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Mr. President, Don't Cut Law Enforcement Money On Drug Trafficking: Schumer
Posted: Thursday, February 26, 2015 11:37 am--By Bill San Antonio
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Sen. Charles Schumer



Sen. Charles Schumer is urging the Senate to reject a budget proposal that would cut funding to a law enforcement program that assists in policing regions with a high frequency of drug-trafficking, telling reporters Sunday that more funding is necessary to combat the nation’s growing heroin epidemic.

Schumer, a Democrat, said he cannot support President Barack Obama’s $193 million appropriation for the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas program - also known as HIDTA - which marks a $52 million decrease from last year.

“President Obama’s budget outlines a lot of critical priorities for this nation, but I simply do not agree with his plan to cut critical drug trafficking funding, as heroin use continues to rise and kill our youth,” he told reporters.

Schumer instead said he is pushing for a $100 million increase to the program in the next fiscal year in light of recent media reports suggesting that the use of heroin laced with the Schedule-II opioid Fentanyl, which is known to produce a stronger high and exacerbate the dangers associated with heroin, has been on the rise.

He cited figures from the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene that said fatal opioid overdoses increased from 8.2 per 100,000 in 2010 to 11.6 per 100,000 in 2013, with the percentage of fatal heroin overdoses more than doubling in that span.

“We all saw the horrors caused by the crack epidemic when left unchecked by the feds and other law enforcement, and that’s why I will move to increase HIDTA funding by $100 million in the Senate, not make cuts to this vital program,” Schumer said.

New York and New Jersey in 1990 were among the first states to implement a HIDTA program, through which local law enforcement receives federal funding to curb drug trafficking. Today, 17 counties - including Nassau and Suffolk - are part of the region’s program.

There were 87 fatal heroin and opioid overdoses in Nassau County in 2014, according to county statistics, a decrease from the 159 opioid and heroin-related deaths in 2013.





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