STATE DIVIDES DRUG TREATMENT MONEY AMONG COUNTIES

The state is leaving it to California's 58 counties to divide their
share of $60 million to implement a drug treatment initiative
approved by voters last year.

Proposition 36 takes effect July 1. It requires that first- and
second-time drug users be sent to treatment programs instead of
prison or jail.

Counties will share $60 million as they prepare for the program, and
$120 million each year for the next five years. The state Department
of Alcohol and Drug Program's allocation to each county was made
public Wednesday.

That is leading to predictions of a fight between drug treatment
providers and county probation departments over the money.

Probation offices say they lack enough officers to oversee the
estimated 36,000 offenders who otherwise would have gone to state
jails or prisons, while treatment providers already have long waiting
lists.

"There will be politics" as county supervisors divide the money, said
San Francisco District Attorney Terence Hallinan, whose county will
receive $2.3 million.

He hopes the Legislature helps avert disputes by approving more money
this spring to beef up county probation offices and pay for drug
tests.

Los Angeles County will get $15.7 million, or 27 percent of the money
announced Wednesday.

The county would have received slightly more had the money been
divided strictly on population, as the county proposed, said Bob
Mimura, director of the Countywide Criminal Justice Coordination
Committee set up by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.

But the state department instead factored in treatment caseloads and
drug crimes, which benefited San Francisco County, among others. San
Francisco is the 10th most populous county but received the
seventh-largest allotment, Hallinan said.

Los Angeles County officials opposed Proposition 36 but won't fight
over the money as other counties might, Mimura predicted.

"We can't fully implement it if we're arguing over scraps," he said.

See each county's share of the money, and requirements for using it,
at: http://www.adp.cahwnet.gov/