Waiting Lists For Drug Treatment

By TChris, Section Crime Policy
Posted on Sat Dec 09, 2006 at 06:50:53 PM EST
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The Drug Czar's web page trumpets the administration's commitment to effective drug treatment.

Director Walters has overseen the creation and implementation of the "Access to Recovery" treatment initiative announced by President Bush in his 2003 State of the Union address. This innovative approach to drug treatment funding provides vouchers for hundreds of thousands of Americans struggling with addiction.

The program doesn't seem to be helping Travis County, Texas, where probationers wait months to enter underfunded treatment programs.

"It's imperative to get them into treatment early," [pobation officer Julie Vasquez-Martinez] said. "It's imperative so they don't continue to make the wrong decisions. They need these tools and techniques to stay clean and sober." But department statistics show that hundreds of newly sentenced probationers in Travis County are waiting to get into court-ordered substance abuse treatment.
Judges send some offenders to county jails to wait for a treatment slot to open up, exacerbating the county's ongoing jail crowding problem. Others are released into the community to fight their addiction on their own.

Travis County has 118 probationers waiting to get into residential substance abuse facilities, including the county-run, 76-bed SMART program near the jail in Del Valle. About half of them are waiting in the Travis County Jail, which on Friday was more than 400 inmates over its designed capacity.

The county only receives a couple million dollars each year for drug treatment. Funding an expansion of those programs would mitigate overcrowding in the jail, but Travis County went the more expensive, short-sighted route.

Crowded jails led Travis County voters last year to approve spending $23.5 million for jail expansion; construction should begin next year.

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Waiting Lists For Drug Treatment | 10 comments (10 topical)

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Can also delay parole. (none / 0) (#1)
by JSN on Sat Dec 09, 2006 at 08:13:21 PM EST

if drug treatment is a condition for parole and there is a long waiting list to get into the drug treatment program parole can be significantly delayed.

An effective method for reducing recidivism is to have after prison drug treatment programs in the community. There are Federal funds available for such programs that require matching State funds. We had to fight off an attempt several years ago by the Republican leadership in the Iowa legislature to eliminate the State matching funds. An encouraging aspect of this fight was that lot of Republican members joined with the Democrats to restore the funds because they had heard from their constituents about how important the program was to their family members.

Another effective tactic is to do both substance abuse and mental health screening when the prisoners are admitted to prison. One of the problems with mental health screening is that there can be a false positive if there is also a substance abuse issue.

Be thankful (none / 0) (#2)
by scarshapedstar on Sat Dec 09, 2006 at 08:30:54 PM EST

This being Texas, I would have expected them to simply build more death chambers.

Catch-22 (none / 0) (#3)
by roxtar on Sun Dec 10, 2006 at 06:27:49 AM EST

In my county, the prosecutor has a veto over who gets into the drug treatment diversion program. If you get caught with dope, you get a chance to be a snitch. If you don't snitch, you don't get into a drug treatment diversion program. Rinse and repeat.

Texas is just about as red a state... (none / 0) (#4)
by Bill Arnett on Sun Dec 10, 2006 at 12:08:53 PM EST

...as a state can be, so it figures that the rethug power structure there would prefer to build more prisons than provide treatment to drug offenders.

The rethug party nowadays is much more into domination and depriving citizens of their rights than solving any of societies problems. Control, absolute control by the state of its citizens is paramount. Texas is one of the worst states of all.

I was down there for a year, 98-99, and they are so anti-drug there that it was a tooth-and nail fight every time I needed a refill on my morphine ("We don't do pain pills here" I believe was the exact quote). I finally had to threaten to get an attorney to fight for my right to needed medicine when they finally relented after speaking to the pain specialists in Martinez, CA.

I always figured that if I had that much trouble getting a lawful prescription I was coming back to California, which I did.

In other words, don't hold your breath waiting for any reasonableness from Texas Authorities.

Is tx public defender out there today? I'm sure he can confirm what I said here.

Statewide problem (none / 0) (#5)
by txpublicdefender on Sun Dec 10, 2006 at 03:52:38 PM EST

This problem is not limited to Travis County. There are a couple different kinds of long-term inpatient drug treatment programs for felons. Some are non-lockdown for nonviolent offenders only. Others are lockdown facilities that are actually a part of the prison system. The waiting list for both of these facilities in the state is long, with the wait for the lockdown facility usually being substantially longer. And, yes, you have to wait in jail until your treatment bed opens. Sadly, the longest wait is for men who are mentally ill and dealing with addiction or substance abuse. The non-lockdown facility will not take patients who are also mentally ill, so they must wait for the lockdown facility, and they must wait for a bed designated for a mentally ill individual. Some of these individuals end up waiting 4-6 months for a bed. I also had numerous clients who had been diagnosed as mentally ill and been taking psychiatric medications for years who, upon arrival at the drug treatment facility, were told that they didn't really need to be on medication. The medication was taken away from them, and then they ended up getting kicked out of the program for "behavioral problems."

So, yes, the system is a mess. They desperately need more treatment facilities. It is not easy to convince someone on probation that they should wait however many weeks or months for a treatment bed, then spend six months in treatment (for which they get no time credit if they are eventually revoked and sent to prison), when they could get their probation revoked and probably do less time overall.

this reminds me very much (none / 0) (#6)
by cpinva on Sun Dec 10, 2006 at 04:50:35 PM EST

of the vaunted school voucher program. big public announcements, then...........nothing.

it's as though qualified facilities are going to spring up overnite, like toadstools after a hard rain, just because you say so.

oddly (and not surprisingly) enough, it doesn't work that way, for schools or drug rehab programs. the devil's in the details.

in fairness to texas (i know, i know, who the hell needs to be fair to texas!), i suspect they aren't alone. were you to examine all 50 states, you'd probably find similar problems.

it's one thing to make big announcements, get your picture in the paper, etc. it's quite another, and much more difficult, job of actually putting it into practice.

on and on (none / 0) (#7)
by jimakaPPJ on Mon Dec 11, 2006 at 08:42:20 AM EST

I was watching Michael Crichton yesterday on C-Span2 and he asked an interesting question.

Where is the proof that any of these programs actually work??

Now squeaky, edger, et al, before you start screaming impeach Bush, remember that I have called for reform of our drug laws, up to and including just giving away MJ, coke, speed, etc. Just register yourself as an addict, and get what you want/need.

Makes as much sense as convicting someone for breaking the law, and then giving them what they want/need. Probably cheaper, too.

The problem with all of this, of course, is that once a program gets in place, no one every looks at the results, so it just goes on and on.

: There is nothing simple about (none / 0) (#8)
by JSN on Mon Dec 11, 2006 at 09:17:52 AM EST

drug and alcohol treatment and they both have high relapse rates.
This is why drug aftercare in the community is so important. In a residential treatment facility or a prison is is very difficult (but not impossible) to obtain drugs where in the community it is easy do get drugs and have a relapse.
When a person who has been treated for alcohol or drug abuse has a relapse it is devastating for the individual, their family and it gives the drug treatment program a bad reputation. A common reaction is that it is a waste of money and they should be eliminated. Places where drug programs have been eliminated quickly find their jails and prisons overflowing so they do make a difference but they don't work in all cases.

Proof (none / 0) (#9)
by jondee on Mon Dec 11, 2006 at 09:22:36 AM EST

You'll see it when you believe it. In the mean time, they'll just have to try and pry your Bush from your cold, dead, fingers.

The answer is, like everything else, sometimes the program "works", sometimes it dosnt. But, the object is really to attack the ceredibility of anything and anyone that could possibly reflect poorly on all-things-Red, so the original question winds up being rhetorical anyway.

Does sending them to jail longer work? (none / 0) (#10)
by peacrevol on Mon Dec 11, 2006 at 11:57:31 AM EST

Drug treatment facilities dont always work to help get people off of drugs, but their success rate, I would be willing to bet, is more effective than just sending them to jail. We need to have the means to provide what these people need (at least the non-violent offenders).