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The District Attorney's Office spent $219,411 getting the task force up and running last year. The funds included $169,234 for employees, $4,775 in training costs, $28,402 for equipment including computers, printers, cameras and office supplies and $17,000 in vehicle operation and maintainance.

This year, those costs are expected to reach $222,575. Morse believes the cost is well worth it. "Taxpayers will end up paying way more on the front end, if we really do not get ourselves established with a track record," Morse said. "We'll pay way, way more in public safety costs."

Although Morse and others believe the task force plays a key role in eliminating the scourge of gang violence from the county, critics call it a Band-Aid approach to the problem. Counselors who work with gang members say the revolving door of incarceration, combined with the lack of rehabilitation programs, means most gang members arrested by the task force eventually end up back on the street.

After their release, though, they're more criminally sophisticated after spending time in the big house.

And with the current economic downturn and a dismal job market, some believe the problem will only get worse.

The Sun-Star recently spent four days with officers of the Merced Multi-Agency Gang Task Force. Some of those days were spent sitting quietly in cars, conducting surveillance on suspects; others were spent serving search warrants and patrolling county streets.

One thing is clear: In a county where the gang population is bigger than the total population of some small cities, the task force has its hands full.

Three dots vs. four dots

Although the name "multi-agency gang task force" might seem ready-made for prime-time reality TV, à la "Cops," the officers on the force say it's not all about kicking down doors and catching the bad guys, with breaks for commercials.

Kensey, a 10-year veteran of the CHP who recently joined the task force, said most of his job is spent conducting "direct enforcement." That ranges from serving arrest warrants and probation searches to building intelligence on the gangs. "It's not like on TV, where you are arresting someone every 10 minutes," Kensey explained. "You've got to get out there and beat the pavement."

While direct enforcement accounts for about 50 percent of the task force's duties, 30 percent is dedicated to targeted investigations of specific gangs, according Val Pacheco, the task force's commander. The other 20 percent is spent conducting gang awareness presentations in schools and for community groups, Pacheco said.

Both the Nortenos and Surenos, by far the county's largest gangs, are considered large umbrella criminal street gangs, comprised of smaller gangs, or "sets" (Varrio Planada X, for example, is a Norteno gang).

The gangs are also represented by different colors -- Nortenos typically wear red, Surenos blue.

The gang color system might seem almost comical if their resumes didn't include a laundry list of crimes, such as murder, illicit drug production and sales, violence and prostitution.

The first day with the task force was spent beating the pavement in Le Grand, Planada, Winton and Merced with Kensey and his partner, Merced County Probation Officer Jose Pacheco.

Much of the intelligence-gathering was done by talking one-on-one to gang members and their affiliates. That lets officers follow their movements and place their names into an information database. Another part entails documenting the graffiti left by gang members.