Pubdate: Thu, 03 May 2007
Source: Union Leader (Manchester, NH)
Copyright: 2007 The Union Leader Corp.
Contact:  http://www.theunionleader.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/761
Note: Out-of-state e-mail letters are seldom published.
Author: Kathryn Marchocki
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STREETSWEEPER IN THE DUST BIN?

New Hampshire crime fighters say they fear drug dealers and gun
traders could retake hard-fought territory since Congress stripped
funding for a street-level anti-drug program at a time when
narcotics-driven gun violence is on the rise.

Manchester alone lost two thirds of its drug-fighting punch when funds
for Operation Streetsweeper and other earmarked federal programs were
cut this year. "If you take away two-thirds of what we've had in past
years as an operation to target drug trafficking, it's going to have
an impact on the city," Manchester Deputy Police Chief Glenn S.
Leidemer said yesterday. The multi-agency initiative -- long touted by
law enforcers for helping beat back drug crime -- provides federal
grants to police departments statewide, primarily for undercover
narcotics operations.

"If I don't get this money, pro-active narcotics investigations in
Portsmouth will cease to exist. They will come to a stop and we will
end up being in reactionary mode," Portsmouth Police Chief Michael J.
Magnant said yesterday. Portsmouth was able to tap $94,000 left over
from 1996 to continue its program through the end of this fiscal year
on Sept. 30, said U.S. Attorney for New Hampshire Thomas P.
Colantuono. After that, Magnant said he does know how he will be able
to continue to staff and train his narcotics unit and pay the overtime
and drug-buy money needed to carry on its undercover work. Portsmouth
has received about $100,000 a year for Streetsweeper. Manchester --
where Operation Streetsweeper got its start in 1995 and has tended to
receive the lion's share of the funding since -- recently learned the
$291,860 it requested in federal funds to cover undercover operations
this fiscal year will not be funded, Leidemer said.

In addition, money will not be available to pay city police officers
overtime so they can partner with state troopers on gang interdiction,
traffic enforcement and information-gathering "knock & talk" details,
Leidemer continued. The city got $10,000 a month to cover these
details in recent years, he said.

"The reality is -- absent those additional resources -- we will not be
as productive as we have in the past," Leidemer said of the program
that netted a total 518 arrests and the seizure of 49 firearms and
hundreds of pounds of marijuana, cocaine, crack cocaine and heroin in
five of the last seven years. "There is a clear connection between
those three -- drugs, guns and violence," Leidemer said.

Manchester's mayor is urging the state's Congressional delegation to
restore the funds. Meanwhile, Mayor Frank C. Guinta pledged to divert
city funds from the city's current and future budgets to get
Streetsweeper operations up and running within weeks.

Saying public safety is his top priority, Guinta said the $2.6 million
saved through cost-cutting measures in the current city budget will be
used to cover the overtime and drug-buy costs that the federal
government previously funded. He said he will take similar steps in
next year's budget to ensure the program continues.

"We're going to make every effort to make up any potential shortfall
should Congress not allocate this money," Guinta explained. Meanwhile,
the New England High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area's New Hampshire
task force recently increased its staff and should be able to help
fill the gap left by the loss of Streetsweeper funding, especially in
Hillsborough County, where the task force is based, Colantuono said.
But the task force targets mid-to high-level drug trafficking.
Streetsweeper focuses on street-level crime, he said.

The U.S. Attorney's Office has received about $1.5 million in
Streetsweeper money in recent years, which pays for seven staff
positions in its office and funnels the remainder to law enforcement
agencies statewide through grants, Colantuono said.

Streetsweeper is an earmarked initiative that falls outside the
office's general budget he said. While the new Congress funded the
office's 2007 budget at a slightly higher level than last year through
a continuing resolution, it slashed all earmarked initiatives,
Colantuono said. A spokesman for U.S. Rep. Carol Shea-Porter, D-N.H.,
said funding questions must be understood in terms of the issues
Democrats faced when they took control of Congress last fall and
passed a continuing budget resolution because the outgoing
Republican-dominated Congress failed to act on a budget. The
continuing resolution enabled government to keep running, but cut
earmarks because of past abuses, said spokesman Harry Gural.
"Hopefully, 'good' earmarks like Operation Streetsweeper will be
re-inserted in the next budget," Gural said.

U.S. Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H., said in a statement that he remains
"strongly committed" to Streetsweeper and will continue to work to
support funding for the initiative. He said he has helped provide more
than $10 million to the initiative since 1998.
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