Countywide
The sale of several chemicals used to make illegal drugs will be regulated by the county under an ordinance approved Tuesday by the Board of Supervisors.
The board voted, 4-0, with Supervisor Susan Golding absent, to regulate the sale of six chemicals in the unincorporated areas of the county and to urge the region’s 18 cities to do the same.
The ordinance, which takes effect immediately, requires people who sell or give one of the chemicals to another person to report the transaction to the county sheriff.
The seller must obtain the name and address of the purchaser, the license number of the buyer’s car and a letter of authorization from any business for which the chemicals are intended.
Exempted from the ordinance will be pharmacists selling the chemicals under a prescription, doctors, dentists, podiatrists and veterinarians, and manufacturers who sell to licensed pharmacies or physicians.
The chemicals involved are ephedrine, pseudoephedrine, norpseudoephedrine and phenylpropanolamine, ether and hydriodic acid, which are used in the production of methamphetamine.
The ordinance will be repealed Oct. 1, 1987, when a new state law will take effect requiring that the sale of those chemicals be reported to the state Department of Justice.
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