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California Proposition 36
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What Proponents Say
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"The measure, Proposition 36, would send as many as 37,000 Californians a year into drug treatment programs rather than jail. Roughly 2,500 of those would be in the San Francisco area, backers say."
(Alexis Chiu, Ed Pope, and Bill Romano, San Jose Mercury News 8/6/00)

"‘Drug addiction and drug abuse is a medical problem, not a criminal justice problem, and should be treated as such,' said (author Cliff) Gardner, a defense attorney who said he primarily handles death-penalty and other non-drug cases. ‘This initiative makes sure there's a range of treatments available, and you don't get it only if you happen to be able to afford the Betty Ford Clinic.'"
(Alexis Chiu, Ed Pope, and Bill Romano, San Jose Mercury News 8/6/00)

"That San Francisco has such a large presence in the push isn't surprising, said Dave Fratello, spokesman for the measure's sponsor, the Campaign for New Drug Policies. ‘Something has clicked for voters in the Bay Area,' Fratello said, citing focus group research. ‘They have seen enough of the war on drugs and have been talking a lot about alternatives.'"
(Alexis Chiu, Ed Pope, and Bill Romano, San Jose Mercury News 8/6/00)

What Opponents Say
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Opponents say Proposition 36 will wreck Drug Courts and will remove all incentives for addicts to recover.

"This isn't a debate over whether drug abusers should be given jail or treatment. It's a choice between treatment that works and treatment that doesn't," says actor Martin Sheen, whose son Charlie is recovering from drug addiction.

On September 17, 2000, the California Republican Party joined the California Democratic Party in opposing Proposition 36.

"With the California Republican Party and the Democratic Party both pledging not to support the initiative proves that Proposition 36 is a radical idea that is out of line with California," said California Assemblyman Jim Battin (R-La Quinta).  Proposition 36 is "dangerous and misleading," "will undermine legitimate drug treatment in California," and "will threaten public safety by effectively decriminalizing dangerous and highly addictive drugs like heroin, PCP, crack cocaine, and methamphetamine."

"Proposition 36 isn't about treatment, it's about trying to legalize hard drugs," said Barry Jantz, Chairman of the California Republican Party Initiatives Committee.  "California voters know a fraud when they see one, and this initiative is as dishonest as they come."
Californians United Against Drug Abuse Press Release 9/17/00.

Supporters of Prop 36 "don't see the downside of decriminalization because they look at their own middle-class lives and their own experience with drugs, and assume people in prison are just like them."
(Jim Gogek and Ed Gogek, The San Diego Union Tribune 8/10/00)

"'I've done research for the department for almost 10 years, and I don't come in contact with the casual drug user or the weekend drug user,' Jarman said. ‘From my corrections experience, I don't know what that is . . . We deal in severity here.'"
(Ernest Jarman, prison psychologist, Jim Gogek and Ed Gogek, The San Diego Union Tribune 8/10/00)

"Claude Meitzenheimer, who runs a treatment program at the Corcoran state prison, says the inmates he treats are society's heaviest drug abusers, round-the-clock junkies and tweakers whose drug use is so all-consuming it makes holding a job, being a parent or living a normal life utterly impossible. . .The middle-class casual drug experience might be smoking a joint before a Bruce Springsteen concert, then going back to work on Monday. The criminal addict drug experience is snorting crystal meth every day for three weeks, smoking pot and drinking a gallon of cheap wine each day to take the edge off, and in the meantime robbing a gas station, driving while extremely intoxicated and beating up his girlfriend. Eventually, the criminal addict gets arrested for one of these crimes, and drugs are found on him. When he goes before the judge, he often cops a plea down to the drug charge."
(Jim Gogek and Ed Gogek, The San Diego Union Tribune 8/10/00)

"While approximately one-third of state prison inmates are in for drug crimes, research shows that about 80 percent of all inmates have substance abuse problems. Addiction causes most crime, and that's all crime, not just drug crime. For example, most murders are committed under the influence of drugs or alcohol. The inmates locked up for violent crimes or property crimes are no different from those in for drug crimes. They're the same people with the same problems, they just happened to get caught for different things. Many convicts in for drug crimes were arrested for other crimes but then pleaded down to the drug crime."
(Jim Gogek and Ed Gogek, The San Diego Union Tribune 8/10/00)

"Criminal addicts need extensive, long-term treatment to become happy, productive and law-abiding. But they rarely seek treatment by themselves, and don't want it when it's offered. Almost everyone knows that denial is a symptom of addiction; prisons are full of addicts who deny they have a problem. If we set them free first and then offer treatment, most will refuse it. But by keeping our drug laws strict, providing enough drug treatment in prison and for parolees and probationers, we can coerce criminal addicts into finally getting the help they need."
(Jim Gogek and Ed Gogek, The San Diego Union Tribune 8/10/00)

My heart breaks for people addicted to drugs and for their families. Clearly, we need to do everything possible to help drug abusers recover from their addictions and get on with their lives. But Proposition 36 isn't the answer. Decriminalizing dangerous and addictive drugs like heroin, crack cocaine, PCP and methamphetamine won't help drug abusers. Nor will we help drug abusers by removing the two essential incentives for successful drug treatment: consequences and accountability. Yet this is what Proposition 36, which is on the November ballot, proposes."
(Actor Martin Sheen, The Los Angeles Times 8/7/00.  Mr. Sheen is spokesperson for Californians United Against Drug Abuse.)

"According to judges, prosecutors and probation officers who have reviewed Proposition 36, the initiative makes it nearly impossible for judges to impose any meaningful sanctions in cases where the abusers fail or refuse to take treatment seriously."
(Actor Martin Sheen, The Los Angeles Times 8/7/00)

"While claiming to be a treatment initiative, Proposition 36 fails to specify the standards of what constitutes a legitimate treatment program. This opens the door to ineffective programs run by unqualified operators."
(Actor Martin Sheen, The Los Angeles Times 8/7/00)

"The real damage done by Proposition 36 is the devastating impact it will have on California's increasingly popular drug courts, which are helping thousands of drug abusers break their addictions. Drug courts provide precisely what Proposition 36 fails to deliver: court-supervised treatment with regular drug testing and consequences that hold participants accountable if they fail to take treatment seriously. Drug courts have a remarkable 65% to 85% success rate, whereas the success rate for the treatment programs proposed by Proposition 36, in which testing and consequences are lacking, are typically less than half that."
(Actor Martin Sheen, The Los Angeles Times 8/7/00)

"Alameda County Deputy District Attorney Jeff Rubin. . .said he studied and now opposes Prop 36 as ‘the most devastating assault on our ability to prosecute crimes that has ever been foisted on the citizens of California. No one in Alameda County is going to state prison for first- or second-time drug possession – it just doesn't occur,' he said.
‘I would buy lunch for the first person to show me a dozen people who are in state prison for a first- or second-time possession case that wasn't pleaded down to from a sales case or that didn't have a strike prior.'"
(Alameda Times-Star 7/28/00)

"The initiative prohibits jail or prison for virtually any person convicted of using or possessing heroin, methamphetamines, PCP, crack cocaine, GHB, ‘date-rape' drugs, and other illegal substances, even abusers with a long history of drug dealing, parole violation or past felony offenses. Serial rapists, child molesters, and other sex offenders convicted of possessing ‘date-rape' drugs could escape a jail or prison term. They would instead be diverted into a drug ‘treatment' program, even though they are not using these drugs personally."
(Gary Armstrong, past president, California Narcotics Association, The Record [CA] 7/30/00)