Governor Perdue Attends GBI Methamphetamine Lab Response Training Exercise

Governor Perdue Attends GBI Methamphetamine Lab Response Training Exercise

Discusses State Actions to Combat Growing Meth Crisis in Georgia

FORSYTH, Ga. – Governor Sonny Perdue today visited the Georgia Public Safety Training Center (GPSTC) in Forsyth, Georgia to witness a methamphetamine lab response training exercise at the GPSTC mock village. Agents with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) participated in the training scenario. Governor Perdue’s visit highlighted the successful passage by the General Assembly of his budget recommendations of $1 million for a GBI Meth Force and $1 million for substance abuse treatment.

“Georgia has built a strong local, state and federal coalition to fight the meth plague in our state,” said Governor Sonny Perdue. “Georgia will fight the meth traffickers and help reunite families torn apart by this drug. For our families and for our future, we will win the battle against meth.”

GBI drug enforcement agents conducted the training exercise at a house in the GPSTC mock village. The agents executed arrest warrants for two suspects and a GBI meth response team secured the meth lab on the premises with support from the GPSTC fire department. The exercise was filmed for a new GBI training video.

The mock village was constructed in 1987. It is used for scenario based training without live ammunition. The mock village includes a bank, gas/grocery store, warehouse, motel, a row of store fronts, a public park and a functional chemical agents building.

Governor Perdue’s budget includes more than $1 million to create a 15 agent Meth Force within the GBI. The force will assist local law enforcement and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) in Georgia’s areas of highest need for methamphetamine investigative work. The Governor’s budget also includes $1 million for methamphetamine substance abuse treatment to treat approximately 200 adults with families that are affected by meth.

Governor Perdue and U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales led a town hall meeting in March 2006 on the methamphetamine crisis in Georgia. The purpose of the town hall was to discuss the impact of methamphetamine production and use in Georgia and the state and federal solutions for combating the problem.

Last year Governor Perdue signed legislation to combat the manufacture and abuse of methamphetamine by requiring products with pseudoephredine as the sole active ingredient to be sold behind the counter of a retail or pharmacy store.

As a part of Governor Perdue’s 2004 Child Protection Legislation, he proposed and signed into law stiffer penalties for manufacturing or possessing methamphetamine or a chemical substance intended to be used in the manufacture of methamphetamine in the presence of a child. Later in 2004, Governor Perdue helped bring statewide attention to the rising problem of manufacturing and abusing methamphetamine with the Methamphetamine and Georgia: Seeking Solutions summit. The summit resulted in 25 recommendations divided into five categories – public awareness, clandestine lab response, pre-cursor chemicals, drug endangered children, and statewide coordination, training, best practices, and protocols.

In 2003 Governor Perdue proposed and signed into law legislation that strengthened criminal penalties for the manufacture, transfer and possession of methamphetamine and criminalized the transport of materials used in its illegal production.

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