Nearly 50,000 drug offenders are annually offered treatment in lieu of traditional sentencing as a result of California's voter-approved Substance Abuse and Crime Prevention Act (SACPA). The challenges SACPA currently faces and their potential solutions may be similar to those faced by diversion programs in other regions. Stakeholders responsible for SACPA implementation were surveyed about the impact of recent budget cuts and were asked for suggestions on how to improve SACPA. Budget cuts undermined portions of the law that stakeholders agreed with and stakeholders themselves sought to circumvent portions of the law that they disagreed with. However, two areas of broad stakeholder agreement emerged: 1) funding should be increased, and 2) the option of brief jail sanctions for noncompliant participants should be made available. To address current challenges, key stakeholder groups should collectively draft and propose a revised version of the law using these areas of agreement as a foundation.
There is an increasing demand on voluntary sector counselling agencies to evaluate the effectiveness of their work with clients. A pilot study was carried out in a voluntary sector counselling agency to assess the feasibility of adopting a well-established evaluation system (CORE) designed to measure client outcomes. The paper describes the issues and complexities involved in introducing such a system, and explores the impact of the evaluation on counsellors, staff and users of the service. It is suggested that evaluation can play an important role within voluntary organisations in enabling counsellors and staff to reflect on their work.
This article describes the findings of a recent national survey of 958 local (municipal and county) law enforcement agencies on the subject of higher education in US policing. It is the first national study in 30 years to examine the issue and in 40 years to examine higher education in small departments. Findings reveal that minimum education requirements to be hired, which are primarily dictated by state standards, have not changed significantly since 1988 but CEO education has changed and is highly important for agency policy and practice. Although a college degree is not usually required to be hired, it is usually required to promote to higher ranks. About half (51.5%) of sworn officers in the US who work for local agencies have a 2-year degree or higher, 28.6% have a 4-year degree or higher, and 5.4% have a graduate degree but this varies considerably by agency size, type, region, Chief/Sheriff education level, and union presence. Implications for improving education in policing are discussed.
Proposition 36 (aka SACPA) radically changed how the criminal justice system in California deals with drug offenders—from a crime control model to an addiction-treatment model. Although it was anticipated that the diversion-to-treatment law would have a significant impact on drug offenders, courts, and corrections in the state of California, it was not anticipated to have a noticeable effect on law enforcement. Contrary to expectations, the current study found very high levels of frustration among law enforcement officers. The frustration altered the way some officers exercised discretion and led many to actively circumvent the legislation. Specifically, officers reported that they now seek out additional charges to disqualify offenders from being diverted through Proposition 36, and they are less likely to arrest offenders for being under the influence. These results are consistent with findings from other street-level bureaucracy studies of police response to new policies and programs.
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