Sheriff Copped Out, But the County Must Fund In Custody Drug Treatment Programs

by Norm Kent

This week the county meets with the public on its budget for next year.

Regrettably, the Sheriff has not included Diversion Treatment Programs in his funding request to the County Commission. Told to cut his budget, he eliminated those treatment programs which aid in reducing the jail cap, and which he operated more for that purpose than out of altruism. As a consequence, those in custody treatment programs defense attorneys use to mitigate sentences for their clients are in serious jeopardy.

Add to that treatment programs, such as BARC, Broward Alcohol Rehab, are losing counselors. The more counselors you lose, the less clients you can intake. The consequence: the more addicts you leave without help.

The burden for these initiatives should probably come from the County Commission’s resources because the citizens we are helping are members of our family, they are our friends, they are our neighbors. I dare say that there is not a single one of us, either on the commission, or in our courtrooms, that has not been adversely impacted by drug abuse.

I dare say the percentage of success is smaller than we all would like them to be. Not everyone gets better. But the Torah teaches us ‘that he who saves a life it is as if he has saved the world.’ If we spend money on curing people today, we may have less property crimes tomorrow. If we spend money on these programs today, we may reduce jail costs tomorrow. Partly, we fund these programs because we are selfish, because we want to be safer. Partly, we fund them because we aspire to do good, and we know that our inner nature dictates it is honorable to give people a second chance.

Ultimately, where or why the funding comes is not as important as that the funding comes.

I know the County Commission and I know that in their heart of hearts they want to fund these programs. I know that as a society we all want rehabilitation to flourish and recidivism to diminish. That requires a sound fiscal investment in successful programs, such as ATACC, where clients remain in custody and in treatment; where they have a clean environment and strong inducement to get better. Freedom is a heavy price to pay, but it steers people in the right direction. If only they take the wheel.

The real test for the addict comes not in the jail but out on the streets after the program is ended and the doors to the community are opened. We need to insure we have given them the tools to turn away from the streets and the easy high which leads to a disastrous road. But it is also up to the addict to do better so he can become a partner in our society, instead of an inmate in our jails.

When you raise a child, you have to put away money for his bar mitzvah or wedding but you have to save for the unforeseen illness like pneumonia, or cancer, which I and some of you have gone through. When you govern a county, you plan for our schools and our theaters and our highways, but you set aside funds for the hurricanes, the calamities, and the catastrophies.

The sheriff capitulated a bit, copped out if you will, by turning this task back to County Commissioners, but truly it was theirs to begin with. I am not sure I want the Sheriff really operating drug treatment programs anyway. His job is to insure decent housing, humane treatment, normal recreation, safe incarceration, and proper medical care. That's enough.

But when you plan and design a jail, you cannot just provide hot meals and steel cots. You must take into account those living with illness, AIDS, and diseases; you must realize that those locked up are going to have mental health issues and emotional problems; that they are going to be alcoholics and dependent on drugs. We have more than just a constitutional and legal duty to serve this community.

We have a moral obligation you cannot allow the limitation of finances to ignore. For a county to not fund a drug program in a jail is the legal and moral equivalent of bringing a patient in a gurney to the emergency room and not having oxygen or a physician to treat him. You might as well have left him in the street because you are sentencing him to certain death.

If this County Commission chooses to be remembered instead for life, it will re-fund these programs in the next budget.

Some Anecdotes on Sex Offender Registrations

Sex offenders will be at least temporarily barred from moving into a neighborhood that has become a haven amid growing living restrictions across South Florida. The county agreed to a 90 day abatement until they could create a task force for long term answers.

John Rodstrom proposed the measure, pointing out that an over concentration of sex offenders in one small community was not just scaring families, but driving property values down, inhibiting people from moving in and was just plain unfair to the community of Broadview Park.

Broadview Park is a small working class neighborhood no larger than a square mile, yet it's home to 5 percent of all sexual offenders in Broward. Under the temporary rules, sex offenders cannot move to a home within 2,500 feet of a school, day care center, park, bus stop or playground in any unincorporated area.

Broward County commissioners agreed to create a task force to look at long-term answers to issue of where sex offenders live. Commissioners Lois Wexler and Ilene Jacobs incisively pointed out that 'distance restrictions' create a false sense of security, because offenders on probation can still get in their cars and go to parks. It is not a real answer, and they were very sophisticated in their approach. They did not just parrot the popular pablum. Applause. The majority of speakers agreed, from sex offenders to sex therapists.

I spoke at the meeting because I don't want to pass laws which lead to us having people wind up sleeping under bridges like Miami. I don't think you can supervise an offender, who needs supervision, when they are living under an overpass. It is hard to have a gps hooked up to a light pole under a bridge.

Two other things come to mind. We should trust our judicial system. The offenders who are released are individuals who either finished their time, or a court and prosecutor agreed were legitimate candidates for probation. They are already inhibited by a vast body of supervisory regulations, from reporting to counseling to ankle bracelets to day monitoring to scarlet letter stamps on drivers' licenses. The penalties for sex offenders are the most severe in the state and yet you get all these studies showing that they could be your grandfather more than an unknown assailant.

So I was just thinking I would rather have state reporting requirements telling me where the known convicted crack addicts and burglars are that are living in my neighborhood. Those are the recidivists whose conduct places my property and home in jeopardy and safety in question. Those are the ones who affect not small populations but large groups and vast neighborhoods. Maybe we have done this ass backwards. Maybe instead of registering sex offenders we should have registered known burglars.

Just a thought.......................here are Michael Mayo's in the Sun Sentinel

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/columnists/sfl-sex-offenders-mayocol-b04190sbapr19,0,4324410.column

Courthouse Floods, Loses Power and More

The postcard view above is an aerial view showing both the Broward County Courthouse and the New River Canal. (Oh, but it is about a hundred years old.)

Todd Wright of the Herald says it best, tongue in cheek, in today's paper. Let's just go with his words.

"First, there were floods. Then came darkness.
Some are wondering if Broward County Courthouse officials should start preparing for an influx of locusts. Power outages plagued the courthouse Friday, delaying hearings and leaving some courtrooms and officials without lights for much of the morning. The outages came the day after a flood forced a judge from his chambers and delayed dozens of child-support hearings. It was the third flood in three months.
Friday's power outage was blamed on a severed electrical wire.
Parts of the seventh, eighth and ninth floors in the east wing -- the oldest part of the building -were without lights or electricity until about noon.Scores of people, including inmates, waited outside courtrooms as officials tried to figure out if court would be held.
Some judges were reassigned to other courtrooms, but ran into another problem. The outage affected the court administration office, which houses the computer system used for electronic court reporting throughout the courthouse."

This is not a joke. It is just the Twilight Zone here in Broward.

This is really happening almost weekly in one of Florida's largest communities.

This is really happening in the state where we launch rockets into space, the city where we send the world's largest cruise ships off to sail the Earth's vast oceans.

How is that committee 'to look at what the hell we should do' doing anyway?

I know the bond issue to build the new courthouse was voted down, but if it was a necessity to build it anyway, and the county commissioners knew then what we are seeing now, are they not directly responsible and personally accountable for malfeasance in doing so little for so long? I think so. Whose job was it? Theirs!

With the stimulus package in place, can someone see if there is a courthouse construction project stuck in there somewhere? If not, then let's just move the county commissioner's offices into the old wing of the courthouse for a month, and no special parking either. Make them wait on the same lines to get in that the public does.

How to 'Brew' an Unconstitutional Law

My friend Scott Wyman reports today that the Broward County Commission finally got around to an ordinance making it a crime for anyone not old enough to drink to patronize a bar or nightclub while alcohol is being served. The penalty would be 60 days in jail or a $500 fine.

It is a law that was pushed by the United Way, initiated last summer by the County’s Substance Abuse Commission, and one that no one really wanted to dare speak against. Let’s face it. If the law is you cannot drink until you are 21, why let anyone under 21 in a bar? And most of the drinking problems in the county are centrally focused in Fort Lauderdale, which has had this ordinance in place for 20 years. The city survived, even electing Jack Seiler last nite. Congratulations to a good man.

But wait, the law has exemptions if a) you are in the military, or b) you are with a parent, or c) if you work in the place, or c) if it is a restaurant that serves food and not just liquor. And that is when the constitutional rights experts wake up and say, wait a moment folks, what makes someone wearing a military uniform get a pass? What about a concert at the Bank Atlantic Center where Billy Joel performs and wine is served? Do we then say no one under 21 admitted?

What if I am 19 and an orphan, why does my buddy get to go in cause he has a dad? What is the rationally based restriction you are creating which treats me differently than the other guy? Why is someone similarly situated to me getting a right or privilege I am not entitled to?

This, ladies and gentlemen, for better or worse, is how law suits get created.