Pubdate: Sat, 20 Jul 2013
Source: Press Democrat, The (Santa Rosa, CA)
Copyright: 2013 The Press Democrat
Contact:  http://www.pressdemocrat.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/348
Author: Guy Kovner

HARSHER PENALTIES SOUGHT FOR ILLEGAL POT FARMERS

With illegal marijuana cultivation wreaking environmental havoc 
across the nation, North Coast Reps. Mike Thompson and Jared Huffman 
are seeking new penalties for harm done to woodlands, waterways and wildlife.

The two Democrats, joined by a pair of Republicans, introduced the 
Protecting Lands Against Narcotics Trafficking Act, nicknamed the 
PLANT Act, aimed at imposing penalties for environmental damage from 
pot gardens and other illegal drug production on public lands and 
private property.

Huffman, D-San Rafael, who represents the marijuana-rich Emerald 
Triangle of Mendocino, Humboldt and Trinity counties, said pot grows 
are "threatening endangered wildlife, contaminating fragile salmon 
streams and making forests unsafe for working and recreation."

Thompson, D-Napa, said there should be "stiff penalties for the 
people whose reckless and illegal actions" are damaging natural resources.

A Sonoma County report last year said 3.6 million marijuana plants 
were seized on about 9,100 acres of California public lands in 2008.

The pot's street value was more than $14 billion; the cost of 
cleaning up the land was estimated at $100 million.

Supervisor Shirlee Zane, who served on an ad hoc county committee on 
medical marijuana last year, hailed the move to "crack down on 
environmental crime."

Zane said she got an "eye-opener" from touring a major pot growing 
and processing operation with law officers near Santa Rosa and seeing 
gallons of toxic pesticides at the scene.

On a Sheriff's Department helicopter flight, Zane said she saw a 
large trash dump on a Sonoma Valley mountaintop that was also a pot garden.

Scientists at UC Davis said that 80 percent of California fisheries 
have been exposed to high doses of rat poison related to illegal 
marijuana grows, the county report said.

Nearly 1 million pot plants were eradicated from 471 sites on 
national forest lands in 20 states last year, accompanied by damage 
that included leveled hilltops, diverted streams and excessive 
pesticide use, the congressmen said in a statement.

Drug cultivation on public property is already a crime, "but 
prosecutions are rare and environmental damage is almost never fully 
accounted for," they said.

The PLANT Act, which was referred to a House committee, instructs the 
U.S. Sentencing Commission to establish penalties for drug-related 
environmental damage.

Zane said the penalties "need to be severe enough to deter" the 
illegal activity. "We know this is a lucrative industry. People are 
making millions on it."

Co-sponsoring the bill were Republican Reps. Doug LaMalfa, whose 
district covers vast public lands from Truckee to Mount Shasta, and 
Doug Lamborn of Colorado.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom