CHIEF LAUDS COUNTY METH LAW

Floyd County police will continue enforcing the local methamphetamine
ordinance, despite a less-restrictive state law scheduled to go into effect
in July.

Police Chief Bill Shiflett said investigators have picked up some leads
from the log books customers must sign when they buy medicine containing
pseudoephedrine, which is used to make the illegal drug. The requirement
has been on the books since December.

"We're going to continue to enforce it until we can't," said Shiflett, who
added that he plans to talk with Rome police about the city's similar
ordinance.

Legislation passed by the Georgia General Assembly calls for retailers to
keep pseudoephedrine behind a counter but, unlike local laws, does not
require a log or a photo ID for purchase. In a rare move that officials
attribute to the powerful grocery lobby, the state law will supersede
stronger local laws.

"They trumped us," Floyd County Commissioner John Mayes said.

The state law will allow enforcement to continue through the end of the
year for laws in effect by Jan. 1. County Manager Kevin Poe said the county
plans to submit a progress report to state legislators early next year.

"When they go back into session, maybe we'll have some stats we can throw
at them to make them rethink the legislation," he said.

The discussion came during Wednesday's meeting of the County Public Safety
Committee.

David Reeps, commander of the Rome-Floyd Metro Task Force said the task
force has seized methamphetamine with a street value of more than $33,000
so far this year, compared with $16,800 during the same three-month period
last year.

"Cocaine and marijuana are down, but meth is way up," he said.

The committee also heard about some of the programs implemented by school
resource officers Steve Harkins and Raymond Stock, under Shiflett's command:

* The Chick-fil-A Seatbelt Awareness Program awards sandwich certificates
to students wearing seat belts during random checks on campuses. Police
were at Model and Pepperell high schools this week.

* Harkins and Stock are certified PRIDE instructors. Evening classes in the
Parents Reducing Incidents of Driver Error program teach parents how to
teach their teenagers to drive.

* The officers are setting up in-school Choose Freedom programs aimed at
showing students their options in staying out of jail.

Mayes noted that students often are unaware that there are about 20 crimes
where judges do not have the leeway to reduce long prison sentences. Floyd
County Prison Warden Anne Brinkley offered to send inmates to speak to
classes, saying "some of them have been very effective" in the past.

* Among the in-school presentations available is a discussion on sex
crimes, including statutory rape.

"The girls are the ones who will argue with you," Harkins said. "They say
they're 15 and can do what they want. We have to tell them their boyfriends
can go to jail."

Stock said the resource officers work with school principals to tailor
programs to their needs. Shiflett also has approved presentations to
parent-teacher organizations and scout troops upon request, he said.