Crime - or the fear of crime - dominated California's politics for a quarter-century. Proposition 47, which would reduce punishment for some crimes, tests whether that era has passed. During its heyday, Republicans rode the crime issue hard and successfully, such as the 1982 election of Republican George Deukmejian, a death penalty champion, as governor. Democrats felt the backlash, such as Jerry Brown's failing bid for the Senate in 1982 and the ouster of Brown appointee Rose Bird and two other anti-death penalty state Supreme Court justices in 1986. [continues 363 words]
This is harvest time on California's scenic, sparsely populated North Coast - and that means the half-century-long war between marijuana growers and cops has resumed. Growers in the Emerald Triangle - southern Humboldt County, northern Mendocino County and southwestern Trinity County - are gathering, processing, packaging and shipping what's been dubbed "Humboldt Gold," highly potent, prized and profitable marijuana obtained from unpollinated female plants. This ritual has been annually repeated, to one extent or another, for a half-century, ever since counterculture types migrated into the region from the Bay Area. [continues 358 words]
Habitual use of marijuana may be a dumb thing to do, but really, is it any dumber, or more harmful, than abusing liquor or smoking cancer-causing cigarettes? The difference, of course, is that while possession of marijuana in small amounts is no more illegal than a traffic infraction, selling it can be a serious crime. And those who sell it and those who commit other crimes to buy it represent a significant portion of those locked in California's very overcrowded prisons. [continues 399 words]
California's bad habit of settling political conflicts with blockbuster ballot measures began in 1978 with Proposition 13, the property tax limitation whose effects continue to reverberate nearly three decades later. By 1988, a decade later, the syndrome was in full flower, with several dozen high-profile measures proposed. Not all qualified for the ballot, but tens of millions of dollars were spent - big money in those days - on the ones that did. They included five measures on insurance and personal-injury lawsuits and Proposition 98, the school finance measure that is the most powerful factor in the annual state budget wrangle. [continues 503 words]
When Arnold Schwarzenegger was an action-movie star contemplating a career in politics as governor of California, it probably didn't cross his mind that managing a crisis in the nation's largest and most troubled prison system would be a big part of the job. But there it is, a toxic stew of public perceptions, self-interested politics and ideological conflict that is just about to reach the boiling point. California has more than 170,000 inmates packed into prisons designed for little more than half that number, the prisons' health care system already has been taken over by a federal judge, the drug-rehabilitation program has been labeled an abject failure and judges seem to be vying with one another over who will be the first to seize control. [continues 499 words]
A two-part PBS documentary, broadcast last week, graphically demonstrated what anyone with common sense already knows: America's decades-long, multibillion-dollar "war on drugs" has been an abject failure. Not only have efforts to lock up drug users, intercept drug imports and catch dealers failed miserably but failure has had negative social consequences, including crimes that drug users commit to support their habits, violence involving those in the high-profit illicit drug trade, the corruptive effects on governments, and the waste of hundreds of billions of dollars in tax money. [continues 550 words]
ROBERT Presley, the highly respected former cop and state senator who heads the state's correctional agency, says that in just two years, "every nook and cranny" in the state's huge prison system will be filled with inmates. There are 160,000 inmates now, eight times the 1980 prison population, thanks to get-tough policies adopted by legislators and voters. And despite massive prison construction in the 1980s and early 1990s, all but a few inmates are doubled up in cells designed for one person or housed in gymnasiums and other temporary quarters. [continues 496 words]
IT'S too early, of course, to completely tally the winners and losers in a legislative session that's only half finished. Nevertheless, it's already certain that labor unions will count 1999 as a banner year in the Capitol. More specifically, public employee unions are racking up big gains, and those covering police officers and fire fighters may be the biggest winners. The latter have dual clout in the political arena, as unions and as representatives of two occupations that command high respect among voters. They have become two of the Capitol's most powerful special-interest groups by adeptly exploiting their public prestige. [continues 458 words]
SUE Reams was near tears as she told state legislators Tuesday how her son came to face life in state prison. Son Shane, she said, became involved in drugs and committed some residential robberies, including one of her own home. She turned him in to authorities. "We thought he would get some help," the Orange County woman said, "some drug rehabilitation." But Shane's drug involvement continued, and 10 years after his original offenses, he was nailed as the lookout in a drug sale to undercover cops. It was his third offense, and under the state's "Three Strikes, You're Out" law, Shane went to prison for 25 years to life. [continues 421 words]
Sacramento - Sue Reams was in near tears as she told state legislators Tuesday how her son came to face life in state prison. Son Shane, she said, became involved in drugs and committed some residential robberies, including one of her own home. She turned him in to authorities. "We though he would get some help," the Orange County woman said, "some drug rehabilitation." But Shane's drug involvement continued and 10 years after his original offenses, he was nailed as the lookout in a drug sale to undercover cops. [continues 493 words]
Gray Davis rolled out his first state budget last week, he took great pains to stress its fiscally conservative patina. Citing an economic slowdown that has depressed revenues from earlier projections, Davis said he was able to bring in-come and outgo into balance and provide "modest" amounts of new money for his priorities "by the exercise of prudent fiscal discipline." But governors always claim their budgets are tightly drawn. And despite the hoopla, the new budget was an insignificant event. A couple of decades ago, the budget that the governor presented each January was taken seriously. Since then, however, the budget process has changed markedly, moving in several somewhat contradictory directions. [continues 477 words]
The Legislature and governor are at loggerheads over how to house more prisoners in California. Sacramento-California voters have demanded-by passing the "three-strikes-and-you're-out" measure, for instance - that more felons be locked up for longer terms. But when it comes to building the prisons to house those felons, voters have been much less enthusiastic. They rejected the last state prison bond issue in 1990. Since then, new prisons have been constructed through a convoluted leasing arrangement in which a state agency issues "revenue bonds" to build prisons, then rents them to the Department of Corrections. [continues 511 words]
We have become accustomed - or perhaps inured -to government- sponsored exhortations for us to act in ways deemed socially responsible. We are berated to recycle our trash, use seat belts, stop smoking, be careful with fire, car pool, conserve water, abstain from liquor while driving and/or gestating, wear helmets while cycling with or without motors, obey speed limits and avoid unsafe sex. Government at all levels spends untold millions of dollars on these campaigns, often farming out the details of indoctrination to private public relations and advertising firms. Indeed, obtaining such contracts has become a lucrative business in Sacramento and other political capitals. [continues 510 words]
We have become accustomed -- or perhaps inured -- to government-sponsored exhortations for us to act in ways deemed socially responsible. We are berated to recycle our trash, use seat belts, stop smoking, be careful with fire, car pool, conserve water, abstain from liquor while driving and/or gestating, wear helmets while cycling with or without motors, obey speed limits and avoid unsafe sex. Government at all levels spends untold millions of dollars on these campaigns, often farming out the details of indoctrination to private public relations and advertising firms. Indeed, obtaining such contracts has become a lucrative business in Sacramento and other political capitals. [continues 508 words]
The eight Corcoran State Prison guards indicted on federal cruelty charges must, of course, be held personally responsible for their own actions, whatever they were. Such accountability is, after all, the philosophical core of the penal system itself. But the semi-official line from the state Department of Corrections and the Governor's Office -- that if there was wrongdoing, it was solely the misdeeds of rogue guards -- is not acceptable. There's something more fundamentally amiss with the department. As any business executive knows, one of the most perilous circumstances is unbridled, unmanaged growth, and the Department of Corrections has been, by a wide margin, the state government's fastest-growing segment. It has added dozens of new facilities, hired some 35,000 new employees, expanded its spending 10-fold and absorbed more than 130,000 new inmates since 1980. [continues 435 words]
THE eight Corcoran State Prison guards indicted last week on federal cruelty charges must, of course, be held personally responsible for their own actions, whatever they were. But the semi-official line from the state Department of Corrections and Gov. Pete Wilson's administration -- that if there was wrongdoing, it was solely the misdeeds of rogue guards -- is not acceptable. There's something more fundamentally amiss with the department. As any business executive knows, one of the most perilous circumstances is unbridled, unmanaged growth, and the Department of Corrections has been, by a wide margin, the state government's fastest-growing segment. It has added dozens of new facilities, hired some 35,000 new employees, expanded its spending 10-fold and absorbed more than 130,000 new inmates since 1980. [continues 410 words]
SACRAMENTO - Gov. Pete Wilson, accompanied by law enforcement and victims rights representatives, launched an advertising campaign Tuesday to warn Californians of a new law that will sharply toughen penalties for those who use guns in crimes. The program - television spots and printed notices to inmates, probationer and parolees - is dubbed "use a gun and you're done." Wilson said he wants to "put gun-wielding criminals in jail for a very long time." Few law-abiding Californians would argue the concept of hammering those who use guns in crimes. That's why lock-'em-up measures are so popular with politicians. [continues 475 words]
