3 CHEERS: To Santa Clara County sheriff’s deputies for seizing
10,000 marijuana plants at Mount Madonna County Park in Gilroy,
John Laird for passage of Assembly AB 1602 and Gloria Zufall and
the Morgan Hill Dog Owners Group (D.O.G.) for getting the Morgan
Hill City Council to give them $20,000 to build an off-leash dog
park at Community Park.
The following organizations and individuals deserve cheers this week:
cheers: To the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Special Operations Division that eradicated 10,000 marijuana plants out of land that belongs to the public.
In the most recent raid, which occurred Aug. 15, deputies seized marijuana plants that were growing at Mount Madonna County Park in Gilroy. The confiscated plants had an estimated street value of $40 million. No arrests were made in the raid.
In addition to breaking the law by growing marijuana, the pot farmers damage the park’s sensitive ecosystem.
Before the most recent raid, deputies had confiscated more than 70,000 marijuana plants valued at $280 million this year alone. Marijuana season is just under way, so with the latest raid, deputies are likely to surpass last year’s haul of 80,000 plants.
Criminals will go to great and dangerous lengths to protect anything that’s worth that kind of money, so as long as marijuana is illegal, we’re glad that deputies are working to keep them away from South County – especially its publicly owned lands.
We’ll leave the bigger-picture questions about the war on drugs in general, and the illegal status of marijuana in particular, for another time. They are important issues that all of us ought to consider and debate. In the meantime, kudos to the undercover sheriff’s deputies who risk so much to protect South County from these dangerous large-scale pot-growing operations.
cheers: To John Laird, his colleagues in the State Assembly, all San Martin residents who worked to pass AB 1602, and especially Sylvia Hamilton, who has worked tirelessly for the benefit of San Martin and its residents. The bill, which will make it easier for the town to pursue the goal of incorporating, was passed 79-0 in the Assembly. The issue of incorporation could be before the voters as early as Nov. 2007. And, while we’re on the subject, it’s events such as last weekend’s Happy Days Car Show that help raise money for the incorporation and display San Martin’s community spirit.
cheers: To the grassroots effort led by Morgan Hill resident and dog lover Gloria Zufall for working with members of the Morgan Hill City Council who last week allocated $20,000 toward building an off-leash park at Community Park on Edmundson Avenue.
The funding is a welcome surprise to members of the Morgan Hill Dog Owners Group (D.O.G.) who’ve worked hard during the past three years to raise about $27,000 to build a special place for their canine friends to recreate.
While the group will need to continue to raise funds to accomplish its goal – the city’s allocation will be a big boost to get the group to work even harder in the future. We commend Councilman Steve Tate for getting the ball rolling on this one and the Parks and Recreation Commission for reviewing the funding request expeditiously and voting unanimously to give Zufall and D.O.G. the money.
