Officials spearheading Oregon drug recriminalization could learn a lot from Washington
Narrowly tailoring deflection offerings to just possession charges – not the low-level public disorder crimes that often accompany drug use – means counties “are going to miss 98% of what’s really bugging everyone,’ said Lisa Daugaard, a Seattle attorney and key architect of the LEAD model… “LEAD is intended to be a public safety, public order response,” said Tiarra Bryant, who helps cities and counties around the country stand up LEAD programs at a Seattle-based legal nonprofit. “We use human services, social services methods, harm reduction. But part of the framework is being very responsive to the public order and public safety concerns that people raise around public substance use, theft and disorder.”
Bryant, the nonprofit leader who has helped local officials around the country set up LEAD programs, says it sometimes feels like the model is a secret to Oregonians, too. Few officials in the state have inquired about LEAD as they prepare for Oregon’s new drug laws to take effect. “The people who are really causing public impact are committing crimes beyond drug possession,” said Daugaard, who in 2019 won a prestigious “genius grant” from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation for her work on LEAD. “Right now it’s drug possession, but three hours later it’s trespass. Three hours later it’s theft. Three hours later it’s harassment because they’re out of their minds and they’re saying really crazy things to people.” But the proposals coming out of Oregon aren’t surprising to Daugaard – especially because Oregon counties are being offered limited state funding and not much time to create these new systems. In more than a decade of preaching the benefits of LEAD, she’s seen plenty of local officials come up with their own ideas for steering drug users away from jail. Almost without fail, she says, they come around.
Original Article (Oregon Public Broadcasting):
Officials spearheading Oregon drug recriminalization could learn a lot from Washington
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