REDEFINE JACNET

Drug Enforcement Team Is Now Free Of Apparent Conflict Of Interest

In the latest fallout from ballot measures passed by Oregon voters this
month, Jackson County Sheriff Bob Kennedy is busy trying to figure out how
to come up with $80,000 to keep the Jackson County Narcotic Enforcement
Team operating.

It seems JACNET has come to depend on its share of cash and property seized
from suspected drug dealers. That's suspected drug dealers, not convicted
or even arrested ones.

We think that's exactly what troubled the voters who approved Ballot
Measure 3 at the polls 2-1 on Nov. 7. They felt -- and we agree -- that the
traditional American presumption of innocence ought to apply when police
deprive people of property just as it does when they deprive them of
liberty by locking them up.

Certainly the new law will put a crimp in JACNET's balance sheet.

The agency's budget is not huge. Local law enforcement agencies loan
officers to JACNET and pay their salaries while they serve with the task
force. The $80,000, says JACNET commander Sgt. Jim Anderson, amounts to
nearly half the agency's operating budget. It pays for things such as
office supplies and gasoline.

That money, Anderson told the Mail Tribune, is "what (we use) to keep the
lights on and the phones working."

There's the rub. When a police agency -- any police agency -- depends on
seizing property from people who may be innocent in order to pay its
utility bills, there is at least the appearance of a huge conflict of
interest. There certainly is an incentive for JACNET agents to pursue
forfeiture when they know the agency's bottom line will benefit.

That incentive appears to be gone. In the first place, pursuing forfeiture
in cases where a conviction is unlikely would amount to wasted effort. In
the second place, Measure 3 requires that 75 percent of all forfeiture
proceeds go to drug treatment, education and prevention.

Kennedy says that requirement may put an end to forfeitures here and elsewhere.

Maybe that's not such a bad thing. But where does that leave JACNET?

We sympathize with JACNET's dilemma. The interagency drug squad certainly
has proved its worth since it was created nearly a decade ago. Its officers
have aggressively attacked the drug trade in Southern Oregon, making the
county safer for all of us.

Still, it can't be that difficult to come up with $80,000 for such a worthy
effort. Dividing the sum among the county and the cities who participate in
JACNET would make each jurisdiction's share quite affordable when compared
with the total annual budget of a city or a county.

And we can all sleep a little more soundly knowing our law enforcement
agencies aren't self-supporting.