OFFICERS TRAIN TO ERADICATE POT PLANTS

CAMP GRUBER -- Officers from 20 law enforcement agencies have been training
here this week for the annual crackdown starting in June on eastern
Oklahoma's marijuana harvest.

Authorities are expecting a more efficient eradication program this year
because sprays will be used for the first time, making Oklahoma only the
second state to use the method.

Russ Higbie, chief agent over enforcement for the Oklahoma Bureau of
Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs, said the use of sprays gives officers an
eradication tool quicker than the old method of chopping down stalks and
then burning them.

``It is going to revolutionize this entire project, making it possible to
eradicate thousands of more marijuana plants in a shorter period of time,''
he said, noting that in the past ``we had to whack it, stack it and burn
it.''

The Bureau, the lead agency in the eradication program, joined hands this
week with the Oklahoma Army National Guard to provide the training at Camp
Gruber where the Guard frequently holds weekend and annual two-week drills.

The Guard also is a source of federal funding for the marijuana operation
and will provide equipment and manpower for surveillance from helicopters,
Higbie said.

Traditionally, the major marijuana alley in the state has stretched through
the eastern sector of the state, virtually all the way from Kansas to Texas.

Officers training with the Guard this week are from nine counties, large
and small municipal police departments, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol and the
Cherokee Nation.

Much of the training Wednesday centered on the officers descending from a
platform on ropes. Later this week, they will test their skills at coming
down ropes from flying helicopters.

The rappel training is necessary, Higbie said, because in many areas of the
state it is impossible to land helicopters.

Higbie said the Bureau's marijuana eradication program started in Oklahoma
about 10 years ago, and the Department of the Army began ``blending in'' by
providing monies and personnel to combat drug use.

Though he didn't have numbers immediately available, Higbie said the
program has been a major success, resulting in high arrest and seizure
rates during the summer months.

While the primary marijuana corridor in Oklahoma is in the eastern part of
the state, Higbie said the task force also has worked operations in the
western sector.

The participation of the officers is important, he said, because they have
the qualifications to make the hundreds of arrests occurring each year.

The National Guard, he said, is never put in a position of having to give
testimony or be involved in the chain of custody of evidence.

``The support us,'' he said, ``by allowing us to work the towers (at
Gruber), and flying helicopters to work the surveillance and spotting
mission through their own funding.''

Higbie said the chemical spraying program passed an environmental impact
study and is patterned after one in Hawaii, the only other state where
sprays are used on marijuana plants.

``We gave a demonstration of the spray late last year and were happy with
it,'' he said.

In previous years, when marijuana was chopped down and then burned, he
said, officers were eradicating an estimated 8,000 plants a week.

During the demonstration program last October, 50,000 plants were
eradicated in two days, he said.