A sweeping new ballot initiative sponsored by the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA) Network would address criminal-justice costs and prison overcrowding in California by requiring greater investment in addiction treatment for youths and offenders, eliminating court involvement in minor marijuana cases, and shortening parole for most drug offenses and nonviolent property crimes.

The measure, the Nonviolent Offender Rehabilitation Act of 2008 (NORA), also would put more "teeth" in California's Proposition 36 by giving judges latitude to incarcerate offenders who don't comply with court-ordered treatment.

In a letter to supporters, DPA Network Executive Director Ethan Nadelmann called NORA "the biggest sentencing and prison reform in United States history" and an initiative that, if successful, could "transform the drug-policy reform landscape nationwide."

"We're doing what we know people [in California] support to reduce prison costs," said Margaret Dooley-Sammuli, the DPA Network's deputy state director for Southern California. "NORA uses treatment to address a problem that plays a huge role in prison overcrowding."

Al Senella, chief operating officer of Tarzana Treatment Centers and president of the California Association of Alcohol and Drug Program Executives (CAADPE), which has endorsed NORA, said that while the measure is not perfect -- he would have liked to have seen more funding for youth programs and for drug courts other than those designed for adult felons, for example -- "it does a lot to fix things that are broken here in California with how people with addictions and mental illness are treated."

"My support for NORA comes from six years of fighting to get the state of California to do the right thing with Proposition 36" -- which supporters say is chronically underfunded -- "and a lifetime of fighting the legislature to fund addiction services properly," said Senella.

NORA backers are currently gathering the approximately 435,000 petition signatures needed to get the measure on the November 2008 ballot in California. Dooley-Sammuli said that the DPA Alliance plans to gather "several hundred thousand more" signatures than needed to ensure that the measure qualifies for the ballot. Plans call for the petitions to be submitted to the California Secretary of State's office in the next few weeks. "We're confident that support for the measure is high," said Dooley-Sammuli.

$460 Million for Diversion and Treatment Programs

The bulk of funding required under NORA would go toward addiction treatment, including $385 million for diversion programs for adults and $65 million for youth drug treatment programs. The latter will "build a system of care for young people under the age of 18 where no system exists today," according to DPA; fines paid by young marijuana offenders also would be used to pay for youth treatment programs.

The adult diversion program proposed under NORA would have three tracks:

• Track I: treatment for nonviolent drug offenders, with criminal pleas held in abeyance during treatment.
  
  
• Track II: similar to the current Prop 36, provides treatment after conviction for those who fail at the lower track. Up to 24 months of treatment can be ordered, and offenders who violate probation can be subject to sanctions. Moreover, judges may sentence offenders who fail out of this track to county jail or refer them to drug court.
  
  
• Track III: drug court for adult felons, most enrolled at the discretion of judges. "High-cost" offenders with multiple, recent arrests would also be automatically enrolled in this track. NORA would roughly double funding for these types of drug courts.

Dooley-Sammuli said that the sentencing provisions included in NORA were a concession designed to address one of the main criticisms of Prop 36 -- that the treatment-over-incarceration system lacked meaningful penalties for offenders who failed to comply with court-ordered treatment. "There are conditions for jail sentences in NORA that don't exist in Prop 36, as an option after other sanctions are found not to have an effect," she said. "It gives judges that, if they feel it is needed to keep people in treatment."

"We continue to believe that jail sentences have no positive effects on outcomes," added Dooley-Sammuli, "but we hope it increases support for the program."

NORA carries a hefty price tag -- $150 million for the second half of FY2008-09, then $460 annually in 2009-10, which is more than $300 million more than the state now spends on Prop 36 programs. The program also is expected to increase spending for treatment of parolees and offenders still in prison, according to the California Legislative Analyst's Office (LAO). In total, NORA could cost California an extra $1 billion annually for treatment and rehabilitation, the LAO estimated.

That could be a hard sell in a tough economy, but Dooley-Sammuli insists that the measure is merely "asking voters to reallocate resources." She pointed to the LAO's finding that NORA also could save the state $1 billion annually in prison and parole operating costs and "could eventually result in one-time net state savings on capital outlay costs for new prison facilities that could exceed $2.5 billion."

Senella said that there is "certainly a concern that voters, given the economy, will not be convinced about the return on investment. But all of the polling indicates that the voters do understand the investment made by this."

In addition to CAADPE, the California Society of Addiction Medicine and the California Alcohol & Drug Program Administrators Council are among the other groups that have endorsed the NORA initiative. Dooley-Sammuli said there is "no organized opposition we know of yet," and said that the DPA Alliance consulted with stakeholders inside and outside of government while drafting the measure in order to build as broad a base of support as possible.

"In the eight years since Proposition 36 everybody has learned a lot," she said. "With NORA, we're not fighting about ideology: we're talking about policy implementation."