Pubdate: Mon, 22 Aug 2005
Source: Press-Enterprise (CA)
Section: Editorial; Pg. B09
Webpage:
Copyright: 2005 The Press-Enterprise Company
Contact:  http://www.pe.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/830
Author: Peter Banys And Donald Kurth
Note: Peter Banys, M.D., is a clinical professor of psychiatry at UC San 
Francisco and past president of the California Society of Addiction 
Medicine. Donald Kurth, M.D., is an associate professor in the Department 
of Psychiatry at Loma Linda University and president of the California 
Society of Addiction Medicine.
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?159 (Drug Courts)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/prison.htm (Incarceration)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/rehab.htm (Treatment)

DON'T GUT DRUG-TREATMENT RULES OF PROP. 36

Enacted nearly five years ago, Prop. 36 is a voters' initiative that 
mandates the provision of drug treatment to nonviolent drug offenders 
convicted for first or second offenses of simple possession.

California voters rocked criminal justice opposition by a 61 percent versus 
39 percent margin in overwhelmingly demanding a public-health approach to 
addictions.

Three years' worth of data has just been analyzed by researchers at UCLA 
who have found that Prop. 36 is working well. More than a third (34.3 
percent) complete their treatment as ordered. Another 7.3 percent are 
discharged from treatment with a rating of "satisfactory progress." Almost 
twice as many patients are employed at the end of treatment as were at the 
beginning, having gone from being tax consumers to taxpayers.

All this at 10 percent of the cost of incarceration. These outcomes are 
comparable to rates found in diverse treatment and specialized drug court 
settings.

Despite the overwhelming evidence that Prop. 36 saves hundreds of millions 
of dollars and improves thousands of lives, we physicians find ourselves 
again disputing police, prosecutors and corrections officers who assisted 
Sen. Denise Moreno Ducheny, D-Chula Vista, in drafting Senate Bill 803 to 
"improve" Prop. 36. This bill is scheduled for debate Aug. 23 in the 
Assembly Public Safety Committee, chaired by Mark Leno of San Francisco.

The California Society of Addiction Medicine opposes provisions of SB 803 
that would impose jail sanctions on Prop. 36 clients who fail to show up 
for an appointment with a drug counselor or who submit a dirty drug test. 
We believe these provisions undermine the public's defining intent to shift 
from a criminal justice to a public-health model.

Ducheny's bill argues that amendments will modify Prop. 36 to follow the 
drug court model.

While we believe that drug courts can be effective,  they have a number of 
sanctions (community service, court appearances, urine toxicology testing) 
and structures (liaisons with treatment facilities, social work 
assessments, probation visits) that other courts don't. In no way will 
simply returning broad incarceration powers to sitting judges turn their 
courts into the "drug court model," as has been asserted by some 
enthusiasts of SB 803.

The state Legislature's own lawyers have written that elements of SB 803 
would violate the intent and purpose of Prop. 36. SB 803 is bad medicine, 
bad policy - and a repudiation of drug-war-weary California voters.
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MAP posted-by: Beth