State Of Colorado - Changes In Drug Policies Needed

Over the past decade, the number of people sent to prison in Colorado for a drug offense has increased 476%, making drug offenders the fastest growing and largest category of felons in prison. Between fiscal years 1987 and 2001, the percentage of prisoners whose most serious offense is a non-violent drug charge quadrupled from 5% to 20%. 
Sources: Colorado Legislative Council. An Overview of the Adult Criminal Justice System. Research Pub No.452.9-10. Colorado Dept. of Corrections, Statistical Reports (FY 1989 through FY 2004).

As of June 30, 2004, there were 3,932 people in prison for a drug offense. This costs taxpayers over $106 million dollars per year. In 2001, the DOC profiled people in prison for a drug offense and reported that 50% were convicted of simple possession.
Sources: Colorado Department of Corrections. Statistical Report for Fiscal Year 2004 by Kristi Rosten (2005), 70.   Colorado Department of Corrections. 2001, "Profile of Drug Offenders in Colorado Department of Corrections."

Nationwide, the United States incarcerates more people for drug offenses (458, 131), than the European Union does for all offenses combined (356,626), even though the EU has 100 million more citizens than the U.S.
Source: Phillip Beatty, Barry Holman, and Vincent Schiraldi, Poor Prescription: The Costs of Imprisoning Drug Offenders in the United States, (Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice, 2000), 3.

In 1999, there were 16,761 adult drug arrests in Colorado. Eighty-eight percent of arrests were for drug possession - 50% for possession of marijuana, 22% for possession of cocaine, 11% for possession of other controlled substances. Only 11.5% of drug arrests were for drug distribution. The adult arrest rate for a drug crime increased from a rate of 222. 1 per 100,000 adult residents (in 1980) to 598.1 per 100,000 adult residents (in 1999).  Sources: Colorado Bureau of Investigation, 1999

According to the latest national survey of substance abuse patterns, Colorado has the fifth highest rate of drug dependency and abuse of the fifty states and the District of Columbia.  Colorado also has the sixth worst treatment gap (i.e., number of people in need of, but not receiving, treatment) of the fifty states and DC. With the current economic crisis in Colorado, the treatment gap will only widen.
Sources: U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, State Estimates of Substance Abuse from the 2000 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse, v. 1 (October 2002), 134-35;   National and State Estimates of the Drug Abuse Treatment Gap: 2000 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (July 2002), 20.

A 2001 study by the National Center for Alcohol and Substance Abuse found that Colorado has the lowest per capita spending on substance abuse prevention, treatment, and research out of the 46 reporting states. 
Source: Columbia University, National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse, Shoveling up: The Impact of Substance Abuse on State Budgets (2001), 25.

Substance abuse in Denver is considerably more severe than in the nation as a whole. A 2002 study of substance abuse patterns in Denver revealed that:
  1. Rates of binge drinking and chronic drinking are about 40% higher than national rates
  2. Denver residents are hospitalized for alcohol-related illnesses at nearly twice the national average. 
  3. Denver arrests and incarcerates drug offenders at more than twice the national rate.
   4. Substance abuse costs Denver residents, businesses and government at least $1.5 billion a year. 
Source: Drug Strategies, Denver: On the Horizon, Reducing Substance Abuse and Addiction (2002), 2.

According to the Department of Corrections, 90% of men and women in prison are in need of substance abuse treatment. Over two-thirds of them were assessed to be in moderately severe to severe need of substance abuse treatment. 
Source: Colorado Dept. of Corrections, Statistical Report for Fiscal Year 2004, by Kristi Rosten (2005), 47.

Treatment is effective.

In 1998, the Colorado Drug and Alcohol Abuse Division conducted a survey of people who had completed community-based substance abuse treatment programs. The findings showed:

  1. Within one year of completing treatment, 78% of ex-offenders reported no substance abuse.

  2. Of those ex-offenders who had been arrested prior to treatment, 80% had no re-arrests after treatment

  3. Unemployment among the patients surveyed dropped 41% after completion of treatment

Source: Colorado Dept. of Human Services,Alcohol and Drug Abuse Division, Problems in Colorado: Charecteristics & Trends.

Treatment is cost effective.

A 2001 report on Colorado substance abuse treatment found that community-based treatment ranges from $400 (for education-based programs) to $20,075 (residential therapeutic community) per patient per year --contrasted with $28,000 to incarcerate someone in prison.

Sources: Interagency Advisory Committee on Adult and Juvenile Correctional Treatment, Statewide Bulletin: Analysis of Offender Substance Abuse Treatment Needs and the Availability of Treatment Services (December 2001). Colorado Dept. of Human Services,Alcohol and Drug Abuse Division, The Costs and Effectiveness of Alcohol and Drug Abuse Programs in the State of Colorado, Report to the Colorado General Assembly (October, 2002).

Background on Drug Policy in Colorado

In 2000, Colorado voters approved Amendment 20, which authorizes the medical use of marijuana to alleviate certain debilitating medical conditions.

In 2002, the General Assembly passed House Bill 1404, which radically reformed asset forfeiture laws by requiring a criminal conviction prior to forfeiture and raising the burden of proof in civil forfeiture actions to clear and convincing evidence.

HB 1404 also ends the practice of law enforcement and district attorneys keeping proceeds from forfeiture--instead, after reimbursing victims and lienholders proceeds are split equally between substance abuse treatment and the local government for allocation for public safety.

In 2003, Senate Bill 3 18 became law, lowering felony classifications for possession of one gram or less of a controlled substance. SB 3 18 also provides that cost-savings from the prison system be allocated to expanding substance abuse treatment, however, to date, no additional funding for treatment has been allocated.

If this doesnt happen by 2009, the sentencing reform will be repealed.

Public Opinion

In 2001, CCJRC commissioned an opinion poll of Colorado voters attitudes toward drugs and drug policy. The poll revealed that Coloradans believe the war on drugs is a failure. Seventy-three percent of those polled want to see decreased penal-ties for drug possession in order to redirect funds to prevention, education and treatment. 

It is obvious that sweeping drug policy changes are desperately needed within Colorado immediately.  Despite the fact that it will meet with public opposition, it is necessary.  The focus of these changes should be on prevention, education and treament, instead of incarseration. 

Continued mass incarseration is only going to destroy the states economy and produce more addicts as the children of incarserated offends grow up and are caught in the grips of a system that let them down.

The current system is not working that is obvious from these alarming figures.

We need to demand changes be made and that they be made  immediately.  The current system is not working and the politicians know it.  They need to stop thinking about the next election and worry about the financial implications this is having on our beautiful state. 

At present, the costs of law enforcement efforts on arresting and insitutionalizing drug addicts is costing other areas of law enforcement that deal with true crime.  The true drug offenders are not being incarserated, but instead are free to continue profitting.  That is why the drug problem increases, as the supply of drugs is not being hindered. 

The current policies are not only using excessive funds which result in  only keep our state's prisons full, but are also going to have far reaching and long term effects on on our state's economy as more and more people are taken from the tax paying base of society and placed into the Colorado prison system.  Diverting funds from much needed and productive programs such as education.  

The effects of continued mass incarseration are going to be economically devestaing to our States economy, as well as our own personal financial well being. 

Thank you...

                Data obtained from CCJRC - Colorado Prison Facts 2006 -

                                   http://www.ccjrc.org/