Pubdate: Fri, 18 Mar 2011
Source: AlterNet (US Web)
Copyright: 2011 Independent Media Institute
Website: http://www.alternet.org/
Author: Anthony Papa
Note: Anthony Papa, author of 15 To Life: How I Painted My Way To 
Freedom, is a communications specialist for the Drug Policy Alliance.

NEW DIRECTIONS

Religious and Community Leaders Address the Failed Drug War

Conference Gathers This March to Chart a New Course in Drug Policy 
That Could Serve As a Model for the Nation.

On Saturday, March 19th, an unprecedented collection of community 
advocates, service providers, public safety personnel and public 
health professionals will come together at a day-long conference to 
chart a new course in drug policy that could serve as a model for the 
nation. The New Directions conference will examine the decades-old 
ramifications of President Nixon's declaration of the "war on drugs" 
in urban communities like Newark and African American communities in 
particular.

One of the unique themes of the conference will be how the war on 
drugs has increased prohibition-related violence, leading to declines 
in property values, the evaporation of local businesses, and an array 
of social ills in urban areas. Convened at Bethany Baptist Church, 
one of the oldest and largest African American churches in Newark, 
the conference will speak to the unique concerns and viewpoints of 
communities of color as they look for new ways to reduce the harms of 
drug use and drug prohibition. The conference will serve as a model 
for cities across the nation looking for new directions and 
strategies for ending the war on drugs.

Drug policy experts from across the country and around the globe will 
discuss topics including: reducing crime and incarceration, 
effectively addressing addiction, treating drug use as a health 
issue, communities of color and the war on drugs, and drug policy 
lessons and models from abroad. The keynote address will be given by 
Michelle Alexander, whose book, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration 
in the Age of Colorblindness, has sparked a national discussion about 
the drug war's disparate impact on communities of color.

When asked about the war on drugs on the campaign trail, President 
Barack Obama said, "I believe in shifting the paradigm, shifting the 
model, so that we focus more on a public health approach [to drugs]." 
Polls show the American people agree. President Obama's drug czar, 
Gil Kerlikowske, told the Wall Street Journal last year that he 
doesn't like the term "war on drugs" because "[w]e're not at war with 
people in this country." Yet for the tens of millions of Americans 
who have been arrested and incarcerated for a drug offense, U.S. drug 
policy is a war on them--and their families. What exactly is a public 
health approach to drugs? What might truly ending the war on drugs look like?

"We see the impact of the 'drug war' first hand, where so many people 
are incarcerated for being economically disadvantaged by the 
disappearance of work," says Bethany Baptist Church pastor, Reverend 
William Howard. "Afterwards, they are virtually permanently barred 
from the legal workforce for the rest of their lives. We must take 
our stand against the destructive scourge of drug abuse and 
trafficking by developing new, sensible strategies that solve more 
problems than they create."

The conference will be guided by four principles:

The war on drugs has failed and it is time for a new approach to drug policy.

Effective drug policy balances prevention, harm reduction, treatment 
and public safety.

Alcohol and other drug use is fundamentally a health issue and must 
be addressed as such.

Drug policies must be based on science, compassion, health and human rights.

Panel members and conference speakers include:

. Rev. Dr. M. William Howard, Jr., pastor, Bethany Baptist Church

. Ethan Nadelmann, executive director, Drug Policy Alliance

. Paula T. Dow, New Jersey Attorney General

. Garry F. McCarthy, police director, City of Newark

. Michelle Alexander, Esq., associate professor, Ohio State 
University's Moritz College of Law and the Kirwan Institute for the 
Study of Race and Ethnicity; Author, The New Jim Crow: Mass 
Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness

. Beny Primm, MD, executive director, Addiction, Research and 
Treatment Corporation, Brooklyn, New York

. Todd Clear, dean, School of Criminal Justice, Rutgers University

. Donald MacPherson, former drug policy coordinator, City of Vancouver

. Alex Stevens, professor of Criminal Justice, School of Social 
Policy, Sociology and Social Research, University of Kent, Chatham, UK

. Stephanie Bush-Baskette, Esq., Author and Director of the Joseph C. 
Cornwall Center for Metropolitan Studies at Rutgers University

. Deborah Peterson Small, Founder and Executive Director, Break the 
Chains: Communities of Color & the War on Drugs

For a full list of panel members, go to: 
http://www.drugpolicy.org/docUploads/DPA_New_Directions_NJ_final_prog_REFERENCE.pdf

The Drug Policy Alliance is co-hosting the 2011 New Directions 
conference with the Bethany Baptist Church. For more information on 
the conference visit: http://www.bethany-newark.org/
- ---
MAP posted-by: Richard Lake