POT GROWERS SETTLE INTO THE SUNSET DISTRICT

San Francisco's Sunset District holds a reputation as a quiet,
sprawling neighborhood of lightly traveled streets, usually swathed
in fog and filled with well-tended houses populated by working folks
who keep to themselves. It does not, for the most part, attract
hipsters, tour buses or frequent visits from police probing criminal activity.

But while those characteristics have long lured families, especially
immigrants, these days they're also drawing some less wholesome
denizens - marijuana growers.

In the past six months, San Francisco police and federal drug agents
have raided 27 indoor pot farms on the city's western edge - most of
them inside homes in the serene Sunset.

"They're all over the Sunset - mainly from 19th Avenue west, but not
exclusively," said Capt. Paul Chignell, who heads the Taraval
Station, whose officers patrol the district. "And this is a growing
thing. It seems like every other day we get a tip on another
marijuana growing operation in a (residential) neighborhood."

In most of the pot busts, Chignell said, police have found about 250
plants in houses equipped with bright "grow" lights, to simulate
sunshine, and irrigation systems - both of which are often automated.
But lately the raids have been yielding larger crops.

On Wednesday, federal Drug Enforcement Administration agents raided a
home on the 2600 block of 26th Avenue and discovered about 1,800
plants, said Casey McEnry, a spokeswoman for the agency. Information
from that raid led police to a home at 34th Avenue and Lawton Street,
where they found a pot farm with 800 plants, she said.

In a separate bust Tuesday afternoon, Chignell said, police found "a
massive marijuana-growing operation" along with a large quantity of
methamphetamine, powdered and crack cocaine and a loaded gun.

What's Behind It?

So what's made San Francisco's big bedroom district such fertile
ground for urban pot farmers?

The cops have their hunches.

"We get that question all the time," said Chignell, who's not sure if
there's been a boom in "grow houses" or simply more tips and
complaints from neighbors who are now aware of their district's
indoor agricultural activity.

Among the attractions for pot growers, he said, is the large number
of fairly sizable houses available for rent at reasonable rates. Then
there are the ocean breezes, which tend to sweep away the telltale
skunky aroma, and the famous fog that shrouds illicit activity. And
since most of the homes in the Sunset are attached, with front doors
behind metal gates, it's easier for growers to conceal their growing
operations.

Art Tom, a Sunset resident, community activist and real estate agent,
believes that much of the appeal to the green-leaf farmers is "the
perception that the people are hard-working and quiet, and keep to
themselves," he said. "You can get a house, and your neighbors aren't
going to hassle you."

That quiet image is what drew residential brothels to the Sunset, a
problem that surfaced last year, he said.

But the perception of nonchalant neighbors is changing, Tom said.
Residents have been increasingly joining forces in crime watches and
other neighborhood groups, neighbors are talking about the grow
houses, and people up and down the blocks are comparing notes.
Chignell says tips are up noticeably.

"People are starting to take notice in the Sunset," Tom said. "Pot
houses are going to find a tougher time."

Loss of Connection

Owen Raven, 65, a retired state banking examiner, is not so sure.

He's lived in the Sunset since 1974 - just down the street from one
of Wednesday's raids. He said he's seen the neighborhood change from
one dominated by families and longtime homeowners who knew each other
to one of high turnover and neighbors who stick to themselves.

"People don't know who their neighbors are anymore," he said.

As a consequence, he said, he no longer considers the Sunset safe.
His next-door neighbor was the victim of a home-invasion robbery, a
house up the street was storing illegal fireworks, and now a
pot-growing operation was busted a block away.

"You have to be aware of your surroundings," Raven said.

But Anatoly Iskoz, a Russian immigrant and another neighbor of a
raided pot-growing operation, isn't so concerned. Most of his
neighbors are relatively conservative, he said, he's seen no
suspicious activity, and he doubts they're growing pot.

Still, he said he's not surprised about the boom in busts.

"San Francisco is a very liberal city," he said. "You can expect such
strange things."