DRUG COURTS

Bush daughter's story shows worth Mississippi lawmakers with a
"get-tough-on-crime" approach no matter the cost or consequence might want
to reconsider drug courts, given a recent news item.

President Bush's brother, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, said Monday his daughter
Noelle, 24, was making progress at a drug treatment center. She was
arrested Jan. 29 for allegedly trying to buy the anti-anxiety drug Xanax
with a fake prescription.

With our 85 percent rule requiring all inmates - including first-time drug
offenders - to serve 85 percent of sentences, Noelle Bush could have gone
to prison for a long time if arrested here.

But, unlike all but a couple of urban areas in Mississippi, Florida has
drug courts, which offer treatment: an alternative to turning a first-time
drug offender to a life of crime.

Said Jeb Bush, a Republican not known as a "liberal" or "soft" on crime: "I
think she's in better shape because of the fact she went through the drug
court system."

Mississippi's tight budget may preclude ushering in drug courts this year,
even though it's cheaper than prison.

But state Sen. Rob Smith, D-Richland, has authored two bills that could
help: SB 2354 would establish a five-year pilot program for drug and
alcohol treatment at East Mississippi Correctional Facility in Meridian; SB
2335 would designate 200 beds at the Bolivar County Regional Facility.

These are affordable and can be done until the state's finances recover
enough for a statewide drug court system.

Anyone's child can get caught up in drug addiction and found in violation
of a drug crime. Ask Jeb Bush, who said: "I know . . . how pervasive this
is. And how when you love somebody and they're going through tough times,
how it just sucks the life out of a family."

Noelle Bush should thank her lucky stars she didn't get arrested in
Mississippi, where even among her family's admirers and fellow Republican
Party supporters drug "treatment" means "lock 'em up and throw away the key."

It's not being soft on crime to act smart with drugs.