Bill limits some cold medicines to pharmacies

CARSON CITY -- Convenience stores would no longer be able to sell cold medicines that contain chemicals used to make methamphetamine under a legislative compromise approved Friday.

"The only place to get these precursors (for making meth) now, if we adopt this, is in a pharmacy, behind the counter," Assemblywoman Sheila Leslie, D-Reno, told a conference committee of senators and Assembly members who adopted changes to Assembly Bill 148 Friday morning. She said the legislation would prevent meth labs from proliferating.

The amended bill was approved by the Assembly and Senate later Friday and now goes to Gov. Jim Gibbons, who has made combating methamphetamine a priority.

A previous bill, Assembly Bill 150, would have required convenience stores to report quarterly their sales of drugs such as Sudafed, but retailers said that requirement was burdensome.

Assembly Republicans voted together against the bill, causing it to fall one vote short of the two-thirds needed for passage.

After coming under criticism for defeating a bill on a topic dear to the governor of their own party, Assembly Republicans regrouped and came up with additions to AB148, another bill on meth that had been proposed by Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto.

In addition to restricting the sale of medications containing meth-producing chemicals to pharmacies, the bill would require retailers to immediately notify the state Department of Public Safety by phone if a large amount of the drugs goes missing.

Such reporting already is required by the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, and must be followed by a written report.

"This gives law enforcement another tool to use in the war on methamphetamine," Assemblywoman Valerie Weber, R-Las Vegas, said at a news conference in which Assembly Republicans announced the deal on the bill.

The bill criminalizes the selling of chemicals for the purpose of meth manufacture and the knowing disposal of meth waste. It allows local governments to declare meth labs a nuisance and take action against them.

By duplicating the federal notice requirements in state law, the bill will allow local police to act against suspected meth operations that might be too small for federal authorities to bother with, Cortez Masto said.

Retailers were on board with the revised bill. Liz MacMenamin, a lobbyist for the retailers, said due to federal anti-meth legislation passed last year, few non-pharmacy stores were selling the restricted medications anymore.

Lawmakers hailed the compromise but said more resources were still needed for treatment of meth addicts.

"If we can't treat people who have this problem, we're not going to solve this problem," Assemblyman Bernie Anderson, D-Sparks, said.

The state substance abuse agency has been budgeted $2 million for prevention of meth addiction and $5 million for treatment, Leslie said.

Under Gibbons' package of meth proposals, the public safety department also receives extra officers to fight meth in rural areas.