California may take a big step backwards towards more incarceration with Proposition 36
The measure would defund prevention and reentry services, and is projected to grow the state prison population by 35% over the next 5 years.
by Sarah Staudt, October 17, 2024
This November, Californians will see an initiative on their ballots proposing a way to curb retail theft and drug use. In reality, this measure would undo a decade of progress towards unraveling mass incarceration without any public safety benefit. Bankrolled primarily by major retail brands like Walmart and Target, the ballot initiative known as Proposition 36 would cut millions of dollars from reentry and prevention services in favor of more prison sentences for theft and drug charges. It would punish people with substance use disorder who relapse, increase penalties for many people who use and sell drugs by increasing penalties and makes some small scale thefts eligible for felony charges. Overall, by 2029, Prop 36 is projected to fully undo hard fought progress made in reducing California’s prison population.
Prop 36 is part of a wave of recent measures across the country attempting to resurrect “tough-on-crime” policies. But this one is particularly concerning because it directly repeals decade-old reforms that have been proven to reduce both prison populations and recidivism. Californians who are interested in basing their criminal legal system policy on facts, not fear, should reject the measure — and other states should be on the lookout for similar efforts in their legislatures and on their ballots.
Prop 36 defunds critical prevention and reentry services
The text of Prop 36 doesn’t say it defunds prevention and reentry services, but that’s exactly what it does. In order to understand Prop 36, it’s important to examine another ballot initiative from a decade ago: Proposition 47 in 2014. Sixty percent of Californians voted for Prop 47 that year, a transformative initiative that reduced certain drug possession and theft crimes from felonies into misdemeanors. Lowering charges to misdemeanors decreases the long-term impact of criminal convictions on people’s housing and employment, and misdemeanors have shorter sentences than felonies. Changing these common low-level charges from felonies to misdemeanors dramatically lowered the prison population over time.
The most innovative part of Prop 47, however, was its re-investment provision. It required that the money saved by incarcerating fewer people be calculated by the state and then re-invested in a grant program for local reentry, diversion, substance and mental health treatment and crime prevention programs. So far, Prop 47 has saved the state almost a billion dollars, which has been funneled directly into local programs.
Now, Prop 36 will grow prison populations by reversing the sentencing policy changes of Prop 47. However, because Prop 36 has no funding stream of its own, it will cut into those same Prop 47 savings that fund essential local programs. This will leave local communities without the resources they need to reduce recidivism, house people, treat mental health and substance use disorders, and help people reenter society successfully after incarceration. In other words, it will stoke many of the problems that have fueled tough-on-crime narratives in the first place: fewer reentry programs mean higher recidivism rates, higher homelessness rates, and lower employment rates. Re-conviction rates for participants in Prop 47 reentry programs were 15.3% — 2-3 times lower than the average for people who have served prison sentences. The proportion of Prop 47 reentry participants who were homeless decreased by 60%, and the proportion of people who were unemployed dropped by 50%. These programs are demonstrably effective and essential public safety measures that address homelessness and poverty while reducing crime.
Prop 36 will directly harm Californians, especially those who use drugs
Prop 36 would raise the prison population by filling jails and prisons mostly with people charged with low-level theft and drug possession, while also draining resources from local community programs, and providing less effective treatment for people with substance use disorders and lengthening prison terms.
Draining resources: Prop 36’s proponents claim that they are promoting treatment for drug use even though the proposition drains funding from substance use programs. Instead of helping increase the availability of desperately-needed substance use disorder treatment, Prop 36 is an unfunded mandate, allowing prosecutors to seek “treatment mandated felonies” for people who are charged for a third time with drug possession without providing the funding to make that treatment possible. People who successfully complete these treatment mandates could have their charges dismissed, but people who do not successfully complete these programs would be convicted of a felony and potentially sentenced to prison or jail. And remember, Prop 36 does not do anything to fund these mandatory programs, so cash-strapped county governments will be left to pick up the slack.
Less effective treatment: One concerning feature of drug courts and similar mandatory treatment programs is that they put the rules and regulations of treatment programs in the hands of the courts, not medical professionals. People in community-based voluntary programs work with medical professionals who understand that relapse is part of recovery, while people in court-mandated programs may be labeled as a failure for one relapse and incarcerated. The proposition’s language allows courts and prosecutors to declare that the person has “failed” the program for incredibly broad reasons, including, “If at any time, it appears that the defendant is performing unsatisfactorily in the program, is not benefitting from treatment [or] is not amenable to treatment.”
Mandatory treatment programs are significantly less effective than voluntary treatment programs, and they have higher rates of relapse and overdose deaths. A recent review of 45 studies linking incarceration records with overdose deaths found that, in the first two weeks of release from mandatory treatment programs, opioid overdose deaths were 27 times higher than the general population. People in mandatory treatment programs often spend time in jail, either while awaiting evaluation or as a sanction for relapse and other violations. Even one day in jail can trigger a cascade of problems that are particularly acute for drug users — including heightened risk of death and suicide. Jail also disconnects them from effective treatment: only 24% of jails provide medication assisted treatment (considered the “gold standard” for opioid use disorder care).
Longer sentences: Prop 36 also increases penalties for many people who use and sell drugs by implementing sentencing enhancements for distribution and possession with intent to distribute fentanyl. The impact of expanding these excessively long sentencing enhancements to fentanyl could be disastrous, because fentanyl is so prevalent in the drug supply that most people who buy, use, and sell drugs do not know whether their drugs contain fentanyl. In one recent study, 83% of the study cohort tested positive for fentanyl — but only 18% reported that they intended to use fentanyl. This means that these sentencing enhancements will not just target the people putting fentanyl into the drug supply — they will target the majority of drug users. Prop 36 is likely to simply increase drug offense penalties across the board for Californians, rather than aiming policy at “the worst of the worst”.
Prop 36 would make California’s already-punitive theft laws harsher, locking up more people for low-level theft.
Prop 36 claims to be a response to rising retail theft, and two of the biggest donors supporting the initiative are Walmart and Target. Although retailers have worked hard to claim they are losing large amounts of money and goods from retail theft, it is far from clear that this is true.
What Prop 36 would actually do is make thefts of less than $950 dollars — with no minimum — a “strike” for the purposes of future felony charges. In other words, stealing a candy bar at some point would be enough to enhance someone’s later charge to a felony. Incarcerating more people for retail theft is likely to have notably disproportionate impacts, since people arrested for retail theft are disproportionately young and Black despite white people being more likely to engage in shoplifting. Turning more theft and drug charges into felonies instead of misdemeanors also specifically harms immigrant communities by making more people deportable for minor crimes — even people who are legally in the United States.
These changes aren’t necessary, even according to their own logic. California already has one of the lowest thresholds for felony theft in the nation, and just last month, Governor Gavin Newsom signed a series of “tough on crime” retail theft bills that allow businesses to aggregate the total amount stolen in multiple thefts to reach felony charging thresholds. Prop 36’s draconian punishment for a non-violent crime — crime that is driven most often by poverty and need — is neither needed nor helpful.
Conclusion
Prop 36 is not an isolated policy effort. It is part of a wave of measures across the country that are trying to resurrect “tough on crime” policies that claim to improve public safety or combat drug use or homelessness. But those approaches didn’t work in the past and won’t work now. What communities all over the United States need is more investment in communities, treatment, and reentry — the exact kind of investment that Prop 47 provides in California today, and the exact kind of investment that Prop 36 would undo. If you are interested in learning more about the efforts to defeat Prop 36, California United for a Responsible Budget has compiled a set of resources and ways to get involved. Californians — and people around the country — should reject punitive policies that will simply reboot mass incarceration instead of investing in proven solutions.
