Pubdate: Wed, 21 Jan 2009
Source: Seattle Weekly (WA)
Copyright: 2009 Seattle Weekly
Contact:  http://www.seattleweekly.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/410
Author: Nina Shapiro
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/prison.htm (Incarceration)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/rehab.htm (Treatment)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?159 (Drug Courts)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)

OUR FAILING ECONOMY'S A BOON TO DRUG-LAW REFORMERS

Gregoire's Crafting A Bill, As Part Of Her Sweeping Cost-Cutting 
Plan, That Would Further Reduce Drug Sentences.

It took two years of political warfare before the state Legislature 
managed to pass a bill in 2002 that reduced prison sentences for drug 
offenders by as much as two-thirds, and offered treatment instead of 
incarceration in some cases. The fight drew media attention as 
conservative legislators dug in their heels. "I'm not willing to go 
there," Sen. Pam Roach (R-Auburn) was quoted as saying in The Seattle Times.

What a difference a collapsing economy makes.

As the legislative session got underway last week, Gov. Christine 
Gregoire began crafting a bill that would further reduce drug 
sentences as part of her sweeping cost-cutting plan. Sentences would 
be cut by 25 percent for virtually all drug crimes, says John Lane, 
the Governor's public safety policy advisor. Only the most serious, 
"Level III" offenses (such as involving a minor in drug-dealing) 
would be untouched. In fiscal 2008, just 95 of nearly 8,000 drug 
offenses were Level III, according to state figures. Gregoire isn't 
motivated by a desire to reform our drug laws, says Lane, but rather 
by sheer economics.

So far, the media's barely taken notice of the proposal, lost as it 
is among all the drastic cuts in the Governor's budget. Nor has there 
been an outcry in the Legislature, although Sen. Mike Carrell 
(R-Lakewood) says he'll take a close look at it. Roach declined to be 
interviewed on the subject, saying through an aide that she's working 
on other things.

Law enforcement groups aren't fighting the move either. "We would 
just as soon not see these cuts," says Don Pierce, executive director 
of the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs. "But we 
understand that given the current crisis, this is the best place to make them."

While liberal groups have fought for years for more lenient drug 
policies, our state's financial woes are helping accomplish what 
their arguments alone could not. This is true at the county level as 
well. Faced with a $5 million budget cut to his office, King County 
Prosecutor Dan Satterberg in October started kicking felony cases 
involving less than three grams of narcotics down to District Court, 
where they are prosecuted as misdemeanors. He says the move affects 
two-thirds of his caseload.

Meanwhile, the King County jail is already nearly full, and the 
county has said it will no longer have room for misdemeanor prisoners 
from the cities as of 2012. So Seattle and several suburban cities 
have started planning to build a new multimillion-dollar jail of their own.

"That process got people thinking: How big does this new facility 
really need to be?" says council member Tim Burgess. The city has 
already reduced its jail population by 40 percent in the past 10 
years through various alternatives to incarceration, like electronic 
monitoring, and through Community Court, which channels low-level 
offenders into social service programs rather than jail. Burgess says 
council members started asking whether the jail population could be 
further reduced using more of the same strategies.

Next month, a Council-convened advisory group will begin considering 
alternatives to incarceration for drug offenders. Among the 
participants: Satterberg, Seattle Police Department Chief Gil 
Kerlikowske, City Attorney Tom Carr, The Defender Association's Lisa 
Daugaard, and State Rep. Roger Goodman (D-Kirkland). "People who 
don't normally think of themselves as having much in common are 
really starting to come together," Daugaard says.

Goodman, for instance, has worked for many years on a project of the 
King County Bar that advocates drug legalization. That's not a 
position favored by law enforcement.

Still, even the police have put new energy into searching for 
alternatives to arrest and prosecution.

"There's been a sea change in attitude," says council member Nick Licata.

Capt. Mike Meehan, head of the SPD's narcotics section, calls it more 
of an "evolution."

In the next few months, Meehan says, the department plans to launch a 
pilot project modeled on a program in High Point, North Carolina. 
Police there bring young people who could be arrested on drug charges 
into their precincts. "In one room, all the evidence of the case is 
presented," Meehan says. A person is told: "We can arrest you--but we 
don't want to do that." Then that person is led to another room, 
where police have assembled family, friends, teachers, and community 
members. Police present a choice: get arrested or straighten up with 
the help of those in the room. Many choose option B, according to 
Meehan and studies of the program.

This is among the kind of programs that the city might expand, 
according to Burgess. One move that is not on the table, however, is 
de facto legalization of hard drugs, along the lines of a 2003 
initiative that made marijuana possession the lowest priority of the 
Seattle police. "If we start talking in those terms," says Burgess, a 
former cop, "it is going to push the buttons of some people and will 
really derail the effort."

City Attorney Carr's buttons are already slightly indented. "Don't 
you think we should be driven by best practices and science and not 
what it costs to build a new jail?" he asks. Like many in law 
enforcement, he argues that without arrest and jail hanging over 
people's heads, they don't have the incentive to change their lives. 
And cops might lose their incentive to arrest people if they know 
that it doesn't lead to meaningful jail time. He didn't know enough 
about the Governor's plans to comment on them.

Carr declares himself a big believer in treatment for drug users—once 
they've been arrested. He has been trying to establish something akin 
to the county's Drug Court on a municipal level. He says he would 
call it "Treatment Court" and expand it to alcoholics as well as drug 
users. "The problem is the beds," he says. There aren't enough at 
existing treatment facilities, and the city doesn't have funds to pay 
for new ones.

That situation is not going to be helped by Gregoire's budget, which 
cuts $2 million for treatment services offered through drug courts 
around the state. In King County, fewer people will have access to 
the services that remain because most will go through District Court 
rather than Drug Court. "My regret is that I don't have the resources 
to offer those people treatment," Satterberg says.

As regards liberalizing drug laws in favor of health care rather than 
punishment, we seem to be moving both one step closer and one step further away.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom