Capps spurs
assault on meth
Problems with methamphetamine addiction and its impact on
the community are receiving increased scrutiny following a meeting between U.S.
Rep. Lois Capps, D-Santa Barbara, and local drug abuse experts.
Capps met on March 3 with Santa Barbara County officials
and representatives of non-governmental agencies.
The session, at Santa Barbara’s Casa Serena substance
abuse treatment facility, involved officials including Kathy Gallagher,
director of the department of Social Services; Nancy Gottlieb, interim division
chief of the County Alcohol and Drug Program; Lois Craig of People Helping
People; and Craig and Amy Belknap of Casa Serena.
Capps, now back in Washington D.C., was not available to
comment for this story. Gallagher, reached at her Social Services office, said
the main focus at present is that methamphetamine has an outsize effect on
families, correctional facilities and foster care for children.
“Meth has longer effects,” she said, “meaning that the
high lasts as long as 18 hours.” In cases of parents apprehended while under
the drug’s influence, provision must be made to care for their children.
“Right now, one of the things we’re struggling with is
that, while we separate alcohol abuse from drug abuse, we don’t collect data on
individual drugs,” Gallagher said. “We are trying to find ways to get the
County system to allow for that.”
A glimmer of good news, she added, is that local meth labs
have “pretty much disappeared,” so that the drug must be imported into the
community from elsewhere.
A Capps
spokeswoman said that Santa Barbara County was among the counties that
benefitted from a decision by the Office of National Drug Control Policy to
fund an anti-meth media campaign. The other California counties chosen to take
part in the program were Redding and Bakersfield.