$$ TO AID ANTI-DRUG EFFORTS

Feds Budget $3.6m For Phila., Camden

WASHINGTON - Philadelphia's expanding International Airport, its deep-water
seaport and its railroad and highway connections make the city a major
center for trade along the East Coast.

The same factors that make Philadelphia a hub for commerce make it a focal
point for drug traffickers, a report released yesterday by White House drug
czar Barry McCaffrey says.

"Philadelphia remains a center of activity for the importation, wholesale
distribution and street-level sales of illegal drugs on the East Coast,"
the report says.

Business, it would seem, is booming.

"Philadelphia is becoming something of a [heroin] source city for not just
the surrounding suburbs, but as far west as Harrisburg or West Virginia,"
said Tom Eicher, the chief of narcotics for the U.S. Attorney's office in
Philadelphia.

To combat the flow of narcotics through the area, the federal government
designated Philadelphia and Camden as a "High Intensity Drug Trafficking
Area," or HIDTA, in 1995.

The move allows greater cooperation among area law enforcement and
additional federal funds for anti-drug efforts in the cities.

The Philadelphia/Camden area is slated to receive an additional $3.6
million in funds in the 2001 fiscal year.

"Law enforcement needs help," McCaffrey said. "We cannot leave a sheriff or
a police chief without a coordinated federal effort."

One of the HIDTA's major efforts targets the region's "hidden traffickers"
- - people from the Philadelphia area who are arrested for drug crimes
outside the region along the Interstate 95 corridor.

"Just like you and I travel up and down that corridor, so do drug
traffickers," said Wayne Comer, director of the Philadelphia/Camden HIDTA.

Eicher said the Philadelphia area has seen an increase in the amounts of
LSD, designer drugs and methamphetamine being shipped to the area through
the U.S. Postal Service and firms like UPS.

Philadelphia's proximity to New York doesn't help the city, either.

"A good bit of our drugs flow through New York to us," Eicher said.

"Philadelphia is a transit point from the southwest to New York."