ALCOHOL, POT ARE DRUGS OF CHOICE IN METRO AREA

Boulder's heroin surge, which detectives hope they quashed this week,
apparently has not been repeated outside Boulder County.

Across Colorado, heroin use has stabilized or even tapered off
slightly in the last couple of years, state drug experts say.

Perhaps more significantly, evidence suggests that methamphetamine
use dropped statewide last year for the first time in a decade.

"User-wise, it does seem like meth has gone down," said Tom Gorman,
director of the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area,
which keeps tabs on drug trends in a four-state region.

But he and other experts cautioned that they will need to see the
numbers drop for more than a year in order to believe it's anything
more than a blip on the radar.

"I'm not to the point that I'm willing to call it a trend," he said.

Neither is Tamara Hoxworth, a researcher for the Alcohol and Drug
Abuse division of the Colorado Human Resources Department.

But she is hopeful.

Her statistics show that slightly fewer people admitted to emergency
rooms across the Denver metro area in 2006 were there because of meth use.

The percentage of people seeking treatment for meth as compared with
other drugs went down slightly as well, she said.

Metrowide, alcohol and marijuana remain the drugs of choice for
abusers, followed by cocaine and methamphetamine, she said.

Recently, detectives say, indoor marijuana-growing operations in
Colorado are becoming more toxic. Polluting gasoline generators,
potent fertilizers and jury-rigged electric sockets are causing them
to consider wearing protective suits when they raid the labs, Gorman said.

And anecdotal evidence suggests to Hoxworth that crack is on the rise in Denver.