Pubdate: Fri, 02 Jun 2000 Source: Alameda Times-Star (CA) Copyright: 2000 MediaNews Group, Inc. and ANG Newspapers Contact: 66 Jack London Sq. Oakland, CA 94607 Website: http://www.newschoice.com/newspapers/alameda/times/ Author: Matthew B. Stannard and Josh Richman, Staff Writers COURT OFFICIALS LAMBASTE DRUG TREATMENT INITIATIVE Too Soft On Punishment A proposal to put nonviolent drug offenders into treatment rather than prison is drawing fire not only from law enforcement and victims groups, but also from some of the professionals it's designed to support. "It would be devastating to drug courts in California," insisted Judge Jeffrey S. Tauber, a former Oakland Municipal Court jurist who now is president of the National Association of Drug Court Professionals. "It's a mockery in the sense that its proponents suggest it will assist and enhance drug courts. It will destroy drug courts." The Drug Treatment Diversion Program Act initiative -- bankrolled by wealthy drug policy reformers including billionaire financier George Soros - -- qualified Wednesday for November's ballot. Secretary of State Bill Jones said its backers submitted 713,849 signatures, far more than the 419,260 required. "Our goal is to replace a failed drug war with a more effective public health strategy, to treat drug use as a health issue, not something that in every case required incarceration and punishment," campaign spokesman Dave Fratello said. The initiative requires that any person convicted for the first or second time of a nonviolent drug possession offense receive probation instead of jail and be required to complete a drug treatment program up to a year long. Failure to complete the program would let a judge intensify the treatment or revoke the convict's probation. Upon completing the program, the defendant could petition to have the drug conviction expunged, making it available only to law enforcement and ineligible as a strike under the "Three Strikes, You're Out" sentencing law. Defendants convicted of a serious or violent strike within the past five years would be ineligible for the program. The plan would cost about $120 million a year for 51/2 years beginning in 2001, but the state Legislative Analyst's Office estimates prison savings could reach $150 million per year. Some politicians and drug treatment providers already have endorsed the initiative, including state Sen. Don Perata, D-Oakland; the Berkeley and Oakland city councils; and East Palo Alto drug treatment provider Free at Last. But as the National Association of Drug Court Professionals met Thursday in San Francisco for its annual training conference, it was clear this group and its California affiliate strongly oppose the measure. Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Stephen Manley called it "a serious step backward" toward a failed system in which addicts aren't held accountable for their recovery: "This initiative ... would lead to more addicts not receiving meaningful treatment." Alameda County Superior Court Judge Peggy Hora, who presides over Hayward's drug court and sits on the state association's board, said the initiative disrupts the "carrot-and-stick" balance of incentive and punishment that's vital to successful rehabilitation. "It's all carrot, and addicts need external structure until they can develop their own internal structures. Addicts will continue to use, lie, cheat and steal until they can face their own addictions," Hora said. "This is going to allow people to continue to use, continue to go down to their spiraling deaths." Hora also criticized the measure's limitation of treatment to one year; its failure to fund drug testing; its prohibition of jail time as part of probation; and its requirement that all nonviolent drug offenders get treatment instead of prison regardless whether they plead guilty. That last element could jam courts with offenders who decide to take a chance on a jury trial because they have little to lose. "It keeps everything in the criminal justice system, but takes away all our sanctions," she said. "It takes away every tool I have as a judge." Tauber said the much-needed money the measure provides isn't worth the loss of judicial control. "Why would the addicts do anything we say?" he asked rhetorically. "Because we say it nicely?" The California Correctional Peace Officers Association notes courts would be unable to send nonviolent parolees back to jail on a drug use or possession violation. Spokesman Jeff Thompson said parole officers see drug use as a warning sign that a parolee has returned to crime, and as a chance to get that person off the streets before his or her crimes escalate. "It's playing some Russian roulette with public safety by handcuffing our parole agents," he said. Fratello said he's baffled by the opposition. The measure does not pay for drug testing, he acknowledged, nor does it bar state or federal officials from providing other funding for such testing. And while it requires probation and treatment over jail, he said, it lets judges send drug users who fail their treatment to prison, just as current law provides. Existing drug courts and the initiative share a common goal, Fratello said: getting addicts out of prison and into treatment. "We're really debating one tree when there's a whole forest to deal with," he said. Local drug treatment providers have mixed feelings. "I'm not going to take money when I know it's baloney. And right now, it's looking like baloney," said Joe Loceria, director of CURA Inc., a Fremont drug treatment facility. He shared many of Hora's concerns about the measure's lack of punitive clout. "These people are very well-meaning. The essence of their idea is very well-taken," Loceria said. "But I think it really needs some serious thought." Peter Budlong, director of Berkeley's New Bridge Foundation, said beggars can't be choosers. "Tthere is an enormous disparity between the publicly funded treatment capacity and the demand," he said. "And any way to stem that demand and make up that disparity is a good thing." - --- MAP posted-by: Jo-D