Governor Blanco is
reviewing SB 157 --She must hear from you if we are to save Treatment
for 3rd and 4th DWI offenders.
There is no reason for the Governor to sign
this bill, and every reason for her to Veto it. Governor
Blanco has said publicly she wants to review the SB 157 and the
related information prior to signing it. We can help provide her with
the information necessary to veto this anti-recovery legislation.
Please
write/call her and give her information necessary for a decision that
offers the greatest hope to all of Louisiana's residents, not just a
few politically connected and powerful individuals who simply want to
further punish everyone in our state by placing them at greater risk
when individuals go without the vital services that address the root
of their problem behaviors or sends them to prison for failure to do
so.
National Directives by both Highway
Safety and MADD National call for treatment mandates, Louisiana
officials are willing to disregard what works--mandating substance
abuse treatment for repeat offenders of our DWI laws. Louisiana has
to continue to make progress not go backwards, and SB 157 removes the
"shall" get treatment to a "may" get treatment.
The supporters of this bill know that means: those they
don't believe "worthy" of treatment for this illness will be denied
services and that is discriminatory and wrong. Shall also mandates
that the treatment beds be made available to those referred under
current law.
Many of you have written asking how a few politically driven, well
funded efforts could remove the treatment mandate proven to work,
asking how in the worked SB 157 was passed. We encourage you to share
this with our Governor, along witht he information she needs if she
were to VETO SB 157---She must hear from you if you Support
Treatment/Recovery!
Please ACT TO SAVE THE ONLY TREATMENT PROVISION IN DWI CURRENT
SENTENCING LAW ..........
Governor Blanco's Contact info: Telephone Number: 1-(866)
366-1121 ----E-Mail
http://www.gov.state.la.us/govemail.asp
via Fax (225) 342-7099 website:
http://www.gov.state.la.us/govemail.asp
Contact Governor Blanco Ask
her to VETO SB 157 to:
--Continue the proven
effectiveness of mandating (requiring) treatment for
3rd and 4th offenders--to save Treatment and
promote health and safety for all people.
--Validate our common goals to end
the harms and deaths related as a result of impaired driving (Most of
the deaths are of those actually impaired people most likely to need
help to stop their behaviors and prevent needless deaths
http://www.hopenetworks.org/DWI/Louisiana_Deaths_2003_DWI.htm )
--Support the health and
safety of all people in Louisiana by continuing the
progression our current law passed by Rep. Odinet in 2001, and proven
effective in finally removing impaired drivers off of the highways and
keeping them off if they fail to remain clean and sober by then
placing them in prison.
--Support the Treatment and
Recovery efforts of thousands in our state---it is working
and we must validate this life saving/cost saving effective
approach providing treatment provisions, these provisions can't be
removed without returning to the days of past, and continued systems
proven NOT TO WORK. Many of the repeat offenders we hear about today
have not been sentenced under Odinet's law, if they had they would be
either sober or in prison not on the roads.
--In June of 2005---EBR
one individual had just left prison for an 11 year DWI sentence,
only to get rearrested again shortly thereafter, he now is going
face up to 50 years for being an alcoholic that is simply wrong, not
to mention the cost of this failing of our sentencing laws, it is
expensive $35,000 to incarcerate vs. $3,500 to treat...we should
continue to try to rehabilitate individuals we know have problems
with alcohol/addiction earlier, not later, and support for what is
proven to work should be our priority over moral beliefs that
alcoholics are criminals rather than persons with a treatable
illness.
--Validate that we should not
support DWI sentencing guidelines are solely focused on punative
(punishment is the priority) approaches for sentencing, that
comprehensive solutions are proven to work. Currently courts have all
discretion, however no standard exists statewide for appropriate state
licensed substance abuse professionals to take part in an individuals
recovery process. In fact they play no role in clinical assessment,
brief interventions, and help for problem drinkers is in no a
way a priority in Louisiana sentencing laws, we want to
change this, and will try every year to do so until we find success,
but for now we must keep the sole provision in place that is indeed
working to reduce this costly problem.
--Not Broken --Current
Treatment and Recovery Mandate provisions work, and National
Advocacy groups have state directives for such mandates as part of a
comprehensive strategy to solve this problem.
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Supporters of this legislation falsely believe that Judges should have
more discretion in sentencing drivers convicted of drunken driving a
third or fourth time, lawmakers said Friday, reversing a statute
enacted five years ago mandating treatment over jail time (from Times
Picayune)
Data driven decisions are important to
save dollars and lives--more than 65% of those who have
gotten help since treatment was mandated in 2001 according to
Louisiana Office of Addictive Disorders (OAD) data, remain clean
and sober. Those who did not remain sober now are in prison
--so it is working.
There is no valid data
supporting a decision to sign SB 157
Unrealistic Claims by those Supporting
this Legislation:
Judges are not qualified to make
clinical/medical decisions as to the need for substance abuse
treatment for individuals, and should not be expected of them. The
mandate requires that the obvious need for help is not going to be
swept away(as we see done on 1st and 2nd offenses), reasoned away,
or denied do to moral beliefs about a persons behavior that are the
direct result of their illness going untreated.
*********************************************************************************************************************
The discretion shown for helping alcoholics and
addicts is often met with a lack of services (without the mandate)
or lack of clinical skill set by those in an overcrowded judicial
system.
Efforts to ensure that addicts/alcoholics get
help needed from state licensed professionals in the
treatment/recovery support field has been ignored, overcrowded
prisons, and a revolving door for "offenders" is obvious in our
state, studies by our Office for Addictive Disorders reflect that
77% of those incarcerated are there as a result of their substance
abuse issues. There are no statewide standards for treatment in our
prisons today.
We have seen our current law work to remove
impaired people off of the highway, requiring them to participate in
treatment/recovery programs and remain clean and sober or go to
prison and serve long harsh sentences, this is a start, in fixing
our entire system in need of total reform, and only when the
appropriate screening and assessments, intervention, referral
process is in place can we look at removing the sole treatment
mandate in our law, to do so now, is to ignore the facts and data of
successful outcomes meeting our common goals in removing impaired
people from the highway.
***************************************************************************************************************
National Directives by both Highway Safety and
MADD National call for treatment mandates. Louisiana has to
continue to make progress not go backwards, and SB 157 removes the
"shall" get treatment to a "may" get treatment. The authors of this
bill know that means those they don't believe "worthy" of treatment
for this illness will be denied services and that is discriminatory
and wrong. Further, it is important to realize that we are now
expanding our request to judges to do what they are unqualified to
do, to make decisions on who goes to treatment and who goes to jail.
Punitive only sentencing that saturates our
current DWI sentencing laws have been proven not to work, the deaths
and injuries continue and so do the fees/fines/gadgets, the one
missing critical element, appropriate efforts to find and treat
alcohol problems.
We do have mandates in sentencing across the
board for the punitive provisions, it is very odd that those
supporting this legislation oppose "mandates" but only for what is
needed and proven to work in addressing repeat offenders, they
fought for mandates that raise revenues and jailtime currently in
place but want the sole mandate for treatment removed.
On behalf of those who have taken time to carry a
voice to the legislature by showing up and working tirelessly to
educate lawmakers about the success of treatment and recovery
support we now ask you to help with our efforts to inform Governor
Blanco and encourage her Veto SB 157, and know that in our next
full session we will begin the process of bringing all people
together for real reform in our 2006 legislative session.
Links in support of DWI Recovery Provisions:
More information on SB 157
225-806-8552
Hope is passion for what is possible.
-- Soren Kierkegaard
