Coralville, Ia. - Iowa is on the verge of a $256 million prison construction boom, and Nicholas Viola is one of the statistics behind the growth trend.

Viola, 19, of Des Moines, arrived at the Oakdale state prison here in December after receiving a five-year sentence for second-degree theft. The young man acknowledged he has a methamphetamine problem.

"I'm sad, but I've got to do what I've got to do. I had my fair chances," said Viola, whose girlfriend back home is pregnant with his second child.

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Iowa has a choice: Undertake its biggest prison-building spree in history, or look for alternatives that reduce the need for more prisons.

That choice must be made soon. The Legislature is considering a recommendation from Gov. Chet Culver to build a new state penitentiary and a new women's prison at a cost of $200 million. A legislative committee proposed that, plus a $25 million expansion of the prison at Newton. State corrections officials say the Men's Reformatory in Anamosa is next in line for replacement. And, if the steady growth in prison population continues as projected, the state could face building as many as three more prisons in the next decade.

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Thanks for publishing Greg Francisco's outstanding letter "Legalize, Regulate, and Tax." (See River Cities' Reader Issue 667, January 16-22, 2008.)

It seems to me that in order to properly evaluate our nation's drug policies, we need to compare and contrast our drug policies with those of another nation with substantially different drug policies. I suggest that we use the Czech Republic for our comparison.

In the Czech Republic, citizens can legally use, possess, grow, or purchase small quantities of marijuana.

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A drug-interdiction program devastated by funding cuts could be saved by a group of U.S. senators from both sides of the aisle who announced plans on Wednesday to tack on money to the federal omnibus spending bill.

U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, an Iowa Democrat, along with four other senators, announced plans to replace money cut from the federal Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant program as part of an emergency supplemental funding bill.

They would return $660 million to the program, which was cut to $170 million in December by the Bush administration.

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WATERLOO --- Local police say the federal government has continued to shrink funding that's the backbone for drug trafficking battles.

Now the president has included even more cuts for the Byrne Justice Assistance Grant Program in his recent budget, said Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa.

The Senate approved $660 million for the program but was forced to reduce the funding due to the threat of a presidential veto, Harkin said Friday during a conference in Waterloo with law enforcement representatives.

Current proposals place the Byrne program at only $170 million. This means Iowa agencies, which currently get $4.2 million, would only see $1.5 million.

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Making a dent in meth is the aim of the Southeast Iowa Inter-Agency Drug Task Force. The drug task force has done its job well. The number of meth labs in the area is way down.

Because of that, drug task force officers had more time to pursue bigger culprits -- large drug importers, and that led recently to busts that included a $1.3 million forfeiture.

It's a double win. The illegal drugs are off the streets, and the task force gets part of the money.

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DES MOINES (AP) --- Possible cuts in federal funds could hit drug enforcement programs in Iowa.

The U.S. Department of Justice funds drug control programs at local law enforcement agencies through the Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant program. A proposal calls for cutting 70 percent of the $4.22 million that came to Iowa this year.

The grants make up a large portion of the Iowa Office of Drug Control Policy's budget, and officials say less money means investigations into narcotic suppliers and dealers would be stalled.

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Proposed cuts in a key federal drug-enforcement program threaten efforts in Iowa just as the state has shown progress in the fight against methamphetamine, officials say.

The U.S. Justice Department, which filters money to local law enforcement through the Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant program, could cut 70 percent from the $4.22 million that came to Iowa this year.

Iowa politicians say they will fight the cuts, but all sides agree that the proposed cuts reflect a shift in national priorities toward the war on terrorism.

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Bravo to op-ed author Garry Reed. (See "Do You Speak Thuggery or Freedom?", River Cities' Reader Issue 666, January 9-15, 2008.) Propaganda is propaganda, regardless whether it is used to prop up a totalitarian regime or a totalitarian policy.

Call it a "war on drugs." Tell us it's all about the children. Convince us you're really just doing it for our own good - to protect us from ourselves. Dress failure after failure up as unmitigated success.

Say whatever you want. The war on drugs is still prohibition. And prohibition still does not work.

Legalize, regulate, and tax drugs, so that we can finally control drugs.

Greg Francisco

Member, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition

Paw Paw, Michigan

[end]

DEA Tramples Canada's Sovereignty By Demanding Pot Seller Be Tried In U.S.

Attention, concerned citizens of the United States of America: It is now safe to unlock your doors and let your children back out onto the streets to play hopscotch and jump rope. Yes, the long and terrible reign of the Prince of Pot is over. No longer will this menacing merchant of the devil's weed terrorize and addict our innocent youth to his mind-destroying plants.

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John P. Walters just can't seem to contain himself. Give the career powercrat a job with the imperial appellation of "Drug Czar" and he just instinctively grasps for more.

Last summer, for example, the Top Drug Thug made headlines by declaring that simple, nonviolent marijuana gardeners are dangerous terrorists.

While you puzzle over that oxymoronic disconnect, consider this further quote from the Redding Record Searchlight: "Marijuana gardens are a terrorist threat to the public's health and safety, as well as to the environment."

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Iowa historically has been an island of sanity on prisons, especially when compared to states such as Texas and California. Iowa long believed that prison should be the last option. That has changed in recent decades, however, and Iowa has racked up some of the fastest prison-growth rates in the nation.

In the past 20 years, the state's prison population has tripled - to 8,727 inmates as of Tuesday. At the same time, the number of convicts in community-based corrections programs has doubled, to more than 30,000. In the past decade alone, those two populations combined increased by nearly 60 percent.

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Waterloo, Ia. -- Barack Obama said today that he doesn't believe Americans see his teenage drug use as relevant to his candidacy as president.

"I can't say how Americans think generally about it. I do think that the average American believes that what somebody does when they were a teenager 30 years ago is probably not relevant to how they are going to be performing as commander in chief and president of the United States," Obama said during a press conference. "I think people have pretty good judgment about that."

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Democratic presidential contender Chris Dodd said Monday that he thinks children should hear warnings about the dangers of drugs as early as first grade.

His comments on expanding drug education came after an Urbandale teen told Dodd she is troubled that she knows a lot of people who use or have used methamphetamine, including her brother.

Dodd, a U.S. senator from Connecticut, held a campaign discussion about policies to help women and families at the House of Mercy, which provides drug rehabilitation and other services for women in Des Moines.

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It seemed like such a sure-fire concept when founded in 1983: Have cops teach kids about the dangers of drugs in hopes they'll never use them.

But the facts are that DARE - Drug Abuse Resistance Education - isn't as effective as once thought.

That's why we agree with the Mason City School District's decision to end the program after more than 20 years.

As is often the case in operating schools, it came down to the best use of available personnel.

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Grinnell, Ia. - America needs to reconsider its punitive approach to "the so-called war on drugs," presidential candidate John Edwards said here today.

"We're not going to build enough prisons to solve this problem," he told a crowd of about 800 at Grinnell College.

The former North Carolina senator grinned when a young man sitting behind him on stage asked about drug policy. "Only on college campuses," Edwards joked before answering.

He said he's especially concerned about mandatory minimum sentences for first-time drug offenders, which he said should be reconsidered. He added that too few drug offenders get treatment.

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MASON CITY - After more than 20 years as part of the fifth-grade curriculum, the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) program is gone from Mason City public schools.

The program was suspended five weeks ago when the officer teaching the course was placed on medical leave.

The absence left the district with a choice: Use one of its two school resource officers to teach the program or discontinue the program. All of the officers are employees of the Mason City Police Department.

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Despite what might be perceived as University of Iowa students dotting the police blotter for alcohol-related citations every weekend, the number of students with non-traffic criminal offenses fell to its lowest number in six years last year.

Twenty-five percent fewer students were charged in 2006-07 compared with the previous academic year, falling from 1,678 to 1,274. Of those, there were 1,239 alcohol-related charges, including 400 for public intoxication and 621 for underage drinking topping the list.

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Iowa still ranks in the nation's top 10 for the rate of addiction, and the number of people seeking treatment has gone down only slightly.

Iowa's meth problem - once among the worst in the country - hasn't disappeared even as meth lab seizures have plummeted.

Since Iowa enacted a pseudoephedrine-control law in 2005, meth lab seizures in the state dropped 77 percent in 2006 compared with two years before, according to the Governor's Office of Drug Control Policy.

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Troops who are fighting the war on drugs across Iowa gathered Wednesday night for a round-table discussion with the state's drug czar.

About 20 people turned out at Ankeny City Hall to talk with Gary Kendall, director of the Governor's Office of Drug-Control Policy. The meeting was billed as the first in a series of sessions for sharing information and comparing strategies in the pursuit of cleansing Iowa of drug and alcohol abuse.

"Many of you are in the trenches, dealing with people," said Peter Komendowski, president of the Partnership for a Drug-Free Iowa, a co-sponsor of the event. "It's very important to hear what you have to say."

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