Pubdate: Sat, 09 Apr 2005
Source: Modesto Bee, The (CA)
Copyright: 2005 The Modesto Bee
Contact:  http://www.modbee.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/271
Author: Eric Stern
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine)

METH LABS PRODUCE COSTLY VALLEY HAZARDS

$30,000 Spent In Stevinson Cleanup; Junk From Lab Found Near Patterson

SACRAMENTO -- For three days last month, state contractors used a backhoe 
on a Stevinson farm to clean out seven 3-foot-deep pits filled with waste 
from a methamphetamine lab.

Cooking 1 pound of the drug yields 5 pounds of chemical byproducts, 
officials said. The cleanup crew at the farm hauled away more than 30,000 
pounds of contaminated dirt, chemical-saturated cat litter, empty pill 
bottles and solvent cans.

Ten years after the Legislature added $6.5 million a year for meth cleanup, 
the hazardous waste hole only seems deeper.

"It's kind of a static problem," said Adam Palmer, supervising hazardous 
substances scientist with the Department of Toxic Substances Control. The 
agency has removed 15,453 drug labs since the Legislature created the 
program in 1995.

At least once a week, Stanislaus County officials find toxic trash from 
labs strewn along rural roads, irrigation canals -- even in Dumpsters at 
Interstate 5 rest stops.

Thursday night, on a roadside near a Patterson almond orchard, a farmer 
reported five propane tanks and 10 large plastic trash bags filled with 
empty camping fuel cans and other junk from a lab, according to the 
Sheriff's Department.

"The law needed to be more clear and concise and tougher in my opinion," 
said Assemblyman Dave Cogdill, R-Modesto, who has championed a valley meth 
crackdown -- with harsher penalties and restrictions on ingredients used to 
manufacture the drug.

He has put forth a bill to make it a felony -- with a maximum three-year 
prison sentence and $10,000 fine -- to dump meth by-products on 
agricultural land.

Cogdill said he still is developing the legislation and does not expect 
hearings until next year. The measure, Assembly Bill 1017, also would 
create a public awareness program aimed at farmers who might stumble upon 
illegal waste heaps.

State and local agencies will remove harmful materials, but, ultimately, 
the responsibility falls on property owners to decontaminate their land. 
Often, when it is impossible to recoup money from the perpetrators, the 
state will pick up the tab for soil removal at larger waste sites, such as 
the Stevinson farm.

"Our funding is limited. That will determine how much we'll dig or won't 
dig," said Ivan Rodriguez, a hazardous-materials official who oversaw the 
$30,000 cleanup in Stevinson for the state.

Health officials are worried that some farmers are removing meth waste 
themselves, because "they're afraid of being tagged for the costs," said 
Jim Simpson, program manager of Stanislaus County's hazardous-material 
division.

"They're getting contaminated, their vehicles are getting contaminated," he 
said. "It's just down-the-road exposure to everybody."

Simpson said law enforcement or fire officials need to be called. When 
hazardous-waste cleanup experts come in, they wear respirators and 
protective suits to keep from coming in contact with chemicals that can 
burn the skin, eyes and throat.
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