'GROW BUSTERS' UPROOT POT OPERATIONS

From the outside, the two-storey brick-and-wood-siding house blended in
with the east Vancouver street of well-kept homes and tidy yards.

But behind heavy plastic sheets covering the windows, mould grew from the
floor to the ceiling, and large holes had been smashed through the walls
for electrical wires and crude ventilation systems.

The jacuzzi tub in the bathroom was covered in dust where electrical lines
had been severed, and a dozen ballasts provided 700 volts of power to
massive light bulbs in each of the three hot, smelly bedrooms.

The bulbs were covered by giant reflective sheets, which, along with foil
taped to the walls, beamed light and heat on dozens of leafy marijuana
plants.

Acting on a tip from a neighbour, police got a search warrant Wednesday and
raided the rental house -- one of 4,000 in Vancouver alone that
investigators say have been converted into marijuana-growing operations, a
number that has multiplied in recent years as people discovered pot was
lucrative and police enforcement was time-consuming.

But on Tuesday, city hall approved a $275,000 plan to hire five new fire
and electrical inspectors as part of a police effort to crack down on the
grow operations.

The project, dubbed Grow Busters, begins with a new tip line -- 717-3456 --
that residents can phone to report suspicious activity around a neighbour's
house.

That includes bright lights, covered windows, loud noises from fans and
electrical equipment, and condensation on windows.

Police will use the information to get a search warrant and then, as
detailed last week in a report to city hall, go with firefighters, city
inspectors, gas and BC Hydro employees to shut down the operation.

Services will be cut to the house, and landlords must pay $309 to get
approval to re-occupy the building, and another $200 to reconnect
electrical and gas supplies -- that's once a city inspection team goes
through the house to ensure any irregularities are fixed.

The city hopes the fees will recoup the cost of the program.

In a pilot project between March and June, the city shut down 114
operations.

Vancouver police Inspector Val Harrison said none of the 48 houses to which
services were cut has become a grow-operation again. Under the old system,
she said, after police raided an operation it was up and running again with
new plants and equipment within just a short time.

In the pilot project, a small staff executed four warrants a day, two days
a week. With the new employees, police hope to quadruple those numbers by
the fall.

Harrison said the project is not a comment on the debate about whether
marijuana should be legal, but is aimed at fire and safety hazards in
houses.

When police raided the east Vancouver home about 8:30 a.m. Wednesday, no
one was there. That is not unusual, as often the "gardeners" come by only
at night to care for the plants, she said.

Upstairs, in a large hole in the wall, live electrical lines had been
sliced above the meter, so power could be stolen.

A giant pile of dirt covered the kitchen floor and two canisters had been
installed to pump carbon monoxide throughout the house.

On the sparsely furnished upper floor, a child's teddy bear lay on a grungy
couch, near a Nintendo game and a colouring book.

There were 100 mature plants in the house, and each one would have brought
in about $1,000 every three months. That is a profit of $400,000 a year, a
relatively small operation by Vancouver standards.

Harrison said landlords are also victims because of the repair bills they
face, but she said the program may stop marijuana growers before houses are
totally destroyed. And she noted many insurance companies are now refusing
to pay for repairs, arguing the damage was caused by illegal activity.

One renovation company estimated it could cost $60,000 to fix damage from
pot operations, including rot between walls from heat and condensation.

Mayor Philip Owen rejected concerns Tuesday that it was unfair to further
penalize landlords, arguing they should be responsible for renting to
law-abiding tenants and for supervising what happens in their homes.

But not everyone supports the program.

City Councillor Sam Sullivan was concerned Grow Busters could be another
ineffective technique in the war on drugs.

He also did not want the tip line to become a snitch line, allowing
residents to finger every person in the city growing a few plants in their
own homes.

Pamphlets with the hotline number and tips to landlords will be distributed
to homes in northeast Vancouver.

Chris Taulu, of the Renfrew/Collingwood residents' association, said people
are scared of the fire hazards, traffic and violence grow operations bring
to neighbourhoods.

She said residents have also seen children being taken away in ambulances,
after suffering from carbon monoxide poisoning in houses that grow
marijuana.

"People are very angry."