§ 14-110. Findings of fact.

(a)

Osceola County has broad home rule powers granted by the Florida Constitution to enact ordinances which are not inconsistent with general or special law for the purposes of protecting the public health, safety, and welfare of its citizens. Accordingly, because the activities of illicit pain management clinics, also known as "pill mills," threatens the health, safety and welfare of its citizens, Osceola County may regulate certain aspects of pain management clinic operations not reserved to the State of Florida.

(b)

The State of Florida has implemented a prescription drug monitoring program which would be an effective tool in Osceola County to reduce successful doctor shopping, or multiple prescriptions, or multiple pharmacy filling of prescriptions and dispensing of potentially dangerous opiate drugs, if local physicians are careful to check the database before prescribing potentially dangerous opiate drugs; and if reports are made to the database immediately when potentially dangerous opiate drugs are prescribed by local physicians or dispensed by local pharmacies so that other physicians and pharmacies can know that information.

(c)

The Osceola County Investigative Bureau has conducted research and analysis of the crime related activities located at or in near proximity to the existing pain management clinics operating in and around Osceola County and has informed the board that a pattern of illegal drug use and distribution of certain dangerous drugs has been linked to certain pain management clinics operating in and around Osceola County.

(d)

The Osceola County Investigative Bureau ("OCIB") has found that an analysis of Pain Management Clinics published by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement in May of 2011 showed that there were twenty-five (25) deaths in Osceola County in 2010 which involved lethal amounts of Oxycodone, or a mixture of Oxycodone and other drugs.

(e)

The OCIB has intelligence from numerous law enforcement sources that drug trafficking organizations from the states of Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee have and continue to visit an existing pain management clinic in Osceola County.

(f)

There have been several newspaper articles and media reports illustrating a pattern of illegal drug use and distribution associated with pain management clinics in Florida, which dispense drugs on-site and are trafficked by users from other states, such as Kentucky, Ohio, Georgia, and West Virginia.

(g)

Certain opiate analgesic dangerous drugs, that may be safe when used moderately or properly, have been shown to be particularly dangerous when over-prescribed by doctors in specialized businesses that are primarily focused on treating large numbers of persons who complain of any pain with very high doses of opiate drugs, and have been shown to be particularly dangerous when over consumed by citizens and visitors who may obtain a large number of such opiate drugs by engaging in doctor shopping to obtain multiple prescriptions, closing in time, from multiple doctors, by failing to disclose prior recent prescriptions to subsequent doctors, and then obtaining the prescriptions from multiple dispensing pharmacies, often by using multiple and false identities at both medical clinics and pharmacies.

(h)

Some pill mills and pharmacies have operated on a "cash only" basis.

(i)

Some pharmacies have been operated in conjunction with pill mills, including those that operate on a "cash only" basis have sales of controlled substances that exceed the industry norm.

(j)

Pill mills that illegally prescribe and dispense controlled substances for the treatment of pain, whether acute pain, intractable pain, or chronic pain, are associated with a wide variety of adverse secondary effects including, but not limited to, personal and property crimes, public safety risks, illicit drug use and drug trafficking, undesirable and criminal behavior associated with alcohol consumption, and negative impacts on surrounding properties.

(Ord. No. 2012-34, § 1, 10-8-12)