COUNCIL ENACTS 'MODEL' ANTI-METH ORDINANCE

Fourteen days from now a tough new anti-meth ordinance that could
become a widespread "model" for controlling the illegal drug will take
effect in Cookeville. Cookeville City Council last night voted final
approval for the ordinance, stepping ahead of the state legislature
where State Sen. Charlotte Burks of Monterey worked diligently this
spring for a statewide anti-meth law. Her bill passed easily in the
Senate but was sidetracked to a committee in the State House for
"study" over the summer.

Councilman Ricky Shelton, prime sponsor of the ordinance, said he was
"very pleased" with the city ordinance which, in its latest version,
results from consultations with a number of authorities in the fields
of pharmacy and state law. Present for the Council vote last night
were Bettina Black, executive director of the Tennessee Pharmacists
Association, and Dr. Sullivan Smith, a Cookeville emergency physician
who has persistently advocated action to curb the growing plague of
methamphetamine abuse.

"I wanted this to be a model ordinance that could be duplicated
elsewhere," said Shelton, explaining why help was sought from
authoritative sources, including Walter L. Fitzgerald, professor of
pharmacy at the UT College of Pharmacy in Memphis.

"Our effort was to get it in a form that would not impair health care
delivery," said Black, speaking for the pharmacists' group. "My
members want to limit illicit use, and the verbiage is in there now to
meet the needs both of those who want to maintain legitimate use [of
these medications] versus those who want them for illicit use... We
wanted to make this something that works for everyone."

She noted also that "Most of the sales of these products are not
coming from pharmacies used to dealing with these products" --
referring to cold and allergy medications, such as Sudafed, containing
ephedrine which is extracted as the main ingredient for the illegal
stimulant, "meth."

Most of the sales are reportedly by retail outlets other than
pharmacies and drugstores, such as convenience markets and chain stores.

In fact, it was lobbyists at the State Capitol who fought the Burks
bill and pressured the House to refer it to a study committee,
accordinging to Pam Ash, Burks's administrative assistant in
Nashville. "Charlotte worked tirelessly for her bill and it passed
unanimously or nearly unanimously over here [in the Senate]," said
Ash. "But lobbyists for the big retailers put up a big fight against
it, so it's kind of on hold for now."

Mayor Chuck Womack said last night he understands that Sen. Burks will
take the now-okayed Cookeville ordinance to other towns in her
six-county Upper Cumberland District and urge its adoption.

Its sponsors hope that expanding use of the Cookeville ordinance would
bring grass-roots pressure to bear on the legislature and might result
in a statewide law that would be uniform in all municipalities and
would carry more severe penalties than are possible at the local level.

Although it has been shepherded through several revisions by City
Attorney Mike O'Mara, the anti-meth ordinance has not been
fundamentally weakened from the original. The major provisions:

* It covers all retail stores which sell products containing
ephedrine, pseudoephedrine or phenylpropanolamine, such as Sudafed.

* No more than 100 tablets of these products containing more than
three grams of the three specified active ingredients may be sold at
any one time.

* Stores are prohibited from displaying these products in any location
["on consumer accessible shelving"] where they may be reached by the
public. This is aimed at preventing theft, which is reportedly prevalent.

* Retailers will be required to determine that the prospective
purchaser of these products have proper identification and the
purchaser must sign a register showing the amount of the product
bought, the purchaser's signature, address, driver's license number
and the date of purchase. An exception to this requirement is if the
pharmacist makes "a good faith determination that the purchase of the
product is for a legitimate medical purpose."

* A violation of this ordinance constitutes a civil offense carrying a
$50 penalty for each day of the violation -- the maximum penalty a
city court in Tennessee is permitted to levy.

* The ordinance takes effect 14 days after its passage, which would be
June 19.