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The newest fad among heroin users is to add fentanyl, a painkiller that is many times more powerful than morphine, to a hit. In Chicago alone, the mixture may be responsible for up to 100 deaths. In the Detroit area, 175 have died over the last several months. Pittsburgh cops are investigating whether the heroine-fentanyl mixture is responsible for 3 deaths and 34 overdoses last weekend alone. In St. Louis, the drug mixture appears to be linked to 20 deaths this spring.

The Washington Post says the practice is spreading:

"There's this consumer arc. At first there's fear, but then when the fear is over, it's like: Hey, that's good stuff," said Greg Scott, a DePaul University sociologist who conducts government-funded research on injected drugs. "Most so-called street addicts can't afford more than what they're already doing, so fentanyl gives you that little extra bump. People are scouting for it."

Authorities have also spotted the practice in New Jersey and Michigan. I really can't imagine that if the problem is already this widespread, it won't be coming to your neighborhood soon.

For more, check out The Detroit News, Detroit Free Press, Newsweek, Associated Press and Chicago Tribune coverage.

06/06/06: Are we Still Here?

I went ahead and filed today's column last night, figuring somebody would still be around to read it.

Assuming today does not mark the end of the world, here is a nice background piece from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch about what the "Mark of the Beast" is really about.  

Dog-Bite Season

The St. Cloud (Minn.) Times says summer is the season of dog bites. The story includes tons of research on bite incidents, the worst of the bad dogs in that community and tips for owners and pedestrians.

For more information, you might be interested in checking out an interesting Web site called DogBiteLaw.com or the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention's dog-bite prevention page.

NPR has an interesting story about how, nationwide, cemeteries are running out of space. So cemetery directors are trying all sorts of new space-saving ideas including stacking caskets on top of each other, eliminating headstones and burying people in unconventional places. Listen to the story.

80-mph Speed Limit

Texas just opened the door to the nation's fastest stretches of interstate -- all 521 miles of them. Who's next?

How Much is a Cop Worth?

The Buffalo News found an increasing number of suburban police officers are joining the six-figure club when you count salary, benefits and perks. The shortage of cops nationwide makes cities and municipalities pay up.

The newspaper explained that you would not know about the big-dollar salaries if you just looked at the salary schedule. There is more to the pay schedule than the base pay:

The Buffalo News obtained police contracts and the 2005 payrolls for the towns of Amherst, Cheektowaga, Hamburg, Lancaster, Orchard Park, Tonawanda and West Seneca, as well as the City of Buffalo.

The study counted only salaries and benefits paid for the year 2005, and removed "retroactive" pay, or amounts owed to police for years before 2005. Also excluded from the study were benefits such as health insurance and state pensions.

The payroll records show that police receive a wide variety of "perks," from allowing them to cash in their unused sick time, to a contract provision that allows Cheektowaga officers to claim time and half pay if their lunch is interrupted by police work.

Money to Burn

The Miami Herald ran a fantastic piece on how firefighters there are billing around $100 an hour to act as human smoke detectors when buildings are under renovation or do not have functioning sprinkler or fire-alarm systems. I doubt there is much to localize on this, but it is worth a read, just because it reminds journalists to ask questions about unusual government spending.

School-Bus Radio

Over the years, I have seen stories about school systems that considered selling advertising space on school buses as a way to raise some money. Now a company wants to start piping music and commercials into school buses, claiming the music will keep kids calmer during the ride to school and back home. The agreement listed on the company's Web site seems to say that school systems won't make money on the deal, but the company also promises it won't cost them anything. The Washington Post reports:

BusRadio, a start-up company in Massachusetts, wants to pipe into school buses around the country a private radio network that plays music, public-service announcements, contests and, of course, ads, aimed at kids as they travel to and from school.

As BusRadio's Web site ( http://www.busradio.net/ ) explains: "Every morning and every afternoon on their way to and from school, kids across the country will be listening to the dynamic programming of BusRadio providing advertiser's [sic] with a unique and effective way to reach the highly sought after teen and tween market."

BusRadio, the Web site adds, "will take targeted student marketing to the next level." Marketers can advertise and sponsor contests or provide a celebrity deejay (perhaps to promote that next CD or movie). They can also use BusRadio's Web site to conduct surveys and test songs, CD covers, packaging and ads.

According to its Web site, BusRadio plans to operate in Massachusetts this fall, broadcasting to more than 102,000 students. By September 2007 it plans to take its programs national, reaching a million students.