentioned

that our clients are basically kind of going, you know, don’t worry

about it.

I mean, I can tell somebody, ‘‘Hey, you’re going to die.’’

And they look at me and say, ‘‘Rick, you know, you told me that

last year.’’

So I really need to be able to look at them and say, ‘‘Look, you’re

not going to get a stroke from the judge this weekend,’’ or ‘‘You’re

going to spend the weekend in jail.’’

And instead of going in 13 months and getting out and floating

around, these people basically get short sanctions, they come back

to the treatment program and they talk to us about how that, and

we can use that as a process of treatment, rather than, you know,

this kind of cat and mouse game that we play with the criminal

justice system and the substance abuse.

So that’s all I have. Thank you.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Jones follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Ms. Deatherage.

STATEMENT OF KATHLEEN DEATHERAGE

Ms. DEATHERAGE. Chairman Souder, Congressman Walden,

thank you for holding this important public hearing on the issue

of methamphetamine. My name is Kaleen Deatherage, and I’m the

director of public policy for Oregon Partnership, Oregon’s only

Statewide non-profit organization that provides substance abuse

prevention and treatment referral.

I know that you’ve heard and read a great deal about the tremendous toll methamphetamine is taking on Oregon’s rural and

urban communities. The manufacture and use of meth continues to

harm families; our environment; and the most innocent among us,

our children. And it’s also placing a tremendous burden on our law

enforcement and criminal justice systems.

Helping children, family, and neighborhoods overcome the

scourge of meth requires consistent public investment in a multipronged strategy; prevention that stops meth use before it starts,

substance abuse treatment that helps people who struggle with addiction, and law enforcement that helps maintain community livability. It is in effect a three- legged stool that works only if each

component exists.

The goal of the alcohol and drug abuse prevention component is

to make a positive impact on individual, family, and community behavior. We have an existing prevention knowledge base, founded on

research and principles of effectiveness, which should guide the

prevention strategies applied by agencies and communities across

our Nation to address this issue.

I would like to point out a few of the drug prevention strategies

that have been shown to create positive behavior change. First, it’s

important to help young people to recognize internal pressures,

such as wanting to belong to the group, and external pressures,

like peer attitudes and advertising that influence them to use alcohol and drugs.

Next, it’s important to teach the youth that using alcohol and

other drugs is not the norm amongst teenagers, thereby correcting

the misconception that everyone is doing it. And, last, actively involving the family and the community so that prevention strategies

are reinforced across settings.

The field of alcohol and other drug prevention has also identified

evidence-based principles that should be applied to programs to effectively impact individual, family, and community behavior. Some

of those principles include: Prevention programs should target all

forms of drug abuse.

We know, and we said earlier today, that almost no one starts

by using methamphetamine. They’re starting with alcohol, they’re

starting with marijuana, and our programs need to look at the full

range of substances, not just at methamphetamine.

Prevention programs must include skills to resist drugs when offered. Strengthen personal commitments against drug use and increase the social skills of our young people who use drugs. Prevention programs should include a parent or a care giver component

that reinforces with adults what young people are learning at

school and in community settings.

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Prevention programs should long-term, over an entire school career, with repeat intervention to reinforce those prevention goals.

And prevention programming needs to be adapted to address the

specific nature of a drug abuse problem in a local community.

This summer, Oregon took a big step forward in efforts to address the methamphetamine crisis. With the leadership of our Governor, strong support from State lawmakers, and invaluable

groundwork by the Governor’s Meth Task Force, we signed legislation that requires prescriptions for cold medications containing

pseudoephedrine. The legislation also strengthened law enforcement and provides greater resources for Drug Court and substance

abuse treatment programs, which are proven to heal individuals

and family.

As the work of the Oregon Legislature this session clearly demonstrates, Oregon’s meth crisis transcends politics and requires

that all segments of our community work together. While new tools

will now be available to law enforcement to address meth manufacture and use, communities Statewide also need to use proven prevention principles to develop broad-based strategies to fight their

ongoing meth epidemic.

Oregon Partnership is committed to providing new prevention resources and tools to assist communities in those efforts. And I

would like to tell you about a new collaborative venture between

Oregon Partnership and Southern Oregon Public Television to develop a campaign titled, ‘‘Target Meth: Building a Vision for a

Drug-Free Community.’’

This strategic response to the meth epidemic will incorporate a

Statewide media and community training campaign designed to

educate Oregon residents on the problems and dangers associated

with methamphetamine manufacture and use. The Target Meth

Campaign will deliver cutting-edge information to communities

through a complete multimedia campaign, consisting of four major

components.

The first is a Master Methamphetamine Training Powerpoint,

which will allow the user to select from meth subject matter slides

and customize presentations by adding their own local video. To accompany the training Powerpoint, the Oregon Partnership is producing a Target Meth Community Action Guide to provide community leaders, faith-based organizations, parent groups, and others

with drug prevention practices, techniques from neighborhood involvement, community mobilization, assistance for families dealing

with drug addiction, and a link to local resources.

Oregon Partnership and Southern Oregon Public Television are

co-producing three 30-minute Target Meth specials, and each special will be designed to air with a local companion piece that focuses in on specific regions of Oregon and provides local data.

The last component of the campaign is a Target Meth Web-based

information portal providing Oregon meth information, programing, and downloadable tools. In addition, the portal will include

video clips from Statewide media coverage, resource links, State

and local meth stats.

Oregon Partnership is excited that citizens from all walks of life

are joining together to fight the meth epidemic, from representatives of law enforcement, treatment, community coalitions, and the

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news media to the average citizen on the street. The good news is

that we know prevention works. And the National Institute on

Drug Abuse estimates that for every dollar invested in prevention

programming, we save $10 in enforcement and treatment.

I want to thank you, Chairman Souder and Congressman Walden, for your leadership on the Federal level to address the devastation meth is causing across America. Thanks to you, there is encouragement for families and communities struggling with meth.

Here in Oregon we’ve asked all of our citizens to participate in

stopping the threat to their own safety, to their health, economy,

and the environment. And the best news of all is that as a result

of our ongoing effort, Oregon is starting to see successes in the

fight against meth, and hope is beginning to return to individuals

and families across our State.

Thank you very much.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Deatherage follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Ms. Baney.

STATEMENT OF TAMMY BANEY

Ms. BANEY. Hi. Make sure I’m not too close, not too far away.

Chairman Souder, Congressman Walden, and members of the

panel, thank you for this opportunity. I am here today representing, in essence, the third leg of the stool. I am the community volunteer. And I also am coming to you today as the sister of a recovering addict.

My brother is just now 21 years old, and he’s been battling the

methamphetamine addiction for 5 years. I have watched—I resonate with a lot that you mentioned, and the destruction that it can

cause within a family can be unbearable at times. And coming from

a family of four children; two are firemen, one a community volunteer, and another struggling with meth addiction, it wasn’t just

parenting.

You couldn’t put a finger on what made it different. We all grew

up in the same house. And so I hope to offer some of the stigma,

that it really isn’t there; that it’s not about the parenting, it’s not

about something that went wrong. A lot of times it’s just about the

child and choices that are made.

I’m also here as representative of the Meth Action Coalition,

which is a grass roots effort in Deschutes County, and I’m here representing the Central Oregon region, which is Crook, Deschutes,

and Jefferson Counties. And, of course, as you know, we have a

methamphetamine problem. And we are right on Highway 97,

which I drove to get here.

I didn’t drive slow, and it was very easy to not drive slow because—and sorry for those that are—sheriff.

Mr. WALDEN. You were driving the speed limit.

Ms. BANEY. Well, just over. And, however, as I flew my car here,

I did not run into law enforcement officials. And the reason why

is because of funding cuts. And the reason why is we have rural

areas, we have, you know, 50-mile stretches where there is barely

a house or a barn.

And so we’re talking about a prime—I drove along today, when

I could see the trees flying past, Sheriff, thinking of myself as

someone who has precursor chemicals in the back and thinking

what an easy road this would be to drive. And so no wonder the

rural areas are having such a difficult time grappling around this

situation. And so Deschutes County and Crook and Jefferson are

no different in that.

And one thing that we have done is, thank you to the HIDTA

dollars, we’ve been able to put together the Central Oregon Drug

Enforcement Team. So we are crossing all county lines, and we

have partnered all three counties together to leverage our dollars.

And that’s been very beneficial for us.

Bend may seen like a very urban area; however, we have La Pine

and Sisters and Terrebonne and even Redmond. There are a lot of

areas, I grew up outside of town on five acres, and, you know, we

could do a lot out there. And so to think of Deschutes County just

as Bend, OR, is not the same. There are a lot of rural areas.

We do not have a problem with the mom and pop labs in the

Central Oregon region, so to speak. We primarily, actually, in

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speaking with our CODE team, have taken less than a gram of

powder off of our street, and the vast majority, obviously, is crystal

meth, and that is coming from Mexico. And apparently we have an

influx of the Mexican cartel in our region.

And so when we talk about the precursor chemicals and we talk

about pseudoephedrine and getting them off the shelf, we know

that is more lending a hand to others in saving maybe one child’s

life down the road. You were asking about, well, what does that

really mean by putting those drugs behind the counter.

What it means to us is if we save one child’s life, if the inconvenience is on me because I have a head cold, I would rather save a

child’s life.

So for us, it’s not the mom and pop lab, it’s the crystal meth that

we’re fighting. And it’s not an inexpensive drug. It’s taking those

that have been hard- working and have saved a lot of money, and

it’s taking those dollars and washing them completely down the

drain with $100 to $120 a gram.

So I am here to speak about the three-legged approach. And I

know that I’m getting the yellow light. But the importance is, none

of us are going to be able to conquer this. You could drop $5 million

to the sheriff, and he’s not going to be able to do anything if we

don’t talk treatment and we don’t talk about the community.

So I’m here to, hopefully, instill the importance of the community

aspect in looking at Federal dollars and dropping those down into

the local level. If there’s a component about engaging the community, that is the legwork for those who are doing the work and can

help to take some of the burden off those that are doing the work

as well.

Right now in Deschutes County, in order to get into treatment,

there’s a 120-day waiting period. The vast majority of the people

are on the Oregon Health Plan or they lose the Oregon Health Plan

when they go into jail, which is usually what happens. And then

they’re matrixed out because our jail is well over capacity.

So what I share with you—oh, and to detox, you would need to

put that on your day-planner in about 10 days. So like you were

saying that you get your Egg McMuffin, you have to say, well, in

10 days, I think on the third Wednesday of the fourth month, you’d

want to detox.

So in talking about treatment, in talking about law enforcement,

components in grants dropping down from the Federal level, talking about engaging the community is critical. In talking about getting rotary clubs and getting your volunteers and the school board

and everybody on board in talking about, yes, we have a problem,

and here’s how we’re going to address it. I really encourage you to

add a component in talking about the community involvement and

engaging the community.

Thank you so much for your time.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Baney follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Miller.

STATEMENT OF SHAWN MILLER

Mr. MILLER. Chair Souder, Congressman Walden, my name is

Shawn Miller, and I represent 235 members and 1,113 member locations of the Oregon Grocery Association involved in the manufacturing, wholesaling, and retailing of grocery products. Our industry

employs roughly over 50,000 Oregonians.

I’m here today in support of H.R. 3889, the Methamphetamine

Epidemic Elimination Act. First, I’d like to thank Chair Souder and

Congressman Walden for their leadership and commitment in addressing the serious meth epidemic that faces our communities

here in Oregon and all across the Nation.

The grocery industry recognizes the problem as an epidemic and

wants to be a partner in crafting a comprehensive solution. The crisis has had a significant impact on Oregon communities and the

Oregon Grocery Association joins you in supporting the elimination

of the meth production, distribution, and use.

Not a stranger to this issue, the Oregon Grocery Association has

worked with law enforcement to pass legislation in Oregon limiting

the sale of pseudoephedrine products to 9 grams or less in a single

transaction. OGA is willing to limit the sales even further, which

is proposed in H.R. 3889.

With that said, we do have serious concerns about recent legislation passed in Oregon that imposes questionable and inefficient

controls on the sale of cough and cold medicine containing

pseudoephedrine or PSE. I’m referring specifically to the recent

passage of House bill 2485, which was passed here in Oregon recently, which requires all PSE products to be treated as Schedule

III prescription drugs.

Under the Oregon law, which has not gone into effect yet, it will

go into effect early next year, only retail stores that have a pharmacy are allowed to sell these medications with a doctor’s prescription and these items must be kept behind the pharmacy counter.

OGA believes that Federal legislation needs to balance consumer

access with reasonable PSE sales restriction. I want to be clear

that the Oregon Grocery Association does support restrictions requiring all the PSE products be secured behind the counter, locked

behind the counter at all pharmacy and non-pharmacy outlets.

We also support requiring the clerk to assist the customer in obtaining the PSE product; however, we believe Oregon went a little

too far in House bill 2485 going to prescription-only. We believe

that Oklahoma went a little too far in their model, and we do believe that legislation that’s passed the U.S. Senate and is currently

pending in Congress goes too far.

The end result under the rigid pharmacy-only approach is dramatic reduction in consumer access to cold and cough medication,

depending on whether the consumer’s local grocery store has a

pharmacy department and what hours the pharmacy is open on a

particular day. For consumers living in rural Oregon, which is

much of Oregon, pharmacy-only access can create major hardships

if the nearest pharmacy is 20 or 30 miles from the consumer’s

home.

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The Food Marketing Institute and the National Consumers

League gauged consumer opinion on views of the sales restrictions

of PSE products in a national survey that was released in April

2005. What this survey found is revealing. About 44 percent of the

2,900 adult survey respondents felt that pharmacy-only access

would create a hardship for them, while 62 percent said they did

not believe that restricting sales of PSE products to pharmacies is

a reasonable measure for controlling meth production.

In stark contrast, the survey respondents were far more receptive to less severe restrictions that pharmacy-only access, such as

placing all the cough, cold, and allergy products behind the

counter; not necessarily a pharmacy counter, but placing them in

a locked display case.

Additionally, more than 80 percent of the survey participants expressed support for limiting the quantity of such products that individuals can purchase, which is also a component of H.R. 3889.

For these reasons, the Oregon Grocery Association cannot support

pharmacy-only classification for cough and cold products containing

pseudoephedrine.

Pharmacy-only access clearly poses significant problems for consumers who have a legitimate need for these medications to treat

their allergies, coughs, and cough.

Chair Souder, Congressman Walden, I want to express the industry’s support of the Meth Epidemic Elimination Act. As you work

toward a final product in these next few weeks, we would urge at

subcommittee to amend the bill to include strong Federal preemption language governing the sale of PSE products in order to ensure uniformity.

Many retailers, including OGA members in Oregon, have retail

outlets in multiple States. Creating this restriction on sales of PSE

products that are uniform throughout the States will facilitate retailer compliance.

In conclusion, I want to re-emphasize the need to balance consumer access with reasonable PSE sales restrictions. I want to

thank Chairman Souder for visiting Oregon and listening to the

grocers’ concerns and recommendations as you develop this very

important piece of legislation, and I want to thank Congressman

Walden for his leadership on this issue.

And I thank you for the opportunity to provide this testimony.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Miller follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. And I’m going to—I’ll question a few, and then turn

it over to Congressman Walden. A lot of different things. Let’s start

with Mr. Miller and work backward.

It’s kind of hard to sometimes be a quasi-skunk at the picnic, so

to speak. But we’re working through very tough legislation. I come

from a small town in Indiana where I grew up, and they’ve lost

their pharmacy and their grocery store. I want to make it clear, I

shop at Wal-Mart. I’m a supporter of Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart financially supports me. I’m not anti-Wal-Mart.

But Wal-Mart and Target support this legislation, the restriction

behind the counter, because they can deal with that. Many of the

associations can figure out how to deal with that. What the fundamental question is, is how many small grocery stores are going

to shut down because we took out the profit margin?

When there are ways of tracking at the wholesale level, as the

DEA’s written testimony showed today, the big busts came because

they could tell the small grocery stores were doing large increases.

It’s tracked by distribution organizations. And you can tell which

store went above budget, just like we can tell in Mexico.

If this is the only way we can do it, this is the way we’re going

to do it. And let me just tell you now, there isn’t going to be a preemption. Unfortunately, if you don’t win at the State level, it’s

clear we’re not going to pre- exempt State laws on this.

But what we need out of your association, to the degree—and

often these little stores don’t even belong to the association. But

how many grocery stories in small towns don’t have a pharmacy?

You said you have a membership. How many of those don’t have

a pharmacy?

And to the degree that they’re willing to say this, what percentage of their profit is in the sales—in Indiana it just went into effect, and it went behind the counter as opposed to behind the pharmacy. The average store dropped from 120 pseudoephedrine down

to 20. So first off, if you can get an estimate of how much product

reduction there is and what that does to profit.

And then, second, at the margin, what is the estimate in the

small towns, how many grocery stores will go out? It won’t be 12

months, it won’t be 24 months, I know this is hard, but if you look

at that margin.

In other words, if the average grocery store margin, profit margin is 5 percent after taxes, and 10 or 20 percent of that is from

pseudoephedrine products, or even 5 to 10, you can tell that you’re

going to push them below 3 percent, and they’re not going to survive.

Many of them are already going down, it’s just a matter of how

many will this push over the top, and is that really going to solve

the problem. But we need some hard data. We’re pushing the National Grocery Store Association to tell us what’s happened in

Oklahoma. Everybody knows I came from a retail background. All

businesses yell loudly on each thing.

The question is, is it really going to be a restriction? Can they

make the money on substitute products? Is the only problem going

to be tobacco and lottery tickets? Is that where we’re headed?

What’s going to happen to convenience stores that are a big part

of the access that’s replaced small town grocery stores, you get it

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at the gas station. But if they don’t have a pharmacy, you’re not

going to be able to get the stuff at a gas station. Does that mean

those convenience stores are going to shut down; they’re not making it on the gas?

What is the practical tradeoff we’re making here? And it’s really

not affecting the bigger towns. This is a small town question. Because the bigger grocery stores will have some margin in profits,

but it’s not going to hurt badly.

Mr. MILLER. Chairman Souder, I’d be happy to be look into that.

Our association does represent the large retail stores, the chain

stores that do have pharmacies and some that don’t, and we also

represent the small mom and pop stores in many of the small town

communities across the State.

I think in the issue—and I’d be happy to try to do a survey.

Mr. SOUDER. Yeah, because it would be like we have Super Value

in northeast Indiana, IGA, those type of organizations. They have

a good indication to be able to kind of collectively—how many of

these small stores are left that, in effect, could be toppled by this?

Mr. MILLER. We would be happy to put together that information. I think, from our standpoint, what we’re trying to balance is

the access and the convenience for the consumer, the legitimate

consumer, that wants the product more so than the profit level.

And so I know from the grocery stores that I’ve talked to, it’s

really not a profit issue and a product issue, more so that this is,

you know, in retail industry, obviously we are interested in pleasing our customer.

When they walk into a grocery stove, they want to be able—as

some of the grocery stores you just indicated—they want to be able

to get all the products they can and go home and not have to go

to many different stores. And so in the retail industry, we try to

please those customers.

Mr. SOUDER. This actually first popped up in Hawaii because

they have lots of little tiny towns with grocery stores who don’t

even have a scanning system. And the only way to get to this was

at the wholesale level or to shut down the grocery stores.

Mr. MILLER. And the wholesale level, we do support legislation

and stricter penalties on actually retailers that are going to get in

products from the wholesaler and put them out the back door. I

know that was one of the components of the legislation on the

stricter penalties that we do support as an industry because we

want to get rid of those people in our industry, if they are running

it out the back door.

So if there are any components to your legislation that deal with

the wholesale level, I know that we’re very interested in that end

of the legislation as well.

Mr. SOUDER. Let me ask a couple of you now, some more basic

questions. First, Sheriff Trumbo, do you get a Byrne grant and do

you use the Byrne grant on any narcotic problems?

Mr. TRUMBO. Yeah. The Byrne grant goes to the Blue Mountain

Enforcement Narcotics Team. And they use that for their operation.

Mr. SOUDER. And how many dollars.

Mr. TRUMBO. $30,041.

Mr. SOUDER. And do you also get any COPS money?

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Mr. TRUMBO. Our department doesn’t. I don’t think the BMENT

team does either.

UNKNOWN. No.

Mr. SOUDER. So no on the COPS. Ms. Baney, in the community

prevention in Oregon, does anybody here have any of the community grants that come through the national—the Drug-Free Community.

Ms. BANEY. Yes, we do. And we do in Deschutes County as well.

And it works very good in the rural drug-free area.

Mr. SOUDER. And is it predominantly in your area, or are there

several in Oregon?

Ms. BANEY. Go ahead.

Ms. DEATHERAGE. We have 33 drug-free community grants used

in Oregon, and they’re spread across the State. There’s good geographic representation.

[Discussion off the record].

Mr. SOUDER. What we’re trying to figure out is, initially there

were 50 grantees and then 100 grantees in the entire Nation, and

I was trying to figure out how you got 33. But what you have is

a grantee that is then subdivided into 33.

Ms. DEATHERAGE. No, we have—California has nearly 50 DrugFree Community grants. And so we have 33 separate grants in the

State of Oregon.

Mr. SOUDER. But your grants aren’t——

Ms. DEATHERAGE. Some of those—they’re not all brand- new this

year. Some may be in their 2nd, 3rd year. But there are 33 distinct

grantees. I can share with you more information later, if that

would be helpful.

Mr. SOUDER. What’s happened is, we have a cap. And we’ve

moved through this bill, and we’ve gradually increased the number,

and the dollars are up to $70 million in the amount of our cap. It

basically means there are 700 in the entire Nation. Of that 700, the

question then is would 33 of those be in Oregon? And the answer

is possibly. It may be you have a couple that are coming through

another grantee. But regardless of that, you have a major—that

fund has been tapped into heavily.

Let me ask another kind of entry-level fundamental question,

and that is that in the—may I ask this across the board, but let

me start with Ms. Deatherage. You focused a lot on the kids. In

the meth problem, it doesn’t seem to be heavily among kids. In

your Drug-Free Communities program, are you targeting here the

program specifically at the population that seems to be more at

risk?

One of the problems we’ve had with the Drug-Free Schools program is for years it often—I’m going to make a broad statement

here that, for the record, is dicey. I don’t mean it this way. It’s just

my son, who has never used drugs, and my daughter who has

never used drugs. However, my son, because he loved rock music,

because he hung around with guys who used drugs, found most

anti-drug programs laughable. And he and his friends made fun of

them and didn’t go to them.

My daughter, who was somewhat, in a nice way, a goody two

shoes, which is wonderful, found these programs very good, very

motivating, and she wasn’t a person at risk. And the question is

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how do you—one of my concerns in meth is that we’re approaching

this, we’re really good at convincing young children who aren’t

tempted at this point for the bulk of it, for folks in high school, but

we seem to have a very unusual problem here in that many of

these people—not all.

Because once it gets going in a community, it hits a large percentage. In one town in Arkansas, 80 percent of the town, including

law enforcement, the doctor, everybody else. But typically in the

community, people have already gotten into the culture because of

marijuana and others and often isolate themselves from fear of getting caught.

How, in the community anti-drug effort, can you educate on meth

when they’re already inside the drug culture, to some degree

they’ve somewhat become anti-social. How would you recommend,

in our prevention campaign, we target the people who are actually

most at risk of moving to meth?

Ms. DEATHERAGE. That’s an excellent question. And I—that question in and of itself is why the enforcement piece of this problem

tends to be easier to deal with than the prevention piece.

But to try to take your question apart, first of all, Drug-Free

Community grantees are required, and as they should be, to address more than just one drug. So you shouldn’t find any grants

out there just dealing with methamphetamines and they actually

wouldn’t be in compliance with the grant itself.

You asked about addressing methamphetamine with young people when we know that it tends to be maybe college age or in the

20’s that we see the predominant meth use. It goes back to a comment that we made earlier today. Very few, if any, people ever

begin their drug addiction by deciding this morning I’m going to

get up and try methamphetamine. So they’ve probably been drinking or smoking marijuana or some other entry type drug, then they

have progressed to methamphetamine use.

And I think when we look at a community level at how we’re

going to prevent use among our young people, we’re really looking

at how we’re going to change norms in our community.

And I think what the challenge is, how do we take on a task

that’s not going to have a 6-month or even a 1-year measurable

outcome, like we might want to see, but similar to tobacco, how do

you tackle the 20-year campaign to change public perception and

public knowledge about the dangers of cigarette smoking? And I

think we’re looking at the same type of approach is needed for

drugs.

So I think you’re right that we do have—when we look at prevention, we talk about universal prevention which is for everybody, selective prevention which is for at-risk individuals, and intricate

prevention which is at the most specific population for perhaps a

specific ethnicity at risk.

Universal prevention programs probably are going to be more applicable to people like your daughter who have some of the protective factors in their life and are not at as great of risk to use. More

emphasis has to be put on how do we identify those youth who may

be at greater risk because of past trauma in their life, because of

parental history or use of friends and family.

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And how do we form our messaging so that we can begin to make

an impact with those individuals as well. So I think we’re looking

at the need for a multi-pronged strategy, but clearly we’ve got to

start earlier and we’ve got to be in schools more often with a more

effective message. At this point, we’re not getting the job done efficiently.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Jones, before I yield to Greg, let me—you’ve

been—you’ve dealt with this with your own family, with yourself,

and as well as working with many addicts. And there was one suggestion in the first panel that, in fact, prevention may not work on

meth, and we’re wasting our dollars when we focus on prevention

of using meth.

And what Ms. Deatherage just said, which she wouldn’t phrase

it this way, but she really hit on a core of a debate that I’ve been

having with the drug right now, and that is the position of ONDCP

is that, in fact, we can’t really dent the meth question with the prevention. We have to focus on the marijuana—tobacco is funded

through a different procedure through the tobacco funds—and alcohol.

Because you can’t isolate the meth user once they’re inside this

subgroup, and it is a fact that we’ve moved, that the meth population, we moved the meth population. It’s been real interesting, as

somebody that’s been minutely involved in the National Ad Campaign, to hear Members of Congress sound off about the ineffect,

‘‘Well, I haven’t seen the ads, I don’t understand the ads.’’

Well, they’re not the target of the ads. If I see an ad, then they’ve

made somewhat of a mistake.

Mr. WALDEN. There may be some State legislators who may

be——

Mr. SOUDER. For example, we had a little bit of a battle when

they ran an ad in the Washington Post. I felt that was more political to try to prove to Congress than try to reach kids. I’ve had some

concerns about—I’m a Notre Dame football addict—that the ads

that they run on occasion during games is to show me, as chairman

of the subcommittee, that they’re running ads, rather than focusing

on kids who are at risk, although I don’t really know about Notre

Dame alumni, that particular class.

But the point here is that in watching how they’ve done target

polling, as we’ve pushed in the National Ad Campaign, they’ve actually tried to highlight the highest risk population; let’s say, marijuana go to certain different places.

And the new ads are about to come in on methamphetamine. For

example, there was one of a girl plucking her eyelashes that I just

thought it was the dumbest ad I’ve ever seen. And the females on

my staff were just appalled. They thought it was incredibly effective, and I thought it was incredibly stupid. But I know enough to

know that it doesn’t impact me.

Now, the fundamental question here is do you believe that, in

fact, we can do targeted prevention? I’m not talking about treatment right now, but prevention targets that would have reached

your kids or you or the people who are your addicts, or are we better off trying to get them before they get into that? And then if

that’s the case, we’re miserably failing on meth and why?

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Mr. JONES. I want to echo what Kaleen Deatherage has said, in

I don’t really think that—yes, I think we can prevent methamphetamine use. The prevention work that’s being done that’s effective

is not very specific.

You know, you’re not going to respond to something about plucking your eyebrows out unless you’ve done it or you know somebody

who did or you watched your mom do it. But that would be effective for someone who went, oh, yeah. You know. But you can’t relate to it because it doesn’t address you.

See, methamphetamine once a person has used it, the tug-of-war

is on. You know, it’s a very powerful drug in that the only thing

it’s been compared to is a sexual orgasm. And we’re up against that

issue with our kids anyway. And so then with some of the adults,

it’s like, you know, taking away their chocolate cake. There’s a tugof-war that goes on.

I think—I go all the way—I mean, I’ve been in prevention for all

of my career, too. And I go all the way back to the Chemical People

Project, the Just Say No campaign, the whole Red Ribbon Campaign, and the different things. And they all have their pieces.

What I have seen recently that I really—and I do see treatment

as a primary prevention strategy, particularly in our Drug Court,

we’ve had 15 drug-free babies, I don’t think prevention gets any

better than that. The assets, the street-based program, the community-based program, bringing families together, that’s where prevention is. And it’s not drug specific.

Methamphetamine isn’t a drug of self-esteem. It’s a stimulant.

It’s not far different than the smoking issue. Because, actually, I

used to run a detox, and I could take all the drugs and alcohol off

a drunk and an addict, and they’d kind of tolerate that, but they’d

want to beat me up if I took their cigarettes. Nicotine is a behavioral stimulant. Methamphetamine is a much more powerful behavioral stimulant. It’s a very insidious drug.

You know, your question about actually targeting these folks who

are in it, I think that’s a tough issue. I think we’re involved in

some movement right now as to what we’re doing with kids. I have

40 kids in my treatment right now. I have a wonderful staff. We

have not thrown anybody out of our treatment program over the

last 5 years.

And back in the earlier days of treatment, if you didn’t behave,

you got thrown out. Well, that just fed into things. So, you know,

I think keeping kids engaged, keeping people involved in a process

with positive role models, mentorships, things like that, that are

being talked about in prevention right now are key.

Mr. SOUDER. Do you use the matrix well.

Mr. JONES. Yes. Actually, Joe County recently got a $500,000

grant to implement meth projects.

Mr. SOUDER. Which county.

Mr. JONES. Josephine County.

Mr. SOUDER. And what city does that——

Mr. WALDEN. Grants Pass, Cave Junction, Selma, Williams,

Sunny Valley. Grants Pass is the biggest part of that.

Mr. SOUDER. And do you—a couple quick questions on treatment

yet. One thing we’ve heard in treatment is that the alcohol method

of treatment, where you have an enabler and then the support,

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isn’t really true in meth. Have you run into people where, in any

husband and wife situation, they aren’t both involved?

In other words, the traditional treatment models we assume

there’s an abuser and then a support, where what we see over and

over in meth, they kind of pull away into what we call the mom

and pop places. Even though a lot of people don’t like to use that

expression, often they pull their kids in to help, who are cooking

too, and their immediate friends.

In Ohio we had an addict actually come in that just came off.

Nick had to make sure I read him his rights. There were about 40

sheriffs. But one of the things he said is they’re completely isolated

within the community because they’re afraid somebody’s going to

tip off law enforcement, which is not the traditional enabler community.

How does this differ in treatment?

Mr. JONES. It’s very insidious, the treatment is for these folks.

And there are some similarities. I don’t like getting too specific.

And there’s recent information that Eric Martin has been presenting regarding treatment in that we’re as effective with methamphetamine as we are other drugs, and I don’t know why we’re

getting such a bad wrap.

I think the expectations are high, for one, in the treatment arena

regarding people. And that’s why I made the statement that recovery or treatment, it’s a process, it’s not an event. But it is very insidious, it’s very criminal, and it’s very generational in our area.

It isn’t really uncommon for us to have families who are very

much involved. But we’ve seen the same thing with marijuana in

our area, still a cash crop. And we’re still struggling with

generational growers in the area. The thing about methamphetamine is that most of these folks come through the door having

burned out everybody else. I think that’s the major difference.

When you get someone who’s purely alcoholic, who has the traditional family system around them where there are some enablers

and different people, the meth addict, by the time we get them usually, they have really blown everybody out of the water.

Everybody’s mad.

Mr. SOUDER. So you’re not seeing moms and dads? You’re not

seeing pairs?

Mr. JONES. As far as both using and coming into treatment? Yes,

we are.

Mr. SOUDER. Higher than some other drugs, or do you see it in

some other drugs as well, where you see the pair?

Mr. JONES. Actually, I think we probably see it more with the

meth addicts. I would have to agree. We do see folks coming in who

are jointly addicted more than the other drugs.

Mr. SOUDER. Do you see it in law enforcement? Do they tend to

get both of them? Or sometimes the reason you’re not seeing a pair

is because they caught one and the other didn’t get caught.

Mr. JONES. Actually, they’ve been getting both of them down in

our area, and they’re also getting charged with child neglect. And

we’re actually kind of having——

Mr. SOUDER. Let me ask a quick question of the sheriff. When

you go in, do you tend to get both of them and they both get the

same——

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Mr. TRUMBO. And then we get the child or children.

Mr. SOUDER. Let me ask one other treatment question, so I kind

of keep that train of thought here for a second. We’ve heard in

some places, and I assume all these are true, and I’m just interested in getting data. Some cities are running 50 percent are

women and it’s weight loss driven. Other places, which doesn’t suggest it’s a sexual orgasm approach, although it may give them that

effect, but they lose weight. Maybe they get a sexual orgasm as a

side benefit. Not a side benefit, but their goal is to lose weight.

Other places are just straight the drug was addictive. A third is

that I had a company, an RV company, fastest growing RV company in the United States, heard that they had a drug problem.

They did a quick test, and a third of their employees were either

on cocaine or meth with just a little marijuana.

And the argument, the treatment people in that county, which

has one of the highest meth problems in that State, is that they’re

using it like an amphetamine, because of the piece rate, they initially, at least, get a faster support rate. That suggests that the

people coming into treatment aren’t coming in—it may even be different by region, but even within a region, depending on your mix

of industrial, women, what the word of mouth on the street is, or

are you seeing all these areas?

Mr. JONES. All of the above. I’ve been in the business for a long

time. And I used to consult the Weyerhaeuser Corp. in Klamath

Falls. And other than waiting around waiting for a fire to happen,

those people were all basically in a production position, and they

used a lot of methamphetamine.

And I think any production business in this country, basically

you’re going to find the same thing. Methamphetamine is a stimulant. It is the drug of self- esteem. It is the drug that makes people

feel efficient. Far greater than cocaine in that cocaine makes you

feel that way for about 20 minutes, and methamphetamine will

give you that for 10 to 12 hours or more, depending on the drug

itself.

The comparison with the sexual orgasm is really more of a term,

in that people, lay people don’t seem to understand, if you haven’t

used it, what it feels like to have that kind of a rush, particularly

if you inject. If you smoke it, it’s similar, but it’s about, you know,

around 3 seconds. What is it like to have a feeling like that within

3 seconds, 5 to 3 seconds? Most lay people around, unless you’ve

experienced it, have no idea.

So orgasm is used as a, well, that’s similar, that’s the competitor.

What you’ll also find out in talking to law enforcement is that the

meth addicts do have a tendency to be very involved in high risk

sexual behavior. And there’s a lot of jokes and stuff around about

sex toys and those kind of things.

My generational overview of that, actually developmental overview of that is that some of these folks have never participated in

sexual behavior not stoned on some chemical. And that’s a major

issue that we have in our treatment program.

I think the thing I want to say about treatment more than anything else is that we have to really stay focused with them. They

have to come in and see us a lot. Rather than traditional therapy

and psychotherapy and issue-oriented kind of things, it’s really imVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:49 Dec 14, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00154 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\27723.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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portant to have these folks kind of coming in two or three times

week, if not more.

We have an ability to see people five times week. And sometimes

we’ll see them four or five times, you know, in a couple of days,

you know, just coming in, having them give urine screens. It isn’t

about therapy as much as it is about contact and accountability

and kind of keeping clean long enough to get to where they can get

some therapy.

The problem we’re having in the treatment arena is people expect it to be like surgery, where you go in and get the cure, you

know, and never drink again. That doesn’t work for people on

meth. We have to keep these people involved in some form of treatment forever.

It’s like my cardiac problems, you know. I’m going to be dealing

with this forever. It’s not—I’m not done just because I got a

defibrillator and I’ll get shocked if I don’t behave. It’s important for

me to take the medications I need, it’s important for me to do the

followup work. It’s the same thing with addicts.

And we tend to blow that off, and the addicts tend to blow it off.

And, you know, I think that we are growing kind of a different addict with some of these folks in the criminality of it all.

My daughter, for example, at 26 years old, has significant legal

problems that are going to follow her for the rest of her life, as far

as employment and bonding and child care issues and HUD and all

those things that go with that are major barriers. And I think

those folks tend to not do as well out there in the world, and they

do relapse more often, because they have so many more trip-ups.

You know, the alcoholic who works for the frozen food organization over there, he trips on it, he gets sent by his boss to go to

treatment, and we work with his employer and ya-da, ya-da, ya-da,

everything is fine afterwards. He keeps his job, he stays there, everything is fine.

With the meth addict, oftentimes there are so many hoops for

them to jump through, that sometimes they say screw it. And I

think the more we walk with them slowly and lower our expectations of what we expect out of them. Why would you want to—we

expect someone to make $7.50 an hour working at Taco Bell when

they’ve been making a couple thousand a day messing with speed.

I mean, it’s very tough. They look at me like, how do I do that?

And that’s a process, not an event. They have to come talk to us.

We have some groups that focus on that.

Mr. SOUDER. What you say is interesting, but the difference,

other than drug addicted driving, which we need to get under control, like alcohol driving, it’s mostly a process of right now getting

cheap tests that police can administer because more people are

dying from that.

But other than that, the alcohol addict probably is causing some

financial problems in his family, maybe beating his child and family. I’m not arguing that. But they’re not blowing up their home,

they’re not tying up local law enforcement, they’re not polluting the

local waters. And that’s why it’s a different type of a drug to deal

with than alcohol. And we’re not understating alcohol. We’re trying

to tighten this. Let me give it to him.

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Mr. WALDEN. Thank you. And thank you, Rick, for your comments. I was going to have you explore just briefly for the chairman the discussion we had in Josephine County, the followup

forum on the success of the women who had been clean and given

birth and the savings that had been achieved as a result. And I

think that was all tied into the Drug Court, right.

Mr. JONES. It was. Well, I have an interesting position, too. I run

a treatment program that’s actually owned by the Oregon Health

Plan, one of the few—actually, the only one in the State. So I work

with 20 doctors. I work with a small medical clinic.

We actually had a panel today to deal with prescribed medications that I had to miss because I was here. I thought this was important, and those guys could take care of that themselves. And so

there’s a big focus in my job and at my shop about medical issues

and the whole frequent flyer kind of problem.

And, you know, a methamphetamine affected baby costs well

over $1 million. And so they really like it when we have meth addicts who show up in our program who might be pregnant or get

pregnant in the program and deliver a drug-free baby. We make a

big hoopla out of it.

We give them gifts, we bring them before the judge. We give

them a bear. We give them a certificate, we give the baby a certificate, the only Drug Court certificate they’ll ever need. Because

that’s, like I said earlier, that’s the epitome of prevention.

You know, women, we’ve had just a few more women than men

graduate from our Drug Court program in Josephine County. And

in my history, that’s phenomenal. Back in the 1970’s and 1980’s,

we didn’t have women in treatment. We couldn’t figure out how to

balance all the issues, and we now have all these women in treatment and we’re dealing with barriers of child care.

I didn’t answer one of the issues you brought up about women

and the sexuality and the weight loss and all those kinds of things.

You know, that’s a major package deal. We run across of a lot of

these women that can’t clean their house unless they’re wired. And

so it’s kind of—just think if you don’t sleep for a couple days what

you can get done. I mean, it’s amazing how that works.

So I have been real excited about the Drug Court piece down

there.

Mr. WALDEN. Do you remember the numbers? I’ve forgotten the

numbers.

Mr. JONES. We had 15 drug-free babies. And I didn’t really have

time to put together these statistics, but we had a high number of

women in our——

Mr. WALDEN. The equivalent would be, at a minimum, maybe

$15 million in savings just in the ER.

Mr. JONES. Oh exactly.

Mr. WALDEN [continuing]. Let alone the long-term costs of treatment care.

Mr. JONES. Not even really talking about what we know about

the care of—I think you had actually mentioned the child and some

of the issues that these kids have as they become teenagers and

whatnot.

Mr. WALDEN. Go ahead, Karen.

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Ms. ASHBECK. I just want to interject something about what Rick

was saying. My daughter is 42. She’s been fired from every job

she’s held. And it seems that’s the pattern. She can’t focus. She

can’t stay on track.

She was very sexually active, not in a good way, because she had

multiple partners. And then she would use meth, and then coming

off of it she’d go into a deep depression or she’d be in a depression

before she used it. And my granddaughter is seeing all of this.

I mean, that’s, you know, she had a grandpa and I at the same

place. You know, we lived on a ranch outside of town, and she’d

come out there and ride horses and stuff. But my granddaughter

started using marijuana at age nine. So what she was saying—she

was going to be with me here today. She’s out sleeping in the car

because she worked all night, but she wanted to be here.

She’s clean right now, but she has pending charges against her.

She may go to jail. We don’t know. They were—can’t go into why,

but, anyway, so, you know, she has some issues that she has to

deal with. But I remember when she was pregnant with her child

and we were talking, and she said, ‘‘Does God forgive you if you

make the same mistake over again?’’

And I said, ‘‘Well, that depends on if you’re doing it intentionally

or if you’re just doing it, you know, just because you know you’re

going to be excused.’’

And she said—and she’s 16 years old. She said, ‘‘Well, I think

God knows that my mom is fragile and that He will forgive her for

what she does.’’

She’s been her mother’s care giver. And that’s what you see with

so many of these children. And like some of these case histories

that I wrote down, is that the child becomes the parent. And my

daughter would ask my granddaughter if she could have a party

or if they could do this or if they could do that. And she’s in the

fifth grade.

You know, you don’t ask your child—she was trying to be her

daughter’s best friend rather than her parent. And so then what

happens is the child becomes the one who tells the parent what to

do and manipulates that parent into doing what they want them

to do. And they use each other. And it’s sick. It’s just so sad.

And you know it’s going on. I accessed treatment for my granddaughter in three different treatment programs. She was in one in

Portland and then she was in one in Boise, and then she went to

El Cornelius Treatment Center in Baker for almost a year. But she

would sabotage herself and fail so that they would—because if she

felt success, then we would expect more of her.

Or, you know, I mean, there’s—I’m sure Rick sees it all the time.

But it’s so frustrating. And now, you know, she has missed so

much. And she says, ‘‘Grandma, there are things that I should

know, but I just don’t know them. It’s like, ’Why don’t I get that?’’’

You know, and it’s just common, everyday things that you should

know; as feelings for your child or, you know, that pleasure center.

And I visited with a lady who’s 18 years clean from cocaine, and

she said the hardest thing for her and her husband to do when

they came off of cocaine was to know what to do to have fun. They

don’t know what to do.

Mr. WALDEN. Because that’s what they’ve always done.

154

Ms. ASHBECK. And she said, ‘‘We always had friends, ’cause we

had—my husband had a good job and we had lots of money, so we

had lots of friends.’’ ‘‘But,’’ she said, ‘‘when we went off coke,’’ she

said, ‘‘then it was, you know, what do we do for fun.’’

It wasn’t the sunset or the baby ducklings in the pond or any——

Mr. WALDEN. Let me go to Sheriff Trumbo. And then I know

we’ve well gone over the time line of the committee. But I want to

followup on this issue of the cleanup that I raised and the contracting thereof.

Can you tell me what—because you were kind of shaking your

head back there when we were walking through how the contract

works. Can you tell me what your officers and others in the community face when you do discover a lab and then how that contract

works?

Mr. TRUMBO. The last two labs we had, we had to call the cleanup crew out of Portland to come in and clean them up because the

Pendleton cleanup crew was in Portland cleaning up labs.

Mr. WALDEN. Let me get that straight.

Mr. TRUMBO. Pretty simple.

Mr. WALDEN. The Pendleton crew was sent to Portland to clean

up a lab when you’ve got a lab here to clean up, so they send a

crew from Portland to here to clean up a lab. Is that because the

number came up for Pendleton, they get the next lab.

Mr. TRUMBO. Right.

Mr. WALDEN. So rather than—OK. So my fire analogy was pretty

close; next fire that comes up in Portland, we’ll send a Pendleton

crew.

Mr. TRUMBO. So that’s the challenge we’re facing, because we

have to have two lab site safety officers on the lab until the cleanup crew gets there. And when they come out of Portland, that’s 4

or 5 hours. Because they have a minimum time they have to be

here, but they don’t push that, I’ll guarantee it, because they’re

making money for every hour they’re sitting in that truck.

So, you know, they’re pushing right to the limit each time. But

we have to sit there and guard that scene, and it becomes a real

challenge for us.

Mr. WALDEN. And am I correct that the DEA picks up the actual

cleanup costs——

Mr. TRUMBO. Yes.

Mr. WALDEN [continuing]. But not your officer time?

Mr. TRUMBO. No. But they don’t pick up our overtime costs.

Mr. WALDEN. That’s what I mean.

Mr. TRUMBO. And the protective suits and all the other things.

Mr. SOUDER. Because we were trying to sort this out earlier, let

me see if I can understand this, because there’s several things

going on. DEA does the clean-up cost. Your primary pressure isn’t

the clean-up cost. Your primary pressure is how long they have to

sit there until the agency——

Mr. TRUMBO. It’s the manpower cost.

Mr. SOUDER. Therefore, the Kentucky model that enables you to

do it directly or for minimal cost would enable your officers to get

out of the way, and then the DEA comes in and cleans it up.

Mr. TRUMBO. Absolutely.

Mr. SOUDER. So that would——

155

Mr. TRUMBO. That would save the Federal Government hundreds

of thousands of dollars every year.

Mr. SOUDER. Because this is what, in Indiana, our State police

run the cleanup, so they can do the first sites. And part of our

problem is to try to get enough of those mobile labs. And we don’t

have enough mobile labs to come in.

So we have all these police agencies sitting in a minimum of 4

hours up to 8 hours with drug teams of four people, tying up in

some counties the entire police narcotics force. And if there’s a way

to seal that in 30 minutes such that the site is secure enough that

the officers can leave or just leave one person, you change the cost

dynamics for overtime substantially.

Mr. TRUMBO. We spent about $360,000 in this county last year

on drug cleanup. That includes what DEA paid and what our overtime cost and equipment costs and everything else, about $360,000.

Mr. SOUDER. You said that included the DEA costs.

Mr. TRUMBO. That includes everything. But it’s all taxpayer

money, whether it’s Federal, State, or local. It’s still taxpayer

money, which is what I said in my speech. You know, you become

a victim and a victim and a victim, and you keep paying.

Mr. WALDEN. So one of your issues is the delay in the cleanup.

Mr. TRUMBO. Yeah. It becomes a real major delay, especially

with us. Right now my staffing level is one-third of an officer for

every thousand people, and I should have an officer and a half for

every thousand people. So that becomes a big issue.

And one of our patrol officers is site safety trained, which means

we pull him off the street, stick him in a protective suit, send him

out.

Mr. WALDEN. And help me understand this; are you required to

have more than one officer on the site?

Mr. TRUMBO. We have to have two.

Mr. WALDEN. And they have to be site trained.

Mr. TRUMBO. They have to be site safety officers, and they have

to be trained, and they have to have the proper equipment.

Mr. WALDEN. Why do you have to have more than one? I would

think one of you standing there well-armed would be enough to

chase away anybody that was going to mess around.

Mr. TRUMBO. That’s an OSHA requirement, isn’t it? State of Oregon stepped in and said they wanted two.

Mr. WALDEN. Is that what’s required elsewhere across the country, or is that an Oregon requirement?

STAFF MEMBER. It just depends on State law.

Mr. SOUDER. I think it’s Oregon.

Mr. WALDEN. Does anybody know what it is in Washington? Do

they have to have two?

Mr. TRUMBO. The thing that concerns me—and at one time a

couple years ago, DEA might have dried up and DEQ stepped in.

But if it came down to the local level having to suffer the cost of

cleanup——

Mr. WALDEN. You wouldn’t bust many labs.

Mr. TRUMBO. Well, that, and, in fact, there would be some things

done to try to circumvent some of the costs, and we don’t want to

go there. You know, we’ve still got an environment, we’ve got a

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neighborhood, and we want things done correctly. So there’s got to

be some way of doing it correctly and then saving taxpayer money.

Mr. SOUDER. I just want to ask a followup question because it’s

so refreshing to hear a local official say, hey, it’s all the taxpayers’

money, it doesn’t matter which level.

Mr. TRUMBO. Well, it’s the same thing when people say, you

know, ‘‘I’m not affected by methamphetamines because I live in a

good neighborhood and my kids don’t use it,’’ and all that.

And I say, ‘‘Fine, you’re the same one that’s paying the taxes.

Who do you think is paying the freight on this thing?’’

Mr. WALDEN. Yeah, the editor of the Medford Mail Tribune, we

had a forum in Medford, and he was talking about how they’d done

a series on it, front page sort of deal, and a reader had called in

to complain that they were wasting all the paper on covering this

issue that had no effect on him and why were they doing that?

And he recounted that story.

Mr. TRUMBO. And what we’re experiencing here on the local

level, and I talked about these indirect costs, what’s happening now

is these meth abusers are stealing cars and they’re driving right

to the front of a business and right through the front door. And

then they’re stealing everything, throwing the stuff in the stolen

car and—so now not only do we have theft, we have some major

building destruction because they’re driving right through the front

doors.

Mr. JONES. Mr. Chairman, there was some discussion earlier

about the difference between alcoholics and meth addicts or alcohol

and meth, and I’d just like to quickly draw an analogy in that—

because I don’t know about the rest of the State, but Josephine

County still has a significant drunk driving problem.

And most of the drunk drivers that come into my treatment program are repeat offenders. And they don’t understand anything

about the fact that they’re driving a bullet down the road than the

meth addict understands that he’s messing up someone’s property.

It’s big to us, but they’re just as much messed up up here as the

alcoholic is who thinks—I guess in D.C. you really can’t drive at

all, unless—if you’ve had one glass of wine, I heard on the news

this morning, which is fine, but they’re in just as much denial

about the effect.

The guy that drove the car into the building over there—I mean,

I’m not soft on crime, but he doesn’t understand it any more than

the guy driving down the road drunk. The disease of addiction is

the disease of addiction regardless of the drug.

Mr. SOUDER. Let me just ask on that, because you’re getting—

do you—one of the questions about meth, and as we look at treatment is does meth do different things to your body than others and

does it cause quicker negative damage to your body?

Mr. JONES. Definitely.

Mr. SOUDER. More than other drugs? And in case that, for example, the question of whether somebody can hold a job, does it depend somewhat whether they—I would think if crystal meth is

pure, that crystal meth would burn you out quicker and you’d start

to lose your job quicker and so on.

Mr. JONES. The lifestyle issues are certainly huge. They are certainly much huger than alcohol. We’ve known that for decades.

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Mr. SOUDER. Are there meth users that would—like some people

smoke a little bit and then some drinkers drink more on weekends

or that type of thing. Are meth users, do they binge? Do they control some? Or is it such that you just have straight downhill?

Mr. JONES. Well, I think it’s just like anything else. We see people who do that. We see bingers.

Mr. WALDEN. But that suggests you can control the extent——

Mr. JONES. Well, there are people that, because of their lifestyle

issues, use occasionally every drug. And then there are people because of whether it’s genetics or lifestyle issues or whatever they

were raised with, use one time and they’re gone. I don’t think you

can lump it all into——

Mr. SOUDER. I understand that basic principle: Some people can

handle more alcohol and less and react differently. The question is,

is meth unique or relatively unusual as a drug that its addictive

properties—and we’ve had different testimony of what it does to

your brain and body—is such that you can’t kind of restrain yourself.

Mr. JONES. It becomes that way. I think for some it’s a matter

of time. I mean, there are people, just like anything else, we call

it tapering on, rather than tapering off, in the business. There’s no

question at all that methamphetamine is a very toxic, quick-acting

substance.

But the addiction, you know, it carries the same symptoms. You

know, the denial about how it’s affecting me and all those things,

that’s what I’m really trying to get across. It does happen much

more rapid in some people.

My philosophy is, if you’ve got a screw loose and you use

methamphetamines, you’re going to knock it out of its socket. You

know, it really depends what you’ve got going on——

Mr. WALDEN. It amplifies.

Mr. JONES [continuing]. When you put that stuff in your system

as to what can happen next.

Mr. SOUDER. Ms. Ashbeck, you said that your daughter said,

when you asked her—was it your granddaughter or daughter that

said, you know, what could you have done, and she said she could

have come in contact with the law sooner.

Ms. ASHBECK. Uh-huh.

Mr. SOUDER. Could you elaborate on that a little bit? And do you

think that really would have had an impact? And then the second

thing with that is, would it also, if there was a drug test at work,

would that have had a similar impact.

Ms. ASHBECK. No. Because she wasn’t working. She was just

doing the drug.

With the matrix system the way it’s set up, it’s five points. It’s

a point system. And she said she would get picked up and all she

could think in her mind was book and release, book and release,

book and release. That’s it. They book and they release them.

She said that for her, getting locked up sooner would have helped

her. It might not have some others, because while she was in jail,

she visited with some of the other inmates and they maybe had

been in there 7 to 8 months, and they couldn’t wait until they were

out to go get their first hit.

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That wasn’t the case with her, although she did relapse after a

short time out, but has been, so she says, clean for about the last

9 months.

But here comes the story of, you know, credibility, rebuilding

credibility and trust. She hasn’t been in any trouble, she’s been

working, and she’s gained some weight, so, you know, those are all

really good signs. She’s been lucid in the times that we’ve been

around her.

But I think the way that the system is set up, there was a point

in time where, when we were in this very room, and the judge had

the opportunity in his hands to say, ‘‘You need—this is what I’m

going to do for you, and you need to go to—I’m going to say that

you need to go to treatment.’’

And he didn’t do that. He could have, but he didn’t, whatever the

circumstances.

And I think that we need to be more aware of what is actually

going to help the people, what are the precursors that makes one

person choose a drug and not another. I’m from a family of alcoholics. My father committed suicide when I was 11 because of alcohol

addiction.

My grandfather was. My mother was. I’m not. I like an occasional glass of wine. But my two daughters are drug addicted. My

granddaughter is drug addicted, but my son isn’t. So what are the

precursors?

And, you know, all three children were raised in the same house.

Two were girls, one was a boy. But it’s like they were saying, some

people are predisposed. Some people are predisposed to alcoholism,

some people are predisposed to drugs.

The drug was attractive to my granddaughter because of how her

relationship was with her mother and the world that they lived in,

that’s what it was, even though she had another world to go to and

she could, you know, she had us as a good example. And she had

other friends as good examples.

But it’s just that some people are more destined to do that.

What—you know, we could go on all night to figure out what that

is. You know, is it genetics, is it self-esteem, is it ADHD, is it bipolar? What is it? Maybe it’s all of those.

But I think catching them as soon as you know they have the

problem and separating them from the drug is extremely important. Jail, I would say jail detox, in a situation—and I don’t know

that jail is the answer. But separating the person from the drug

is most important. And then rehab is extremely important.

And not for 30 days like some insurance people want to say. It

has to be long-term. They have to learn a new way of thinking.

And the sooner you catch them, the less damage is going to be done

to their brain.

But like my daughter who’s been doing drugs now for over 20

years, what’s the hope for her? She’s with a man now who really

loves her and cares for her and is getting her help, but will she

ever be able to hold down a job? She might, if she’s the greeter at

Wal-Mart maybe.

But to stay on track—you know, she’s a wonderful, wonderful

lady, but it’s just not there for her anymore. And it’s so sad to see

that. And, you know, I’m sure that Rick will agree with me, the

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sooner that you catch them and separate them from the drug, the

better luck you have or our prisons are going to be full and we may

have a State orphanage because the children are getting neglected.

Amber, my granddaughter, is fortunate to have the support that

we’re giving her. Our family is divided, because some say, you

know, she made her choice. Well, you know, God never gave up on

us. I’m not giving up.

If I didn’t wake up with hope in my heart, I wouldn’t get up in

the morning. It reminds me of a little song: The more we work together, they happier we’ll be. You know, your friend is my friend

and my friend is your friend.

It’s simple, but that’s exactly what we need to look at here, is

that we all need to work together to stop this menace.

Mr. SOUDER. Before closing, I need to ask Ms. Baney one question.

Ms. BANEY. Yes.

Mr. SOUDER. Did your group just go through this review on the

national grant structure.

Ms. BANEY. No not to my knowledge, no.

Mr. SOUDER. Do you know—ONDCP is doing a review right now

of all the different community grants. Did you hear anything back?

We have chaos at the national level.

Ms. DEATHERAGE. Yes, there’s chaos here, too. I know that Oregon Partnership is the fiscal agent for the grant. We received our

scores, but I haven’t—I just got an e-mail yesterday saying that

they want to come out and do a site review next year. We’re in our

second year. We’ve not been site reviewed yet.

Mr. SOUDER. And you said you had 33.

Ms. DEATHERAGE. Uh-huh.

Mr. SOUDER. Of the 33, through either of you, do you know how

many of them got renewed.

Ms. DEATHERAGE. I could find out. I don’t know off-hand. I don’t

know.

Mr. SOUDER. If you could give that to me, because my understanding is they suspended 20 percent.

Ms. DEATHERAGE. OK, 63 were defunded and 88 were put on probation.

Ms. BANEY. We were not one of those.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you. Thank each of you for your openness

today, for your testimony. If you have other things you want to

submit, if you could get those to us as soon as possible. Also, thank

you for your leadership in each of the communities you’re a part

of.

With that, the subcommittee stands adjourned.

[Whereupon, at 5:55 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]

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