The Montana Senate wants the state to hire six new highway patrolmen to combat the increase of methamphetamine coming into the state.
Recently, the Senate added an amendment to House Bill 2, the state’s primary budget bill, which would direct the Montana Highway Patrol to have six officers focus exclusively on tracking drug runners. Sen. Eric Moore, R-Miles City, said that a decade ago, during the state’s first methamphetamine crisis, most of the drug was made locally, but today it is coming from places like Mexico.
“These guys will be tasked with finding drugs coming through on our highways,” he said. “We need to catch the drugs that are coming in, and it’s not rocket science. It takes boots on the ground and more cops.”
Methamphetamine use in Montana made headlines in the early 2000s and spurred a major response by state and federal officials to crack down on its production. The sale of items needed to make meth became highly regulated, and in the ensuing years, use of the drug dropped in Montana. However, there has been an uptick in meth use in recent years.
Flathead County Sheriff Chuck Curry said the Northwest Montana Drug Task Force would confiscate a few ounces of meth at a time a few years ago, but now officers are bringing it in by the pound. In 2014, the Kalispell-based task force brought in nine pounds; by 2016, that amount had tripled.
The increase in meth use is having a ripple effect across the legal system and health care facilities. In response to the new epidemic, Moore teamed up with Sen. Diane Sands, D-Missoula, to host the “Montana Meth Summit” in Helena on Feb. 18. The daylong meeting gathered stakeholders from across the state, and Moore said it helped lawmakers like him think of ways that Montana should combat the issue moving forward. He said the idea to hire new patrolmen to focus on drug trafficking was a result of the summit.
Moore also said that a study bill is currently working its way through the Legislature that would require lawmakers to form a committee to study the issue during the interim with the hopes of proposing new legislation next session.
“This issue touches almost every corner of state government,” Moore said. “We have to keep public awareness up about the issue of methamphetamine in Montana.”