Policy Center

Save the San Francisco Public Defender's Office

Few events better reflect the priorities of elected officials more vividly than a budget crisis.  It is during a budget crisis that policy-makers are forced to choose between the interests of powerful or popular constituencies and the needs of the less powerful and most vulnerable citizens.  Presently, this drama is being played out in San Francisco where social and legal services to the poor

Category: Public Policy

Prison Industry

I’m sure not too many people noticed but a brief news report from a newspaper in Chattanooga, Tennessee called attention once again to the perils of the privatization of prisons.  This story involves the settling of a lawsuit filed against Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), the leading private prison company in the world.

Category: Public Policy

The Return of the Chain Gang

In my previous blog I referenced a recent book by Douglas Blackmon on the subject of convict leasing.  One of the enduring offshoots of this system has been the “chain gang,” popularized by the film “Cool Hand Luke” (with Paul Newman, which carefully tried to make it seem as if it were mostly white) and memorialized in several books (e.g., “I am a Fugitive from a Georgia Chain Gang

Category: Public Policy

Race and the Drug War, Part II

After more than 20 years, even with the heightened awareness of the impact of the drug war on blacks and other minorities, Congress still does nothing.  The drug war’s impact has reached directly into minority neighborhoods with devastating results.  A recent book by Todd Clear documents the impact of mass incarceration (brought about mostly by the drug war) on these communities.  He shows

Category: Drug Policy

Race and the Drug War, Part I

The “war on drugs” must be seen as a concerted effort (whether this has been intended is irrelevant) to keep the black population in a secondary status.  Such an effort can be traced to the days of slavery and even for about 100 years after slavery officially ended, at least in the South (see Douglas Blackmon, Slavery by Another Name

Fix the Prisons? Part II

I stated in Part I of this blog that the prison system is “functional” in that it benefits some segments of the population.  One obvious segment it benefits is all of those who work inside.  Indeed, with $68 billion in annual expenditures on the American prison system plus strong unions in many states you have a very strong vested interest in keeping the prison a going concern (the “ref

Category: Drug Policy

Fix the Prisons? Part I

Senator Jim Webb, an outspoken critic of America’s prison system, has argued that we need to “fix our prisons” (Parade Magazine),

 

I would like to offer a different perspective and pose the following question: Do we really need to “fix” or “reform” the prison?

Category: Drug Policy

Locking Up Teenage Vandals in Texas

I came across this article in the Corpus Christi paper about two teenage taggers who were arrested for a "vandalism spree."  For these crimes they were placed in a juvenile hall for three weeks and then released on house arrest with electronic monitoring. This presents a good example of why the United States leads the world in youth and adult incarceration.

The Danger of Legalizing Marijuana without Comprehensive Reform

As strange as its sounds, American history repeatedly shows that legalization of certain drugs leads to expanded, not reduced, “wars on drugs”:

Category: Public Policy

Marijuana bill is wrong vehicle for legalization

At first glance, AB 390 by Assembly Member Tom Ammiano (D-San Francisco) to legalize the cultivation, sale, and use of marijuana under a regulation and taxation system similar to that applied to alcoholic beverages would seem to epitomize the sensible, humane policies for which he is known.

Category: Public Policy