POT RAIDS FUNDED BY GRANTS

DEA and Others Give $180,000 to Operation Alesia

Although its sheriff's office is leading a 17-agency blitz on illegal
marijuana gardens in Shasta County, funds for the operation aren't
coming from the county.

Grants totaling $180,000 from the U.S. Drug Enforcement
Administration and other agencies are paying expenses, including
office supplies, deputy overtime, gasoline, food, ice and water for
"Operation Alesia," Sheriff Tom Bosenko said Tuesday.

"This is money we received from state and federal grants for
marijuana eradication," he said.

Also leading the charge on the marijuana gardens every day for the
next two weeks are the U.S. Forest Service and California National
Guard, but their spokesmen said they don't know how much will be
spent on the operation.

The other agencies involved are spending money they normally have
earmarked for marijuana eradication on the operation, said Mike Odle,
spokesman for the Shasta-Trinity National Forest.

He said there wasn't one grant to cover the entire operation. Rather,
the different agencies are providing resources for the effort.

Along with pulling marijuana plants tucked into corners of publicly
managed land in Shasta County, crews will tear out irrigation lines
and remove fertilizers and pesticides used by pot growers, Odle said.

In announcing the raid Monday, Bosenko quoted a National Park Service
study that estimated restoration of a 1-acre marijuana garden to its
natural state costs $11,000, but Odle said work during the operation
shouldn't cost that much.

He said the crews will be "reclaiming" the land, not "restoring" it.
The difference is that there won't be work to smooth out terracing or
planting native vegetation. He estimated the work will cost about
$5,500 per acre.

In the past, irrigation lines, small dams and supplies helpful to
growers often would be left behind because the focus was on
eradication, Odle said. This led to gardens popping up in the same
spots each year.

With Operation Alesia, officials hope to stop the gardens from sprouting anew.

The operation started Monday with raids of two small gardens in
Whiskeytown National Recreation Area that netted more than 8,000
marijuana plants, said sheriff's Sgt. Janet Breshears. No evidence or
suspects were seen and no arrests were made.

About 225 people were assigned to the area, she said.

Odle said the raids were tuneups for a "massive" raid Tuesday, but
wouldn't provide more details.

While the sheriff's office tagged the street value of the 8,000
plants at $35 million -- saying each plant could produce a pound of
processed pot worth $4,000 -- a marijuana legalization advocate said
the numbers seemed inflated.

Bruce Mirken, spokesman for the Marijuana Policy Project, said plants
usually produce about 3 to 5 ounces. While he wasn't sure how much an
ounce of marijuana was selling for on the street in California,
another advocate last year said an ounce goes for about $250. At that
price, a pot plant would be worth from $750 to $1,250.

He said the operation could have the unintended results of driving
the price of marijuana up and driving growers deeper into the woods
where it would be more expensive to try to stop their work.

"This doesn't work," he said.