DAVIS SELECTS DIRECTOR OF ALCOHOL AND DRUG OFFICE

Nearly two years after he took office and days after voters approved a
sweeping drug treatment initiative, Gov. Gray Davis appointed his first
director of the Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs.

Also Tuesday, backers of Proposition 36 threatened to sue Davis if he
doesn't immediately release $60 million for drug treatment authorized by
voters a week ago.

Davis appointed Kathryn Jett, 47, to head the department and oversee
implementation of the ballot measure, which requires the state to treat a
projected 36,000 drug users each year instead of incarcerating them.

Jett is director of the attorney general's Crime and Violence Prevention
Center and chairs the executive committee of the non-partisan Crime
Prevention Coalition of America. Previously, she was head of the Department
of Health Services' Office of Women's Health.