Pubdate: Wed, 12 Dec 2001
Source: Times-Standard (CA)
Copyright: 2001 The Times-Standard
Contact:  http://www.times-standard.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1051
Author: James Tressler

PROP. 36 DRAWING MORE SERIOUS DRUG USERS THAN EXPECTED

EUREKA -- Fewer people have been referred to Proposition 36-mandated drug 
treatment than anticipated since the law went into effect six months ago. 
But those getting into the treatment tend to have more serious drug 
problems than was originally expected.

So said the county's drug treatment and probation experts who gave an 
update on the implementation of the law at Tuesday's Humboldt County Board 
of Supervisors meeting. Prop. 36, also known as the Substance Abuse and 
Crime Prevention Act, mandates that all non-violent, low-level drug 
offenders be referred to court-supervised treatment instead of jail.

Bill Damiano, a director at the county Probation Department, said between 
200 and 240 people will be referred by the courts for the treatment over 
the next year, fewer than the 300 originally anticipated.

Damiano and the other Prop. 36-implementation team members had predicted 
the majority of these people would be misdemeanor drug offenders, needing 
only education and minimal supervision. But most of these low-level drug 
offenders have opted instead to serve a jail sentence or pay a fine rather 
than undergo treatment.

The result: Two-thirds of the people referred to Prop. 36 treatment have 
felony convictions, and the majority need the more intensive outpatient or 
residential treatment rather than just education. And nearly half need 
maximum supervision -- two contacts with a probation officer per month. 
Another disturbing outcome is that half of all people sentenced to Prop. 36 
treatment don't even bother to show up for their appointments.

Jet Kruse, senior program manager at the county Mental Health Department, 
said while some of these trends are alarming, they seem to be consistent 
with what she and other experts already know about serious drug users in 
Humboldt County.

"This population is pretty unreliable about following through -- that's 
part of the disease," Kruse said.

The majority of Prop. 36 referrals in the first six months since the law 
went into effect last July have been white men between 26 and 40 years old. 
Methamphetamine and marijuana led the list of drugs of choice.

Kruse said some fine-tuning of the treatment and assessment programs will 
be made. The Prop. 36 team will submit a revised implementation plan 
showing further progress to the Board of Supervisors sometime in January.

Damiano said statistics on the number of people who have successfully 
completed the program probably won't be available for another year because 
of the length of time it takes to get people through the program.
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MAP posted-by: Beth