I support decriminalization of drugs but this is not how to do it. Oregon failed hard on this topic.
Oregon governor signs bill recriminalizing hard drugs, completing liberal experiment's U-turn
Submitted 7 months ago by wintermute_oregon@lemm.ee to conservative@lemm.ee
Bongo_Stryker@lemmy.ca 7 months ago
Portugal achieved a 75% reduction in drug deaths with decriminalization. So citizens in the great state of Oregon voted for decriminalization and diverting people from jail to treatment, and what happened?
Foot dragging happened. Money earmarked for new treatment services didn’t get used, nobody mentioned to police hey we’re doing this new thing, and people with addictions didn’t get directed to treatment.
So throw up your hands and forget it, let’s go back to the war on drugs because that was such a resounding success.
It’s concerning. When people vote for administrators and vote for policy, then those administrators are supposed to implement those policies instead of do nothing and then claim it doesn’t work.
wintermute_oregon@lemm.ee 7 months ago
The police were well aware. The issuer over 16,000 tickets. Only 200 called the number
Which town in Oregon do you live where the police were not informed? I know my police were informed. So what were your police doing different ?
Bongo_Stryker@lemmy.ca 7 months ago
Well I have been cautioned not to share any personal information on the interwebs including where I live, so I won’t comment on that.
I will say that there is least one town I have spent time in, near some mountains with trees where the police were informed but didn’t receive any additional training, nor did they seem to take the policy change seriously. Yes the wrote tickets and they also simply found something else to arrest people for. It seems not many people, of those who were in a position to effect real change, took the policy seriously. Unlike in Portugal where a more serious approach appears to have been more successful.