CALIFORNIA PROP. 5 EDITORIAL: A MORE HUMANE APPROACH

More Nonviolent Offenders Could Avoid Prison

Opponents of Proposition 5, a modest reform of California's drug laws
and parole practices designed in part to help alleviate the woeful
crowding of the state California's prison system, paint a scary
picture of what will happen if voters approve this measure. Parole for
methamphetamine dealers will be shortened from three years to six
months! Lock the doors!

Well, yes, the measure will reduce parole for a wide range of
nonviolent crimes from three years to six months, reducing the stress
on the parole system. But parole eligibility for certain violent
crimes will actually be increased, in some cases from the current
maximum of four years to five years. So if that former meth dealer -
who will have actually undergone drug treatment and education while in
prison - does anything violent, it's back to prison.

Prop. 5 would expand drug treatment for nonviolent drug law offenders
and reduce the use of incarceration as a way to deal with addicts and
other drug users. people who use drugs. It builds on Prop. 36, which
voters passed in 2000 and which puts certain nonviolent drug users
into rehabilitation rather than jail or prison. Prop. 36 has saved
taxpayers about $2 billion and graduated 84,000 people with drug
problems from rehabilitation programs. It hasn't been perfect, but it
has been productive. Prop. 5 would build on that success.

Prop. 5 would increase the number of nonviolent drug offenders,
including vulnerable young people, who receive rehabilitation rather
than imprisonment. It would require prisons to offer drug
rehabilitation programs, which most do not do presently.

Over time, according to the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office,
it should save taxpayers a considerable amount of money. To be sure,
it will appropriate $460 million a year for rehabilitation programs.
But the LAO estimates that while the cumulative cost could reach $1
billion, it would at the same time save about $1 billion in prison and
parole expenses. Over time it should save us $2.5 billion or more in
capital costs for prison construction.

Prop. 5 also reduces possession of less than an ounce of marijuana
from a misdemeanor to an infraction (similar to a traffic ticket).
This will have little enforcement impact, since current law makes such
possession a misdemeanor punishable by with a $100 fine, which will
remain.

It is becoming increasingly clear that the expensive and
counterproductive "war on drugs" is not working. Drug addiction can be
tragic for individuals and their families. But most of the ancillary
damage to society - increased street crime, funding gang activity,
fundraising crimes like burglary, robbery and mugging - are caused by
the laws against drugs rather than the drugs themselves. Prop. 5 is a
modest step toward a more humane and productive approach to the
problem of drug use than the strictly punitive approach that has
failed so abysmally.

We recommend a YES vote on Prop. 5