DRUG TRADE CLAIMING MORE VICTIMS

A resurgent drug trade has boosted the murder tally in Milwaukee, according
to a report at the top of the Journal Sentinel's front page Monday.
Meanwhile, at the bottom of that page, a separate story reported that many
drug addicts seeking to kick their habit can't get timely treatment due to
cutbacks in county funds.

Sometimes, links become self-evident. Putting the two stories together, we
find that a falloff in treatment is likely stoking the sometimes deadly
drug trade. There is also a link between the lack of treatment and a
long-term trend in the news: prison congestion. The former is doubtless
aggravating the latter.

In that it fails to make drug treatment a top priority, public policy is
confounding. Putting money into treatment promises to pay for itself
several times over - through fewer expenditures for crime and prisons, not
to mention less heartache for countless individuals.

Fighting drugs takes a three-pronged approach: law enforcement, education
and treatment. The nation has made no net gain in the two-decade drug war
because, while lavishing funds on the first prong, it has skimped on the
latter two - an awful habit that lawmakers must break. The politicians
prefer filling jail cells over filling treatment beds - an approach that,
besides being ineffective, is costly.

Lawmakers must wage a smarter drug war. They should finance treatment to
the point where a drug addict seeking help can immediately receive it. Why
wait to intervene until he's caught stealing to finance his habit, and then
to put him behind bars?

When it comes to addiction, delayed help is often the same as no help. A
delay often erodes the will to seek treatment.

The county was merely passing on cuts in drug-treatment funds from the
state and federal governments, which, therefore, deserve most of the blame.
The state especially ought to know better. After all, the huge bill for
prisons is coming due - which ought to prompt state lawmakers and
regulators to take all reasonable measures to ease prison crowding and,
thus, the need to build even more, costly prisons.

The Senate version of the state budget would help. It contains $10 million
in new money for treatment. Lawmakers should retain that provision in the
final budget document.