DRUG COURT A REAL WIN-WIN PROPOSITION

Across the country, more than 1 in 100 adults are locked up in jails
or prisons.

It's a shocking statistic that one would assume will grow as
desperation and depression from millions of job layoffs take hold.

According to a study released in 2008 by the Pew Center on the
States, states spent nearly $50 billion on corrections in 2007,
nearly five times what they did two decades earlier. But the rate of
recidivism remained unchanged. About half of those inmates who were
released returned with fresh sentences within three years.

Pew found that in those 20 years, spending on corrections jumped 127
percent, when adjusted for inflation, while spending on higher
education rose 21 percent.

Even under sunnier economic skies, the comparison is hard to swallow,
and counties for some time have been trying to keep their jails from
being overcrowded.

It costs a lot to lock someone up.

McHenry County State's Attorney Lou Bianchi established a special
court for criminal defendants with mental illnesses, which after 18
months has yet to see a participant commit another crime, and he is
now turning his attention to drug abusers.

His hope is to at least lay the groundwork for a drug court in 2009,
if not get the program rolling.

We are big believers in drug court, where offenders agree to plead
guilty in exchange for a strict two-year regimen of treatment,
testing and evaluation - and stay out of jail. After all, what good
does it do to punish the drug abuser, when taxpayers will pay to
warehouse him time and again? When someone who goes to prison is just
as likely as not to offend again, why not treat the root problem instead?

Especially when it's much cheaper.

According to the Office of National Drug Control Policy, it costs
about $2,000 a year to put someone through drug court, while it runs
taxpayers about $23,812 a year to keep someone locked up.

In Kane County, where officials began a drug court in 2000, the
one-year recidivism rate for participants is about 15 percent. The
national rate for offenders who do not participate in a drug court is
about 45 percent, according to the Drug Court Clearinghouse and
Technical Assistance Project. For those in drug courts across the
country, the study found, the rate ranged from between 5 percent and
28 percent.

Kane County was a bit of a trailblazer locally in 2000 when it
created its drug court. DuPage and Lake counties followed suit.

Kane even started a mental health court of its own, graduating its
first participant a year ago.

In order to start a McHenry County drug court, the county likely will
need state lawmakers to authorize the addition of a judge to the 22nd
Judicial Circuit.

We feel that would be money well spent.

Today, with money even harder to find, it's even more critical to
jail those who need to be kept out of society and help those who don't.