Plan gives more funds for fighting meth, gangs.

Byline: David Steves The Register-Guard

SALEM - Charges of pork-barrel politicking by Oregon's top lawmakers led to a plan Thursday to spend an additional $1 million to take the fight against meth- and gang-related violence to communities outside their own districts.

Initially, the legislative Emergency Board was slated to consider a plan spending $350,000 on such police efforts in east Multnomah County, Marion County and Canby - which are in the districts of House Speaker Karen Minnis, R-Wood Village; Senate President Peter Courtney, D-Salem; House Majority Leader and budget chief Wayne Scott, R-Canby; and Senate co-chairman of the Joint Ways and Means Committee Kurt Schrader, D-Canby.

But after the last-minute addition to the E-Board's agenda for Thursday and today surfaced this week, several rank-and-file legislators questioned whether it was a reasonable use of state dollars. Some, such as Sen. Vicki Walker, D-Eugene, said it looked to her like the lawmakers with the most clout over budget decisions were "trying to look for some more pork for their own districts."

So when the proposal was taken up by an E-Board subcommittee Thursday, it had been retooled to offer the same $350,000 for the three targeted areas, but with an additional $1.05 million to be distributed statewide to address meth- and gang-related crime.

Courtney said news coverage of the original proposal's distribution of state dollars to top lawmakers' home districts led to the change. "We want to serve all of Oregon. We want to serve all the hot spots when it comes to gangs and when it comes to meth," he said.

Courtney and fellow Salem Sen. Jackie Winters, a Republican, have worked for most of 2006 on a pilot project to bring multiple police agencies together to stop the manufacture and delivery of meth. The $100,000 would have matched $400,000 raised from local and private sources. State police also would have gotten $50,000 for its part of the Marion County effort, as well as for equipment it could use statewide.

At the last minute, the plan was amended to include the Canby and east Multnomah County funding, which led to criticism that it was a pork-barrel grab by the Legislature's most powerful.

The added $1.05 million won't be targeted to specific communities. Instead, it will be divided between the state police and the Oregon Youth Authority. The two agencies then will distribute grants to counties for gang intervention and prevention, and to communities with proposals to reduce the manufacture of meth and address issues such as crime and addiction.

Rep. Greg Smith, a Heppner Republican who chaired the subcommittee that passed the expanded spending plan, said it proved worthwhile for top lawmakers to add $1 million in spending to the proposal.

"Leadership realized that they needed to distribute those dollars more fairly," he said.

The full Emergency Board will vote on the funding proposal today.