HUNTINGTON BEACH : Drug Money to Pay 2 Officers’ Salaries

The city will hire two new officers for the Police Department’s narcotics unit, using money seized from drug dealers to pay for the additions.

Police Chief Ronald E. Lowenberg proposed hiring one full-time police officer and one full-time police specialist, and the City Council unanimously approved his request this week.

The new police officer would be in charge of the Narcotic Unit’s Asset Forfeiture Program, and the additional police specialist would help with investigative staff work for that program.

The Asset Forfeiture Program stems from federal and state laws that allow police to seize property, such as cars, houses and furniture, that have been used by drug traffickers. Since the Huntington Beach program started in 1974, Lowenberg said, more than $900,000 worth of assets have been seized.

Lowenberg proposed that the City Council spend $151,000 of the seized narcotics funds to pay for the salaries of the two officers and support services for one year. After that, the salaries will be funded through the regular budget process, he said.

The police chief said that the Asset Forfeiture Program is handled by the existing narcotics unit staff as an additional duty. Assigning a full-time officer and specialist to the program would allow narcotics officers to expand their work and probably would result in more seizures of drug-related assets, Lowenberg said.

” . . . Drug traffickers have become more sophisticated in acquiring assets and concealing the true identity of ownership,” Lowenberg said in a report to the council. “This is true of both equipment and cash.”