ORANGE : Drug Tests to Be Required of Police

The Police Department announced Tuesday that it is enacting a policy calling for mandatory drug testing for narcotics officers and other department employees who handle or process drugs.

Orange is one of the first police departments in the county to adopt such a policy, according to Police Chief Merrill V. Duncan.

The policy, which becomes effective immediately, also requires department employees who do not deal directly with narcotics to submit to random--but less frequent--drug testing.

The testing program was adopted partly because “there is a tremendous potential for corruption associated with drug use by police employees,” according to the department policy statement.

Duncan said the policy, under consideration for a year, was not prompted by any incidence of drug use within the department but rather by the department’s desire to retain public confidence.

“Nothing brought it on,” he said. “It comes down to this: Who’s in the patrol car next to me and who’s knocking on my front door when I cry for help?”

The policy was created in cooperation with the department’s union, the City of Orange Police Assn. The COPA board of directors voted unanimously in December to approve the policy.

A letter from COPA board members called the policy “fair and impartial.”

“It is truly a sad time in our profession that such measures have to be considered,” the board’s letter stated. “Yet it is our opinion that both the public and employees themselves must be assured that drugs are not present within our working environment.”

Recommendations for drug-testing policies are often resisted by police department employees, and Duncan praised COPA for supporting the program.

“Some of the (police) associations are using this as a bargaining chip, but COPA decided to adopt it,” he said.

The policy did not require City Council approval, but Councilman Mike Spurgeon commended the Police Department and the association for being willing to monitor themselves.

“This is one reason we have one of the best departments around,” he said.

The drug-testing program will require each narcotics enforcement officer and every employee who conducts drug analysis, or whose work includes preservation or disposal of drugs, to submit to unannounced drug tests up to four times each year. Other police staff will be required to submit to unannounced tests given at random no more than twice a year.

Employees will be tested while on duty, if possible, and will be given two hours to provide a blood or urine sample. The private tests will screen for use of cocaine, marijuana, PCP, LSD, barbiturates, amphetamines, Valium, steroids, codeine, morphine and methadone.

If a drug test is positive, a second test will be given to confirm the results. If tests are confirmed, employees may then elect to take their samples to another lab.

Employees will also be required to notify their superiors if they use prescription medication that may impair their performance on the job or if they have had outside contact with an illegal substance.

If an officer is found to use drugs, he could be dismissed. If an employee has absorbed drugs through handling them on the job, he will receive appropriate treatment, Duncan said.