METH PROGRAM IS GREAT BENEFIT

From Linda Burdick, Little Rock:

Recently the Faulkner County Sheriff's Office, Conway Police Department,
Sheriff's Association and Sen. Gilbert Baker united to present a forum on
the hazards of methamphetamine and methamphetamine laboratories to a
community. The presentation covered the health, environmental, biological
and chemical hazards of the methamphetamine manufacturing process, to the
outward signs and physiological responses of meth use. There must have been
a lot of man-hours devoted to tracking down the right people for each bit
of information which was presented in a basic, bite-sized, understandable
way. The presentation was informative, frighteningly accurate and very well
presented.

The members of the Crime Lab Clandestine Laboratory Response Team have
worked with some of these officers at 2 a.m. when they have been up for 36
hours straight. These men and women work so hard at an overwhelming
problem. The clan lab problem is devouring the time of narcotics officers
across the state, putting huge demands on already busy schedules, and
making them work in highly toxic/explosive environments. These people get
tired.

And yet it is a problem they can't ignore because of the hazards to
communities are very real for themselves and for a growing number of
peripheral victims who may or may not know anything about methamphetamine:
patrol officers, firefighters, haz-mat specialists, EMTs, hospital
personnel, farmers or neighborhood kids.

As was stated in the presentation, are meth cooks and users "bad people"?
Not necessarily, but once they get lost in the world of meth, they forget
there are others who depend on them (pets, spouses, and children). They
forget their lives impact the communities around them -- their families and
their neighbors.

Across this state, the lab team and officers have had to walk in the sad
world they live in. A world where meth doesn't care what happens to their
lives, but the same lives that are devoted to meth.

My congratulations to the hardworking people who put this presentation
together. It is a real and growing problem in every community. And will
only be reigned in by the combined efforts of law enforcement and the
people of the communities they serve. Everyone should see it.

(EDITOR'S NOTE: This letter also was signed by Lori Stacks. Both are
forensic chemists with the Arkansas State Crime Laboratory.)