VALLEY ANTI-METH EFFORTS GET A LIFT FROM DEA, TV SPOTS

The nation's top drug fighter promised Wednesday to restore personnel
to the Central Valley's anti-methamphetamine campaign.

In a brief Capitol Hill meeting with Rep. Cal Dooley, D-Hanford, Drug
Enforcement Administration chief Asa Hutchinson pledged to add four
agents to the valley's meth task force.

Hutchinson, a former congressional colleague of Dooley's, said the
agents would be added within a month. They will help fill in for FBI
agents who have been pulled off the valley's High Intensity Drug
Trafficking Area program to focus on anti-terrorism efforts.

"We've really made great strides in our fight against meth thanks to
federal involvement, and it's important that we not lose that
momentum after Sept. 11," Dooley said in a statement.

In another meth-related development Wednesday, Gov. Davis and valley
law enforcement officials announced in Sacramento the start of
television commercials to encourage residents to tell authorities
about suspected methamphetamine labs.

"This campaign will educate the citizens of the Central Valley as to
the dangers of methamphetamine and how they can provide information
that can help law enforcement to successfully stamp out this threat
to public safety and threat to the Central Valley's principal
industry, which is agriculture," Davis said.

Dooley's meeting with Hutchinson stemmed from a letter signed by the
congressman, other House members from the Central Valley, and
Democratic Sens. Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein.

It was sent in early January, after it became public that the six
agents assigned to the valley task force program had been reassigned
after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

"The valley's methamphetamine labs supply much of the western United
States and because of the wide extent of production, use of the drug
has become far too prevalent," the letter states.

In his meeting with Dooley, Hutchinson said he would reassign four
Drug Enforcement Administration agents in Fresno to the task force.
In turn, Dooley spokesman Adam Kovacevich said, Hutchinson indicated
that four other DEA agents would be brought in to fill in for those
reassigned. Kovacevich estimated that the meeting lasted less than 15
minutes.

The Central Valley High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area links state,
federal and local officers in a nine-county region stretching from
Sacramento to Kern. There are 28 such programs nationwide.

The Bush administration budget proposal released this week calls for
a 10 percent reduction in HIDTA funding. This apparently will not
affect the valley organization's existing $2.5 million budget, but it
could undermine efforts to get more money.

California's anti-meth commercial began airing Wednesday on cable
channels in Stanislaus, San Joaquin, Sacramento and several other
counties.

The ad, the first to target meth specifically, shows a photo of a
child as flames lick at the edges. A voice warns of the dangers of
the drug. The commercial is being run in English and Spanish.

"The chemicals used in making meth are highly toxic and highly
explosive, chemicals that can dissolve plastic or burn human lungs,"
the ad says. It continues: "If you know of anyone involved in making
meth, call 1-866-METHLAB."

The 2001-02 state budget includes $30 million for anti-meth equipment
and personnel in the Central Valley, and Davis' 2002-03 spending
proposal calls for $15 million more.

The first run of anti-meth commercials will cost $250,000, officials
said, with some TV stations donating time for the ads. They initially
will not run in Merced and a few other valley counties, but there are
plans to run the ads in those counties eventually.

"We want to see how it goes before we do a big buy (of advertisement
time)," said Allen Sawyer, director of the state Office of Criminal
Justice Planning.