Vote NO on Oregon Ballot Measure 61
I am not opposed to getting tough on crime. There are too many criminals out there committing a wide variety of property crimes, drug crimes, and identity theft. We must do what we can to stop them.
For many reasons, I believe that Oregon Ballot Measure 61 is not the best way to accomplish these goals. We are presented with another in a series of laws that would drastically increase the penalties for certain crimes. The measure also offers no solution for rehabilitating these offenders. Finally, it restricts the ability of judges to design a sentence that is appropriate to the crime committed.
In implementing this process, we are committing a lot of taxpayer dollars to this solution. I do understand that any measure taken to combat crime will cost some money. I would just like to ensure that we have thought out the process before we spend this much money.
The length of sentences for crimes listed in Measure 61 will double in most cases. The sentence for most drug and theft crimes would be set at 36 months. The supporters of this measure say generally that increasing the length of th sentences will act to deter crime. I would just hope that the 36 month figure, and the other sentence lengths mentioned in the measure, are the amount of time that is required to properly rehabilitate the offenders who commit these crimes. Yet, the people who presented this bill to us offer no justification for the length of the sentense, other than it is sufficiently tough to “get the attention of potential criminals” and “will serve to deter crime.” If we are going to spend $164 million per year to implement this measure, I would like to see some justification as to how these times were chosen. Is it some ideal for the length of time necessary to properly rehabilitate an offender? Or is it a knee-jerk reaction to simply make the period of revenge we wish to take out on these offenders “a long time”? $164 million seems to be a lot of money to spend on revenge.
A second concern I have is that it restricts the ability of judges to set appropriate sentences for particular situations. Certainly not all crimes are the same. I would have no problem with having judges justify the length of the sentences that they impose. Perhaps they do need to implement longer sentences for certain crimes. But these judges are in the best position to see the particular needs of the criminal, of the victim, and of the details of the crime that took place.
It is overly simplistic to say that “you commit the crime, you get 3 years in jail.” Some offenders may benefit from a longer period of incarceration. some may be properly rehabilitated in a shorter period of time. In a few cases, the mandatory length of the sentence is inherently unfair, and does not match the severity of the crime.
I say we give judges back the power to actually judge the crimes committed. If we need to increase the range of the possible sentences given out, that may be an appropriate thing to do. Study the issue and determine the proper range of sentences. But we do not live in a “one size fits all” world, and we need a possible range of sentences. Not a particular figure.
We are determning a new length of time for the sentences. I have heard nothing so far that tells me what makes the new periods of time right, or what was wrong with the old periods of time. If judges are not sentencing to the right amounts of incarceration, we will need to do something about that. this measure does nothing to address that issue.
Also, we are dealing with drug criminals here. Drug use is generally considered to be a health issue. There is no disputing that most drug dealing is related to drug use on the part of the dealer. We can sentence this individual to any length of time behind bars. But until we commit to a plan to provide help to solve the addictions of the drug users and dealers, we are ot going to solve our problems. Alternatively, we are just keeping these offenders in an environment where they can hone their crime skills. That doesn’t seem like a very efficient use of our tax dollars, nor does it seem like a solution to our problems.
Are we really becoming so shallow that we believe we can solve all our problems by increasing sentences to ridiculous figures, then not allowing judges to tailor the sentence to the needs of rehabilitating the individual? Let’s allow judges to do their job to keep us safe. Let’s vote NO on Oregon Ballot Measure 61.
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