Proposition 36 at Major Crossroads, Needs Your Help To Stay Alive

Proposition 36 at Major Crossroads, Needs Your Help To Stay Alive-California Only
Thursday, April 28, 2005

Cops are still actively trying to overturn your vote in the California legislature. Aided by a few drug court judges, prosecutors and narcotics officers are fighting to pass SB 803 (Ducheny) http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/bill/sen/sb_0801-0850/sb_803_bill_20050426_status.html, which will allow prosecutors to deny treatment to nonviolent possession offenders, and add more jail days for those who do get into Proposition 36's treatment instead of incarceration program.

We urgently need your help to stop these police efforts to gut Prop 36, an initiative that 61% of you voted into existence in 2000, declaring a new era of drug policy in the Golden State. Because of your endorsement of Prop 36, when nonviolent low-level drug offenders are arrested they are offered the option of drug treatment, rather than going to prison.

In the last two weeks, your letters helped advance SB 556 (Migden) http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/bill/sen/sb_0551-0600/sb_556_bill_20050427_status.html, a pro-Prop 36 bill that would target available Prop 36 funds to drug treatment, rather than allowing county governments to give the lion's share to probation and prosecutors. But now the will of California voters and the Prop 36 initiative are being seriously threatened by SB 803.

If you live in or near Los Angeles, Oakland, or San Jose, we need you to call your legislators and urge them to oppose Senator Ducheny's SB 803 - in the Senate Public Safety Committee Tuesday morning, May 3 - and to vote yes on SB 556! The difference could not only save lives but also taxpayer dollars.

If you live in the San Jose area please call Senator Elaine Alquist at (408) 286-8318.

If you live in the San Francisco, Oakland or Berkeley areas please call Senator Don Perata at (510) 286-1333.

If you live in the Los Angeles area, please call Senator Gil Cedillo at (213) 612-9566 and Senator Gloria Romero at (323) 881-0100.

Give them your name, and if they ask, your address and phone number. Describe the bill in your own words and explain why you oppose SB 803, a bill in Public Safety this Tuesday that would destroy Prop 36 and increase the number of persons incarcerated for nonviolent drug offenses. Senators need to know that you oppose adding jail time for those who turn in a positive drug test but are still in treatment, and that you oppose life sentences for those with long-past serious felonies who are then caught with a small amount of drugs for personal use!

Thank you so much for your continued support. Together we can fight to protect and strengthen Prop 36 by making sure legislators know that Californians believe in a drug policy based on reason, compassion and justice.