Wednesday, December 19, 2001

Ryan Kim, Chronicle Staff Writer

SFGate.com

Authorities seized a record amount of marijuana plants this summer from the Bay Area, which accounted for almost one-third of the state-wide haul, said the state Department of Justice.

The 2001 California Campaign Against Marijuana Planting, a program involving 70 local, state and federal law enforcement agencies, discovered 101, 000 of its 313,776 plants in the Bay Area.

The Bay Area's total represented a 357 percent increase over last year, when 28,261 plants were seized in the nine-county region. This year, Santa Clara County led the way in the Bay Area with 47,574; San Mateo County had 30, 409; Sonoma County had 15,662; and Napa County finished with 8,002 plants.

Authorities said the plants were no longer mostly found in the rural counties of Northern California. This year, 23 percent were found in the Central Valley. Twenty-two percent were seized in Northern California, including 54,504 plants in Tehama County south of Redding, the most of any county. Another 16 percent were found in the "Emerald Triangle" counties of Humboldt, Mendocino and Trinity counties, which used to be the largest producing area in California.

"Now, the growers find they can plant anywhere there is cover and it's desolate enough," said Mike Van Winkle, spokesman for the Department of Justice.

The program, which ran from late July to early October, included 149 raids in 23 counties and yielded 20 arrests. About 70 percent of the farms had ties to Mexican drug cartels, officials said. Overall, the plants seized had an estimated value of $1.25 billion.