Locke Draws A Bead On Meth Labs Signs 3 Bills To Step Up Battle But Shies Away From ‘Third Strike’ Rap

Gov. Gary Locke on Friday signed three bills designed to crack down on people who operate methamphetamine labs, although he declined for the second year in a row to make the crime a “strike.”

The measures were among 40 bills signed Friday by the governor. Other measures dealt with sex offenders, student regents on university boards, outdoor burning bans and pregnant women who use illegal drugs.

The drug bills are aimed at curbing a growing number of meth labs in Washington. In 1996, the Washington State Patrol investigated 102 meth labs and seized 50,000 grams of the drug, up from 26 labs and 3,000 grams seized in 1991.

Locke signed House Bill 2628, which increases the standard sentencing range for manufacturing methamphetamine from two years to about five years for the first offense. The maximum penalty will jump from 12 years to 16 years.

He also signed Senate Bill 6139, which increases sentences for making or selling amphetamine, which is produced by a meth lab that didn’t get the chemical reaction the operator intended.

But Locke only signed part of HB2791, which allows local governments to use money from their toxics control accounts for assessment and cleanup of meth lab sites. The chemical combinations used in the manufacture of methamphetamine are toxic, and cleanup costs can be a significant and unexpected burden on a community.

The governor vetoed a provision that would have made the operation of a meth lab a “strike” under the “Three strikes, you’re out” law that requires a life sentence after a conviction for a third violent crime.

Locke, who vetoed a similar measure last year, repeated his contention that the three-strikes law should be reserved for violent crimes.

“The ‘Three strikes, you’re out’ law has been effective in permanently putting the most dangerous criminals behind bars, but applying it to new crimes every year, as if it were the cure-all for every crime in society, could jeopardize the ‘three strikes law,’ ” Locke said.

The governor also signed two bills dealing with sex offenders.

HB2350 requires the Washington State Patrol to make information about sex offenders available to all law enforcement agencies in the state. Under the current system, counties maintain their own records, but there is no statewide system that allows law enforcers to make a quick check on a sex offender who may have traveled to a different county.

HB2707 prohibits prison inmates convicted of sex crimes from participating in work programs that provide access to names, addresses and telephone numbers of the general public.

Locke has signed 100 bills so far and has 275 left that must be acted upon by April 4, including the state budget and packages of legislation dealing with drunken driving and preserving salmon runs.